What Is A Worm Virus?

Computer worms are the most common type of virus infecting computers today. Worm is a computer program that replicates itself and is self-propagating. Worms, as opposed to viruses, are meant to spawn in network environments.

Computer worms spread across networks using email, Internet chat, peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing networks and other methods. The names they are given are usually derived from some text within the worm program code, or within the message the worm sends.

Examples of computer worms include: Bagle, Blaster, Mimail, MyDoom, Netsky, Sasser, Sircam, Sober and Sobig. Sometimes a worm may be given different names by different anti virus companies.

Using the Internet, worms can spread so rapidly that they may often go undetected by anti virus software because the updates that would enable the software to detect the worm have not yet been developed or downloaded.

Unlike most viruses, worms do not usually modify or "infect" existing files on a computer. They are usually self-contained files, often dropped into system folders such as the Windows folder. Therefore, removing a worm from a computer should simply be a matter of identifying and deleting the files it installed, and the registry links that may be pointing to them.

The safest and most effective way to remove the virus from a computer that has been infected by a worm is to use a dedicated anti virus removal tool. These tools are provided, free of charge, by several of the anti virus software developers.