HOW TO FIGHT ROOTKIT?
Security professionals and enthusiasts are familiar with rootkits, but the general public is unaware of this type of malware which is mostly designed to hide in an infected system. But this threat is worth being known to the public because there is a good chance of meeting it one day. Cyber criminals are constantly developing new methods to steal your data and they are actively selling these methods to others.
Their ability to be able to hide allows malware to remain in their victims' systems for months and even years, allowing hackers to use computers to do whatever they want. Even if the computer does not contain valuable information (which is unlikely), it can still be used to generate electronic money ("bitcoins"), send spam and participate in DDoS attacks. The rootkit functionality allows malicious activity to be hidden not only from monitoring tools built into the operating system, but also from virus scanners and firewall. That is why we advise you to check if your antivirus software has anti-rootkit functionality and also to check its effectiveness.What makes a rootkit invisible?
It's not that complicated to
explain: the malware tries to embed its code deep enough into the structure of
the operating system so that it can intercept all standard read file requests,
get the list of running processes use, etc. The rootkit analyzes such requests
and removes all mentions of files, processes and other traces related to its
activity. Other techniques are also used - the rootkit can, for example, inject
code into a legitimate process and use that to do its dirty work. This allows
the rootkit to go undetected by antivirus solutions. The less advanced ones
that work on OS requests located at higher levels and do not try to go deeper,
to the kernel and deepest structures of the operating system. If the antivirus succeeded in
detecting the rootkit, the virus might try to disable protection and remove
critical antivirus components. One of the more advanced rootkits had even
developed bait technology - it had created a special file for them to be
detected by the antivirus. As soon as the antivirus accessed this file, the
rootkit tried to disable it and block its next execution.
How do you prevent all of this?
First, to detect any suspicious
activity, the antivirus should monitor system files located at lower levels, in
order to detect malware that tries to modify the structures of the hard drive.
In addition, it is possible to find new rootkits, still unknown to antivirus,
by comparing computer activity as recorded at the operating system level with
the results of low-level monitoring. Second, having sufficient virus protection
is essential, so that malware cannot disable your product. And finally, the
antivirus should remove 100% of the rootkit components, even those injected
into critical operating system files.
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