Show me your Rootkit

Thursday, August 31st, 2006 | Tech Help

Rootkits are becoming more of a problem everyday. Sophos has released a free program that will detect a rootkits presense and remove it.

What is a rootkit?

The term rootkit is used to define a Trojan (or technology) used to hide the presence of a malicious object (process, file, registry key, network port) from the computer user or administrator.

Goto the Sophos website to download the software. Click on the download link and on the next page enter any info you like and press submit.

You will be taken to a download page. Save the file to a location you will remember (i.e. desktop or my documents). Run the installer and accept all the default settings. The program will install in C:\SOPHTEMP, run the GUI executable and choose scan now.

The program will now scan your running proccesse, registry and local harddrives.

Depending on your hardware this can take some time. Take this opportunity to walk the dog.

The program has now finished. As you can see I did not have any rootkits installed on my PC. If you are unlucky and do have one or more installed call a PC repair centre, its time to take your PC in for servicing.

I would run the scan as part of your monthly PC service schedule, along with your anti-spyware scan.

Tags: pc maintenance, rootkits, sophos, windows