The word Trojan comes from the classic Trojan Horse in Homer’s Iliad. In this story the Greek left behind a large wooden horse outside the city of Troy and sailed off. The citizens brought the wooden horse into town. The horse contained Greek warriors, who then jumped out, killed a bunch of people, and opened the city gates, letting in the rest of the Greek army who had been hiding.
A Trojan generally is not by definition a virus and unlike common belief they do not spread to other programs and other computers like a virus either. However they are one of the leading causes of computer breakings. They can also contain a virus within them.
Trojans are generally programs that pose as a legitimate program on your computer and add a subversive functionality to it. That’s when it’s said a program is Trojaned. For example a Trojaned login program can be written so it accepts certain passwords for any user’s account to give the intruder access to your computer
A lot of Trojans will also turn your machine into a "spam sender" by allowing spammers to relay mail out.
Talk to us about our range of spam and virus systems to reduce the level of threats entering your network.
Article ID: 81
Created: Thu, Jul 27, 2017
Last Updated: Thu, Jul 27, 2017
Author: Jonathan
Online URL: https://kb2.ic.uk/article.php?id=81