Computer Bots, The Good And The Bad

Internet robots are known by a variety of names including spiders, crawlers, web robots, or just bots.  They’re commonly used for repetitive work such as search engine indexing because they can perform these simple tasks more quickly than a human. However, they can also be put to nefarious use in the form of malware. Bad bots are capable of gaining complete control of your computer.

We’re going to take a look at the good bots, the bad bots, how to protect yourself from the bad bots, and how to know if your computer has been infected.

Good Bots

The good bots are those that wander around the web (i.e. web crawlers) gathering information for search engines or assisting us with chat messages. 

Bad Bots

The bad bots find a host, attack it, and then link back to a central server. An entire network of computers that have been compromised in this manner is referred to as a “botnet”.  Malware bots can cause all sorts of trouble. They steal passwords, log keystrokes, launch denial of service attacks (DDoS), and make off with your financial information. Unfortunately, they aren’t that easy to detect.

How does a computer get infected with a bot?

If someone sends you an email or a message on social media that encourages you to click on a video, be very careful. This is a common malware delivery method. A little common sense goes a long way here.  If it looks or feels suspicious, the best thing to do is delete it.

You also want to watch out for “frightening” messages urging you to click on a link in order to avoid infecting your computer.  Clicking on those links is a surefire way to get infected.

Signs your computer might be infected by bots

This isn’t a comprehensive list. However, these are some of the more common ways malware bots present themselves:

• Your computer suddenly starts crashing without an obvious cause
• Your internet is slow without an obvious cause
• The programs you’re running seem extremely sluggish
• You’re not using your computer but the fan suddenly starts whirring away
• Your computer isn’t shutting down correctly
• Your computer is taking a long time to shut down
• You’re seeing pop-up ads even though you don’t have a browser open
• Your contacts are getting email messages that you didn’t send
• You find that certain settings have changed on their own and you are unable to change them back

How to keep your computer safe from bots

It’s not that difficult to keep your computer bot-free. The fact that you’ve read this far means that you know more than most people about malicious bots. Here are a few more tips that will help keep you safe online:

• Make sure that all your software is up-to-date.
• Make sure your operating system is up-to-date.
• Don’t reuse passwords. I have an article on how to create a strong password.
• Use a long, complex password that contains a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols.
• If you know that a computer is infected do not insert a flash drive into it.
• Use firewalls.