The world of antivirus is almost as wide as that of viruses themselves, so it is best to have antivirus software on your computer to make periodic reviews and detect if something is wrong. But what dangers do we face if we don’t have any installed? We tell you the main problems of not having an antivirus installed on your PC.
Having an antivirus installed on our PC is essential but we already warned you that they are not entirely perfect. Sometimes they do not allow us to install according to which programs because they consider them a threat and this is sometimes a bit annoying. Some antivirus extensions can also cause problems in the browsers, but, without a doubt, having an antivirus installed on our PC brings more benefits than disadvantages.
Why have an antivirus
Having antivirus software on our PC is essential to keep all our confidential information safe as well as our files. Today we are exposed to a multitude of risks without leaving the sofa, just by connecting to the Internet. Infinity of services require our most intimate data such as the numbers of our credit card or our bank account.
Trusting the website we visit or the emails of a person we do not know about anything can lead us to make a serious mistake. But not only the Internet is the means of diffusion. A friend gives you a pendrive with the photos of the weekend. You do not know that your computer is infected and the virus can infect your computer, even if it is not connected to the Internet.
Spyware, the ally of hackers
In the world of viruses, one of the most prevalent are the so-called Spyware. They settle on our computer like a tick. They are camouflaged in attachments, internet downloads, USB sticks of dubious origin, etc. and collect all possible data from our PC to send it to remote servers where hackers save and analyze all the information.
With this type of software, they will not only try to attack us individually, but they also try to find out patterns of use by many users of certain programs or functions of the operating system, in order to search, find and exploit a vulnerability not yet covered.
Confidential data disclosure
One of the biggest fears we can have is that they access our most intimate data, such as security passwords of our bank, card numbers, account numbers or even our social networks.
On the Internet, available to digital thieves, there is a wide range of tools available to get hold of our most confidential data. Most likely, they will try to monitor your activity in order to install you remotely and without you noticing, a keylogger, which will send them all the information you type. That is, from the name of the website through the user, to the password.
Loss of performance on the PC
One of the most noticeable effects on our computer is the loss of performance. When we notice that it is slow in certain tasks, even after turning it on, that Internet browsing is somewhat deficient, etc. It is when we must be alert, since it is most likely that our computer is infected.
The slowness is mainly due to the fact that these malicious programs are working in the background, without our knowing it, except for the slowness and, many times, they cause an overload in the system processes, since in addition to what you do, the virus must do its own job.
Modified software inadvertently
The greatest danger and the easiest way to infect our PC is when we blindly trust a web page, a file, an email … This is where it is easier to deceive ourselves. Because we lower our guard, we think that we are downloading a program from its official website or that we are going to open a photo with a meme and that’s it. But no. Behind a simple JPG file, a photo of a family meal can hide malicious software.
The extension of the files may lead us to think that it is only a photograph or a text document, but it is not. We will open the file, we will not notice that there is a virus behind it and after closing the photo, we have not found out anything, but the virus has already been installed.
Phishing with the appearance of a bank
Antiviruses have evolved a lot and are capable of detecting, in addition to files, certain fraudulent websites or emails, with the appearance of a bank or social network, in which, in a suspicious way and frequently with spelling mistakes, they ask us for our data . From the outset, this should cause us to activate the alarms, but in case we don’t realize it, an antivirus software can also be alert for good, block this type of unsafe websites or dubious emails or alert us to open our eyes.
If you already have an antivirus installed on your computer, it is important that you always keep it updated, since not having the updates up to date will be as if you did not have any antivirus installed. If, on the contrary, you still do not have an antivirus for your computer and you do not want to expose yourself to all the problems that not having it can cause, it is best that you start looking for the one that best suits your needs taking into account the system operating system you work with and the hardware configuration of your equipment.
