A computer virus can be defined as a program which has the ability to make copies of it and thus, spread inside a computer and also from one computer to another. Just like real life viruses, many of the computer viruses leaves harmful effects on the computer. One such category of virus is a worm. Therefore one has to keep a check on stuffs attached and networks connected using one’s computer. Although an antivirus has been used to keep a machine intact, but the way viruses are updated from time to time, it is almost impossible to stay in a peaceful mind. We always have to keep worrying about viruses and how to get rid of them. Thus, a sound knowledge about different viruses is important.

Blaster worm and its effects

A worm is that category of a virus which is counted as a malware and makes use of a network for copying itself to other nodes.  Many worms have no intension of affecting the system. However, a few like the Morris worm are highly dangerous.  A blaster worm is generally found on machines running on MS-operating system. These are good at making copies of themselves and spreading them to different areas using networks. These are also called lovesan or MSblast. This worm was first released in August 2003 and its working features where noticed. Afterwards the pace of its spreading increased highly. The blaster worm is believed to be created by a Chinese Xfocus which is a cracking collective. It attacked the original Microsoft patch. This worm was engineered in such a way that it exploited the buffer overflow for its replication and spreading activities. The program started a SYN flow and led to a DDOS (Distributed denial of service attacks). However there was not much effect on Microsoft as its target area was windowsupdate.com. If windowsupdate.microsoft.com would have been attacked, there would have been severe harm.  This worm highly spreads on Windows XP running on 32-bit. It has also been observed to affect Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows Server system. It sometimes leads to system shutdown displaying a message like “The system is shutting down” and “please save all the work in progress”. It has various side effects like windows shutdown and display of various messages during start-up. Therefore a computer has to be kept well protected from worms and removal of worms is also very important.

Protection against and removal of blaster worm

Worms exploits the vulnerable sections of the operating system and spreads using them. We need to put up security updates to keep a machine intact from blaster worms. Users should be aware and check emails before opening and scan attachments for the presence of viruses. However the blaster worm undertakes various techniques and it is nearly impossible to detect it at times. To completely remove this worm from the machine, Microsoft patch is to be installed in the system. User then need to run Blaster.worm removal tool or manually delete it from the machine. Blaster worm is highly contagious so, one needs to consistently check for it and clean the computer from time to time.