Crimeware and backup

A couple of recent articles on itBusiness.ca got me thinking.

The first article described the Campi trojan, which has been around since 2007, but is still stumping researchers despite controlling about one million PC’s. It’s main purpose is to steal passwords and other info for a “list of about 4500 financial sites” that it monitors.

The second article discussed the difference between viruses and malware from 5 or 10 years ago and the typical malware found today. In years gone by, malware was advertising, or a joke, rarely serious. Today, malware is crimeware, written for the single purpose of stealing money.

The article goes on to describe the only appropriate response to serious crimeware. Erase your computer and restore from a backup. You do backup up, of course.

My thinking while I read these articles was along these lines. Most backups are file based. Yes, by all means, save your budget and cash flow spreadsheets. Of course you want to keep personell files. Those pictures of the kids (or grandkids) are important, and hey, MP3’s qualify too.

But when you restore a computer, you’re replacing all the programs and configuration data as well. What you really need is a complete image of the computer’s hard drive. Back that information up, even once or twice a year, and you’ll save hours, or days, of re-installing and re-configuring and even then never having the system exactly the same as it was.

So, back up your files, please! And don’t overlook imaging your system, at least once. It’s easy, it should be automated, and lot’s of services out there can do it for you. Certainly IronOak can.

After all, what have you got to lose?