Is This Safe?

Say you have a virus on your computer. You don't know what kind of virus it is, but it's on your computer nonetheless.

Is it generally safe to log on to your website accounts (like here on w7forums, Facebook, Yahoo, etc.) or is this not recommended? I'm not necessarily concerned with only getting those accounts hijacked, but I would be concerned if the accounts also got "infected" (I know that may sound silly, but I'm not much of a computer virus expert) or if my login info somehow got tracked and it enabled someone else to log in to my accounts in the future.

Google'd, but didn't find my desired answers.

If you have ANY virus on your computer it's not safe to go to web with it. It be going to the web without you knowing since there is a virus on it.

Is your computer infected with one? Are you running an AV program at all?

Why the question? With a virus you never know quite what's going on with it and what its doing, unless you know the name of the virus then do a search for what it entails.

Well is there a known virus out there that people can get randomly, that does any of the stuff I mentioned in the first post? I'm simply asking because I have an old computer in my house which, I can't format since its disc drive doesn't work, and I can't really tell if it has a virus on it or not. I mean, I did run a full AVG scan and it said it found nothing, but when I ran LavaSoft's Ad-Aware I think it said it found one little thing...so...that's why I'm asking.

There are lots of viruses that users may be infected with, trojans and malware too.

You state the hard drive doesn't work, yet you claim you scanned it with AVG. How are you able to scan a supposed non-functioning hard drive? If you can scan the hard drive, then it's functioning fine and you should be able to format it also.

LavaSoft's AdAware will usually pickup things most AV programs don't, such as "ad cookies". That's the most common. AV programs ignore most "ad cookies" because they're basically benign.

If your computer is infected with a real virus (not ad or tracking cookies), it's NOT safe to be online, period. Not only would you be placing your own security in jeopardy, and risking your data and personal info, but like walking in public with a flu, you'd be infecting others also. That's not cool, dude.

I have a stepson who does this very thing, he frequents chat rooms, social sites, and refuses to run an AV, period. And yes, his computer is highly infected, so much that when my spouse and I had our own house, he got (ISP) service through Time Warner, and he was actually asked to disconnect his computer from the modem. He was infecting the neighbors computers, and it was traced to him (I suppose his IP address).

So it's not simply a matter of your safety & security, it's for the good of everyone to have an AV of your choosing installed, regularly updated, and scan regularly, once weekly is OK. Also, having a second "on demand" scanner such as Malwarebytes, or using the ESET Online Scanner, at least once monthly, is a good thing to do. These products can be found in the Free Software Database, on the home page of this forum.

Cat

I said disk drive. Disk drive =/= hard drive. Hard drive is C: and disk drive is usually D:.

Before I respond, I just want you to know the computer in question has been scanned with malwarebytes, AVG, and Super Anti-spyware. Some of these caught things others didn't (Super Anti caught like 250 infected objects not detected by malwarebytes...wtf?) but the computer is good for the most part.

But just for curiosity purposes, I was asking if an online account can get infected, like can a virus enter an account (like my account here on w7forums) and infect it that way.

And I apologize in advance if that's a silly question.

It would be my guess that websites (such as forums) has ways to keep viruses off of their sites, I've never caught one from here.

But again, I suppose that any online account can become infected, if the site owner(s) doesn't take security precautions.

It would be more likely to spread viruses through the email sites, Peer to Peer sites, and as I described above, a neighboring computer could be seriously infected enough to spread it as though it were a flu.

That's why having and maintaining a AV/IS suite is a good thing for everyone to do. There's no 100% way to know what is or not infected, all we can do is use common sense, and protect ourselves to the best of our ability.

Not having any AV at all is equal to screwing a prostitute with no protection, you're taking that chance by not protecting your self. That's all we can do, is protect ourselves.

Cat

"It would be my guess...one from here."

Yeah, I kinda was thinking the same thing recently. Things like Xbox Live and Playstation Network for example I'm sure have their own security systems and AV for those servers.

"But...precautions."

Agreed.

"It would...were a flu."

I agree viruses can spread easily that way. Sometimes I even think those "people" you're talking to are not even real people and are just virus-spamming bots and it's kinda obvious when what you're talking to isn't human. At one point during the 1 or 2 minute conversation you will ask a question just to see if there's a person on the other end, like "how old are you?", and you get a response of "hey cutie, wanna chat?!", then just to confirm it even further your next statement will be, "just so I know that you're real...tell me what my username is" and you get a response like "I live Colorado and I'm legal!", LOL.

"That's why...ability."

Yup.

"Not...ourselves."

LOL @ screwing a prostitute with no protection. Awesome analogy and you should get rep for it.

Sorry for the lazy quoting...lazy MJOLNIR is lazy.

What's the consensus regarding whether or not an online account can get infected? I would think a virus needs a hard drive to live on, i.e. attach itself too, but for all I know, they can infect the cyberspace as well.

For instance, let's say I had to do a course assignment and the only way I can do it is through logging in my course's website. All it is, is filling out blank areas with your answers then clicking some buttons to submit the homework, but the only computer I can do this through is a computer with a virus on it (that unfortunately doesn't have a good AV). If I log on to my course website, is there any risk of my account on that site getting infected? I hope this is making sense.

What do you think cyberspace is?
Viruses have to come from somewhere, if they are not transferred locally then they are stored on servers somewhere waiting for you to find them.