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sf.me > Definitions > Malicious Software [malware]

Malicious Software [malware]

Categories: Software

Malware is used to describe any type of malicious software that is designed to exploit, harm or take control of a device or a network. It is of many types:

• Viruses
  • spreads between devices and causes damage
• Spyware
  • collects information about user and sends to attacker
• Worms
  • can propagate or self-replicate without human interaction
• Trojan Horse
  • disguises itself as a standard program to take control of device
• Ransomware
  • encrypts your data and blackmails you, asking you to pay in cryptocurrency (mostly)
• Rootkit
  • collection of malware used by cybercriminals to exploit and gain control of a computer or network
• Backdoor
  • malware backdoors (not non-malware backdoors) allow remote control of a website or computer

To stay safe from malware, you should get a good anti-malware. ClamAV is one of the few open-source anti-malware software. It is available on Linux, MacOS and of course, Windows. I believe that your anti-malware should be free software as it is an application that scans all files on your PC and checks them against a database.

As for smartphones, Android has many options. One of them is the free and open-source app Hypatia, which is available on F-Droid. It has 7 different lists that will be scanned for viruses. On the other hand, iOS does not have any open-source anti-malware or antivirus applications. It does have closed-source ones, but they are not super good. You have to rely on iOS' security.