Overview Of Trojan Horse: Spreading, Effects, Legal Implications

Introduction

In the world full of technology and communication, everyone is having a great life. With each and every step of technological development, every sector is being safe, secured and advanced. But as every coin has two side, with its development comes its danger as well. In IT field, these dangers are of viruses, worms, Trojan horse, key logger, etc. All these malwares provide significantly harm to the infected computers in specific way. In this context, we are going to focus on Trojan horse.

Trojan Horse/ Key Logger

The most common thing in the society is telling that Trojan horse is a virus. Viruses or worms are capable of spreading form on computer to another as being a program or files. Unlike viruses and worms, Trojan horse is a malware that shows users that it is a useful software outside but inside it does negative consequences to the computer without letting the user having any information about it. Trojan horse can be compared as a food mixed with poison given to a rat to be killed. It might not kill the user but can do as it wishes. Key logger is like a software program that installs in the user’s computer specially by the Trojan course. Key logger also enters computer like Trojan horse but instead of controlling the user computer, it grabs the keystrokes and mouse movement. By grabbing the information by keystrokes and mouse clicks, key logger grabs the information from the infected computer and then transmits it to the remote computer. In this report, we are going to particularly discuss about Trojan horse. Trojans can be classified as below;

• Rootkit Backdoor Trojan
• Banker Trojan
• Dropper Trojan
• Spy.

How are they spread

Viruses, worms spread to the computer by being a software, application. But Trojan horse does not show that it is a virus or worm. It transmits by showing that it is useful to the user. It can get transmitted in many ways. Someone having access to the computer can install it manually. Or, it can also can access to computer by clicking the emails attachment containing Trojan as well which shows it as harmless. An another of spreading Trojan is by drive by download. In this method, the Trojan gets installed in the computer by downloading itself without any permission granted by the user. Also, some of the Trojans spread from one computer to another by identifying itself as a part of the same network.

How they affect

Once a computer is affected by Trojan horse, it can have every access to the computer. The remote computer can get any information code from the computer they want. They can have knowledge of each and everything the computer is doing. It can also make the computer to do the things it wants i. e. some crimes without the user having any information about it. Some Trojan are designed in such a way that they affect the user computer in silly way like changing the desktop or by adding some icons in the desktop. Whereas some Trojan provides dangerous damage to the computer by affecting informational files in the computer, deleting or doing serious damage to the files or to the whole computer as well.

What Legal Implications are being made

Legal implication is something that happens to us either it is positive or negative in accordance to the law. The new “support” requirement for patentability is one of the many changes brought into Australian Patent Law by the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment act (Raising the Bar) 2012 (Cth) on 15 April 2013. It is intended to raise the standards of Australian Patents by curtailing the scope of inappropriately broad claims.

However, the importation of this European-type support requirement into Australian patent law may have well opened the door to a Trojan horse. Infected with conflation issues, the European approach to considering what constitutes adequate support for a patent claim does not offer a coherent example that can be practically applied by the Australian Patent Office or by the Australian Courts. [

What is government doing about it

Recently, a member of parliament of Japan opened a mail about the country so hot issues problem. Later, the authorities came to find that there was a Trojan installed in the mail which got access to the computer and grabbed confidential information. The truth is still not found but it was found that Chinese server was after that attack. These attacks are being made all over the world either by government or by some hackers. So, what is government really doing about it.

Nowadays governments are starting to employ hackers to safeguard their information. High level hackers are being called by the governments of many countries in order to tight the leak or strength their information security. Also, cybersecurity officer and cybersecurity department are also being made in some of the countries which are responsible for preventing, checking and controlling those attacks in as strong way as possible. Also, many awareness programs are being conducted online or in public to make public aware about the attacks and how to stay away from it as far as possible. [

What are companies doing about it?

With government a user being attacked, companies are also being attacked with this malware. So, they are also doing whatever they can in order to protect their document. Hackers are using this malware to steal bank information and companies most confidentiality documents. So, in order to get protected from Trojan companies are giving priority to cybersecurity department as well. As diamond can cut diamond only hackers know how other attacks and can know possible ways to get solution. So, companies are gathering hackers to employ them. They are installing antivirus up to date and scans their system every day. Instead of handling such things by themselves, they are giving almost all the security responsibility to a certain team who are responsible for technology department.

What can be done to solve the problem?

Trojan horse is one of the most malicious infection in the IT world. About, 72% of the total infected computers were of Trojan horse. So, with so many infections, how can we solve the problem. Now a days even beginner hackers are able to create these types of malware which can be considered as a one of the dangerous malwares and was created by only professionals in the past. Although we cannot totally eliminate the Trojan horse. But still, we can do some measures so that they can be gone slowly. First thing is by installing anti-virus in the computer and by keeping it up to date. Also, we should be aware before installing the software that are not required to us. Also, suspicious emails and attachments should not be clicked or opened specially having files like. exe, . vbs. One should have latest operating system installed in order to have maximum security available. Scanning is one of the major steps. Before installing downloaded software from internet or opening CDs, DVDs, everything should be scanned properly.

Conclusion

Trojan horse/ key loggers are the infectious malwares that harms the user computer by gaining every access of the computer. It affects the users without having any information from the user. One of the most malware being attacked in the current world is by Trojan horse. Showing itself as an useful email or software, it is harming most of the users even in the higher level, up to the government level as well.

Many efforts are being made by the government as well as many companies in order to protect their information from being attacked. Hackers from around the world are being employed in order to detect and eliminate the Trojan. Also, cybersecurity departments are also getting importance and prioritized as well. In order to protect the computers from Trojans from providing harms, one should install antivirus programs and keep it up to date. Having latest operating system will also enhance the possibility of being harmed from them. Awareness programs should also be conducted in order to make people aware about the Trojan horse/key logger.