Lots of virus- and trojan-creators have become quite shifty and sneaky: they are naming their malware after genuine, important software already on our computers. For example, do you have lsass.exe or Isass.exe in your process files list? It’s very difficult to see the difference between the two, but one is a virus and one is not. I used to scour my process list to check for scoundrels (in the Task Manager and also in msconfig), but these days, who knows what is what?

I have used quite a few online process libraries, some good and user-friendly, and some not. Here;s a good one: ProcessLibrary.com. There’s a searchable database AND it also has some good educational articles to help you understand your computer files a little better.

AND it has a free downloadable scanner, see here. This program will scan all your process files and tell you what’s running. Cool! Once you have a clean, trojan-free computer, you order those nice Votive candle holders online without the threat of hackers or spyware.

Tags: processes, scan, trojans, virus