Viruses and Spyware now have the added danger of being assisted by a rootkit installed on the infected machine. What does this all mean to the average computer user? Well the bottom line is that Anti Virus or Anti Spyware may not remove viruses or spyware because of a rootkit.
Is a rootkit a virus or a spyware? No but they are malicious code that’s enter so deep into the operating system that they can become a part of the operating system. That is why it’s such a problem for Anti Virus etc. Rootkit Remover
There are many types of rootkits but the two main types are Kernel-Mode and User-Mode. Kernel-Mode is the scary one because it’s so deep into the systems priority files that it’s difficult to interpret them as anything but the operating system files. User-Mode rootkits are not as powerful as Kernel-Mode but none the less are difficult to weed out by Antivirus.
How do they come to be? One reason was that legitimate companies e.g. Sony created there own rootkits to manage there digital music downloads etc. (DRM). Digital Rights Management is to stop specific music files from being shared so these companies had to manipulate the operating system to do this and it was done covertly.
Of course they did not think to realize that this would be used by virus and spyware developers and now the rest is history. Rootkits are technically a legitimate concept and to be fair to companies that did use them first, it would have just been a matter of time before the baddies understood rootkits; but they definitely did not need a helping hand.
How do you remove them? The first line of defence is to understand that if you have a good Anti Virus and you don’t have a rootkit then it’s highly unlikely you will get one as they are difficult to get onto a system with good protection. If you have good protection and your not sure if you have one or not, then there are specific free tools that you can use to give you more protection. More on Rootkit Remover
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