The writer at PCWorld was asked to take a look at a computer that was running sluggishly and experiencing odd behavior. He discovered two things-that its anti-virus program was out of date and Windows Updates had been turned off. The result? A severe malware infestation:

I got the machine patched and updated and ran an AV scan right after disconnecting it from the Internet. Thirty-two viruses came up in the form of Trojans, Rootkits and Spyware. After rebooting, the same pop ups and slow behavior continued. I ran the scan again, and only six incidents of malware showed up. Cleaned those and ran antispyware and picked up a few more. Even initiated a boot-time scan the next go around and picked up even more!

It seems that every time he rebooted the system new malware infestations showed up! Apparently some malware has become so smart that when its deleted it simply reinstalls itself automatically. Scary stuff. The writer eventually had to reinstall Windows XP to get rid of the bad stuff once and for all.

What makes this story even more troublesome is that the computer in question was part of a SOHO network. Many types of malware are network aware and eagerly spread to other computers it finds networked to the one it initially infects. This can wreak real havoc for business and organizations. The moral of the story?

Never let your anti-virus get out of date, and never completely turn off Windows Updates.

The wait is over; Microsoft has some news for all of you out there that are participating in the Windows 7 beta. Starting February 24th, Microsoft will start rolling out a series of updates for the fledgling operating system that do…absolutely nothing. You heard me correctly, these will be updates that do not add any new features or fixes to Windows 7, but simply test its ability to handle updates.