It is amazing how many PC users out there do not have any anti-virus software running on their computers at all. And how many more users there are with outdated software, thinking they were being protected, but in fact were sitting wide open for the new viruses being passed around by e-mail messages. Commonly when I arrive, their anti-virus software is months or years out of date. Software that has not been updated within the past few months, is no longer effective.

One of the common viruses hitting around the beginning of the year, was Navidad. The symptom was always the same, when the computer restarted, an error message appeared saying Windows could not find winsrvc.exe. Any program you tried to start, gave you the same error message. The virus infected your system thru an e-mail attachment, usually named navidad.exe, that you or another user of the system opened. The fix was fairly simple, according to documentation from SARC, a leading anti-virus website . Download a quick fix program from their site and run it on your computer. The only fallacy with that suggestion, was that your Internet access had been disabled by the virus as well. The solution was to use a second computer to download the fix program and transfer it to a floppy disk. Write protect the floppy disk after removing from the second computer. Start up the infected system, ignoring the error messages, and insert the floppy disk. Click on Start and Run and type A:\fixnavid.com in the window. The program will run and clean your system, removing all entries from the registry file and cleaning the normally infected system files.

One of the most often repeated rules for e-mail is to never open an unexpected attachment, especially from someone you do not know. The problem with this rule, is that if a virus infects someone who has you on their e-mail list, especially if they are running Outlook or Outlook Express, the first thing most viruses do, is to replicate themselves by sending a copy of themselves to everybody in their address book. So you think the message and file is from a trusted, known source, and oops, there goes the virus again!

If you are running a current version of an anti-virus program, run the update option built into the program (Norton calls it Live Update) or visit their website for the latest virus definition files and update it manually. If you do not keep your virus files updated on a monthly basis, your system is prime for an infection.

There are many different brands of anti-virus software out there. My personal favorites are Norton, McAfee and Computer Associates' personal version of Inoculate IT!. You can download 30 day free trial copies of the first two brands from their respective web sites. Computer Associates offers a full version for free at their site. All three brands offer semi-automatic updates via the web on a regular basis and I urge everyone to get a copy of at least one of them to protect your computer.

If you are interested in finding out more about current virus threats floating around on the Internet, there are a few sources you might want to check out. McAfee will keep you informed via e-mail of any new threats if you sign up on their website for their free newsletter. Another source of information is About.com's e-mail newsletter about viruses and hoaxes. Visit them at http://antivirus.about.com to sign up.

Just like the boy who cried wolf in the classic children's story, false warnings of viruses can cause a legitimate warning to be disbelieved. Despite unlikely sources, bad grammar, and obviously inflated tales of tragedy, people continue to believe and forward on the same old hoaxes. Stop! Don't forward that hoax. Check the Hoax Encyclopedia first.

Not a virus hoax but a little girl lost? Here what the About.com guide to Urban Legends, David Emery, has to say about it.