I wrote awhile back about having a virus attack my computer and I have found out more about how and where I found it. My computer guy told me that he was going to let me use a computer that I could not hurt, slide out "c" drive, and then he told me to look at the sites that I normally go to. I went to the normal ones like Dpreview, Nikonian, Steve Huff, Thom Hogan and others. All I picked up were tracking cookies. Then I went to the Google Homepage, and clicked on images. I looked for 2010 carolina renaissance festival and several hundred shots came up. I looked at the one that I had found before and nothing happened, but then I clicked on another similar photo, and again I got hit with a different virus than what I had before. I started searching and when ever I found a file with grun.lu below it, bingo, another virus. I sent an email to Google this morning, but I checked just a while ago, and they hadn't fixed the problem. I am having to rebuild my workstation. I have all of my programs that I will reload, and I have multi levels of back up, including an archival file that isn't connected to my system, but I am not sure of my two other externals that were connected to the system. I am not sure just how much work I have lost, but I had shots from 50 years ago on my site. My most important work is on Photoshelter, so I could download that if I need to and I had backed up the first of last month. I am thinking about keeping my 8gb cards just like you would store a roll of film. Cost has dropped so much, that you wouldn't be out that much cash. Images for books, magazines and calendars | photosbypike
One of the reasons that I only use Mac and Linux computers is the ever-present virus problem... I do help out family and friends with their Windows machines, and rarely come across one that's virus and Trojan free. Mind you, they only ever call me when their machines are pretty much kaput. Interesting idea you made about using SD cards for archiving - it's worth thinking about.
If you keep your virus definitions up-to-date and active, and use a good anti-virus program (NOT Norton or MacAfee), you should be OK. They'll warn you of files you download that have viruses.
I've had more viruses on my PC while using Norton and McAfee than at any other time. They simply don't do a good job at stopping much of anything, and give you a false sense of security. At least that's been my experience. Since I moved first to Kaperski, then to AVG I haven't had one virus on my PC. All of them have been found and defeated at the point of entry. Keeping the virus definitions up-to-date regularly is something I do weekly.
