Another way that a virus would get in your computer is if you download a game from an untrusted site (usually an site you CAN trust is one that is made by a known company, a friend's site, or a site that you've been visiting for a long time and are personally confident in). This game or program or whatever CAN actully be the game you're expecting, but there is also a little bug hiding inside of it. That's right, the virus basicly is latched onto another program and is then run once you run the game. This same rule applies with sound files, movies, and even budy icons. Don't accept buddy icons from someone who randomly IMs you. Wait for about the 3rd time they SEND YOU an IM, then it may be pretty safe to accept it, cause hacker's like a quick and easy kill.

Once the virus has made its way into your computer, it can do anyhting. Some connect themselves to your little computer clock and wait for a year to start running. Some attatch themselves to a vital windows program. They can do anything. A trojan program is probably the most imfameous type of virus. Like the fameous battle where the Trojans built their wooden horse and came in to the enemy base disguised, this program is disguised as another program, probably has a very large or small size (so it doesnt look like a virus) and then, once it is in your computer, opens up and does its malicious deeds. Most of the time, this is the kind of virus you would get. another type would be a worm. This is a virus that can be activated just by opening an email. Once it's in your computer, it is passed on to anyone elses's computer that is in your address book. That's one of the reason why i try to memorize addresses instead of keeping that list. These are the types of viruses that spread the fastest.

Prevention
Take just a few easy steps to keep your computer virus free. Firstly, don't open any suspicios e-mail. If you don't know who the sender was, don't open it. If you get an e-mail from your best friend saying "pics of me naked!" don't open it. Next, don't download from suspicious sites. Only truseted ones that i discussed in the first section. It's OK to accept IMs from strangers, but don't accept an icon and don't directly connect. YOu can put them on your buddy list, but let them be the ones to IM you. If they do, they probably aren't a virus spreader. Hackers like quick victims usually. If someone IMs you and says that they are one of your frineds, but just has a new SN, ask a personal question. Ask what color hair ou have. This may not ensure that it is the exact person he/she claims they are, but it will most likely ensure that it is not a complete stranger. THen you can go on to asking more specific questions if you still don't believe them.
To end the story that i started at the beginning of this page, I found that I did not have the SubSeven trojan, but DID have an AIM password stealer, some Dolly_Trojan, and another virus. These were either set to trigger on a date that hadn;t arrived yet or they just didn't do anything, because they didn't have any effect. I'll throw in some good links for virus info, too.


Trojan Info HackFix.org Virus Info

What Viruses Do
Viruses can do anything, from just changing your desktop wallpaper to a picture of a dragon and not letting it change*, or letting a person take over your entire system. First of all, there are the "fun" viruses. These are made by programmers that want to advertise their websites, get a small laugh, or get you in trouble with your parents. The common thing a fun virus does is change your destop wallpaper, change your cursor, or do other relatively "harmless" things. But harmless turns to therapy when your wallpaper turns to gay porn, and trust me, things like that are out there.

Then you take a step up to viruses that minorly affect your computer. I had one where i could not shutdown properly or get on to AOL. I didn't care for that one at all for the most part. A virus like this could make you not able to launch a program, launch ANY program, or keep you from doing some other function.

Finally, you step into the big leagues with SubSeven. This nasty virus is a trojan, which claims it's something that it's not. Once you accept an IM buddy icon, a sound file, or anything that is infected with a virus like this, the program adds itself to the windows registry. The windows registry and system files are files that tell the computer exactly what to do when it boots up. So, if the virus is attatched to the registry, then it runs EVERYTIME the computer is turned on. It not only does this, but it also lets a client take control of your computer. A client is a person with a special part of the virus (this part is not harmful to the client) that has many options to ruin your computer life. The client can view exactly what you view on your screen, can see exactly what keys you type (password stealing), can move the cursor on your own screen, can type on your screen, anything. Think of your computer being posessed. The screenshot link to the upper right is a picture of the client program for SubSeven. As you can see, this is a very dangerous program. I'd like to note the creator of this program, someone who goes by the name of MobMan. If someone with this name IMs you, block them. There are a few other programs out there like this one, but none as powerful.