# HELP! My Computer Has a Virus! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 26, 2002, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666 "2002-04-26T00:00:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Dirty\_Earthworm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Dirty\_Earthworm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dirty_Earthworm)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/1 "2002-04-26T00:00:16Z")
Right as I was about to step out the door to go get some food, my Norton Anti-Virus Alert thing popped up onto my screen and told me I had a virus in my C-drive, in the folder where I do my (yes I know it’s “illegal”) file-sharing. I opened the program and attempted to manually delete the file; a prompt then appeared and said I could not delete the file because it’s a “.dat” file. I have no idea what a .dat file is or what purpose it serves, but nonetheless, this one apparently contains a virus that Norton cannot fix. So far nothing has happened to make me think it’s dangerous, but I know very little about how viruses operate. Anyway, does anyone have a suggestion about what to do? Do I have to uninstall my file-sharing service and then re-install it again? Is there a better anti-virus program than Norton? (my inclination would be that there is _always_ something better.) I’m almost ready to panic … help anyone? -Dirty ---
**Author:** ![Dirty\_Earthworm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Dirty\_Earthworm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dirty_Earthworm)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/2 "2002-04-26T00:17:49Z")
I’m sorry … this was meant for MPSIMS. Wasn’t paying attention. Mods … do your thing. -Dirty ---
**Author:** ![Daoloth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/82dd89/32.png) [@Daoloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daoloth)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/3 "2002-04-26T00:33:17Z")
Are you using XP? And what file sharing program are you running? ---
**Author:** ![Dirty\_Earthworm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Dirty\_Earthworm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dirty_Earthworm)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/4 "2002-04-26T02:18:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Daoloth \* > \*\*Are you using XP? And what file sharing program are you running? \*\* Windows XP (Home Edition) and I use Kazaa. -Dirty ---
**Author:** ![Rico](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rico/32/3582_2.png) [@Rico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rico)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/5 "2002-04-26T02:56:48Z")
Well, a \*.DAT file is a data file. It contains data that a particular program needs. Now if it’s in your fileserver directory, I might suppose that is is your list of shared files. But I’ve never heard of a virus being delivered by a DAT file - are you sure it wasn’t a BAT file? That would be MUCH more likely. ---
**Author:** ![Daoloth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/82dd89/32.png) [@Daoloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daoloth)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/6 "2002-04-26T03:40:12Z")
I had some type of corrupted DAT file from something I got on Morpheus once. McCaffee killed it, though. ---
**Author:** ![abel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@abel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abel)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2002, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-my-computer-has-a-virus/105666/7 "2002-04-26T06:43:02Z")
If it’s an infected .dat file in your shared directory, it’s probably a file that isn’t downloaded all the way yet. That’s how Kazaa saves your files while they’re downloading, so that they can be resumed later, if you lose your connection. You should be able to delete the .dat file someway (if it’s in your shared directory, I wouldn’t worry about it), and hopefully that will fix your problem. Kazaa has a setting in it to filter out file types that may potentially contain viruses, I suggest you make sure that setting is turned on in the program. Oh, and update your antivirus software’s virus definitions. 🙂 Geez, I’m bossy tonight! Good luck!