Online Threats: Trojan Horses

"They (hackers) don't care what kind of business you are, they just want to use your computer."

Floyd Short, Assistant U.S Attorney in Seattle

Trojans attacks are popular all around the globe and affects mostly the business sectors. For most of the cases, it is due to users' carelessness about security aspects that allow Trojan horses to invade their PC systems. In the business sector, those that are deeply affected are those companies that are handling the financial-related online transactions...from here, we can see that the malicious hackers had displayed their clear intentions - to rob you of your credit...(>_<)

A Trojan Horse is a program disguise as part of a legitimate program that runs hidden on an infected PC. Using a "Trojaned" computer, hackers can read a user's personal documents, delete stuffs from their PC or display messages on their screens. Hackers rely on a Trojan's abilities to run the simplest of covert channels in order to transfer information from users' computer directly to theirs. With a trojan-infected pc, as soon as a user's PC go online, hackers can have immediate access to their systems.

Like viruses, there are different types of Trojan Horses. Here are the categorical list of Trojan Horses:

1. Remote Access Trojans
2. Data-Sending Trojans
3. Destructive Trojans
4. Denial-of-Services (DOS) attack Trojans
5. Proxy Trojans
6. FTP Trojans
7. Security Software Disabling Trojans
   

At this stage, you don't need to understand all of the different types of Trojans in detail, but some things are for certain: Trojans exist for a certain amount of purpose. Generally, we can say that Trojans are all used for collecting and sending data of a system back to the hackers. Information extracted include your personal info, your current location and secret documents. Moreover, hackers can also have the option of using your computers to do their dirty work, such as hacking a bank account while concealing their identity through using your PC.

Here is something most users will ask: How does a Trojan Horse enter my PC?

Trojan Horse are deceptive, aiming of convincing you/your computer to obtain them via anything you think legitimate, such as your e-mail attachments, freewares, fake programs, instant messenging applications and software bugs through your browsers and operating systems. The usual way of detecting whether a system is being infected by an active Trojan is simply see the behavior of the computer. There are several indications, but nearly all records abnormal behaviors such as a user's taskbar keeps flashing or disappearing, the CTRL+ALT+DELETE function disappeared etc.

Illustration of how a Trojan Horse Infects your PC through a modified MP3

I have some examples of Trojan programs but i will not disclose the name, nor tell you on how to create and use it due to legal purpose and my own personal convictions towards ethical computering. However, i will give you examples of anti-Trojan software on which you can use to check your systems for Trojan infections. Note that most antivirus software programs now include anti-Trojan protections, so use the software examples i gave you only as a sidekick to your current antivirus protection.

1. BillP Studios' WinPatrol (for monitoring your PC only!)
2. Spybot Search & Destroy
3. Trend Micro HijackThis (pretty outdated but moderately nice in detection)
4. SUPERAnti Spyware Free edition (paid upgrade available)
5. Spyware Terminator (with ClamAV antivirus & real-time protection)
6. Lavasoft Ad-Aware 2008 (paid upgrade available)


All of the above software are free for use. If you think that your computer merits a paid-for protection, here are some software which you can pay for and (in my opinion) are effective:

1. CA Antispyware eTrust PestPatrol (it is very good but take note that it conflicts with both Norton & Kaspersky software!)
2. Ashampoo Antispyware v2
3. NETGATE SpyEmergency 2008
4. SpyHunter Security Suite
5. Moosoft's Cleaner


Do not be fooled by the label "antispyware" though. Even though their respective companies name them as antispywares, they are still capable of detecting Trojans!;-)