I simply can’t resist starting this with the obvious ‘there’s a giant wooden horse parked in your driveway’. Okay, now that I’ve got that out of my system, let’s see what you might have on yours.

There is nothing more frustrating than a computer that is either painfully slow in completing the simplest of tasks or constantly locking up, or even completely shutting down, when you’re in the middle of trying to get something done. If you are experiencing these symptoms, guess what, you may have a trojan.

Trojans are malware programs, think of them kind of like computer parasites, that are installed on your computer any number of ways. They are often the result of downloading files from P2P sources or other sources that may not be the most trustworthy sources of files. Like the warriors they are named after trojans come disguised as non-malicious files and then, once successfully inside the walls of your secure system, they unpack all kind of devious little devils ready to wreak havoc that can range from fairly harmless tracking files to very dangerous tools employed to capture sensitive information or distribute viruses and other malicious software to others you share files with.

Here are ten of the most common signs you have a trojan on your computer. If you are experiencing any of the symptoms below, and especially if you are experiencing a number of them, make sure to use a spyware cleaner or other program to find the responsible files and clean them off your system.

1. You are getting a lot of unusual error messages.

2. Your computer sometimes shuts down unexpectedly.

3. Your computer becomes sluggish and/or unresponsive.

4. There are programs you are not familiar with running on your system.

5. You find files on your computer that you didn’t upload or install.

6. Your mouse pointer sometimes disappears or seems to have a will of its own.

7. You are using a lot more internet bandwith than you would expect to.

8. Your email client starts auto sending messages to those in your contact list.

9. Your wallpaper or other system themes or settings change without your input.

10. You start seeing a lot of windows message boxes and pop-ups appearing on the screen.

If these problems are ones you are experiencing don’t worry. There are many free softwares out there that will do an excellent job in cleaning the malicious files from your computer and helping to ensure you stay trojan free from now on. Just do an internet search for malware or spyware programs and read a few reviews to find the ones that are right for you.

Now that you have your system cleaned up you are ready to finally finish that project you were working on. Well, after you finish downloading all those files you’ve been wanting, that is.

Thanks for all the support and please Learn IT, Teach IT, Share IT…

Your Online Security Authority

Bill Wardell

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Written by: OSAblogger / Bill Wardell - Please Read Our Latest OSA eZine Edition

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