I doubt my PC has been infected with Trojan Horse and attached by someone I know. I don't know much about internet security. How much information does the attacker need to connect to my PC while I was online. Computer Name? The ISP phone number I dialed to connect to the Internet and the password? I have one phone line at home and use that to dial the ISP. If the attacker konw my home phone number, does that help the attacker to attack my PC? I heard there were some programs to return my IP address to the attacker once I am online. How does that work? Thanks!

To learn a bit about security and to scan your system for vulnerabilities check out Steve Gibson's website http://grc.com

You don't know much about internet security?Let's see if I can help you.You need at least two things definitely!An antivirus program(www.virusbtn.com has test results with operating systems)and a firewall(wilders.org has reviews/downloads and a lot are free).A firewall can be set up to block attacks.An anti-virus program won't detect every trojan horse.They aren't designed to do that with the exception of Kapersky.Kapersky does that well.If I undestand you correctly,You think that you have a trojan horse but aren't sure?There are two anti-trojan programs that I have.Trojan Hunter and TDS-3.Trojan Hunter is recommended if you are a novice or "newbie".It's easy to use.TDS-3 is a powerful tool for advanced users.They are both available for free trial.If you are looking at possible future purchase;TDS-3 is $49.00,Trojan Hunter is around $35.00.These aren't licenses with a 1 year limit either.You could also use a free on-line scan service like Symantec(Norton).That may verify whether you are clean or not.pcflank.com has a trojan test also.I hope this helps you JB.

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Frank, As Jim said, having a good anti-virus program and firewall are your main lines of defense against trojans and hackers. I myself, prefer Norton's Internet Security suite. Anyways, to answer your questions on how trojans work.... allow me. Here's a crash-course on Trojans101..... A person (not a hacker...... hackers have skill, and it takes no skill to play with trojans) basically doesn't need to know anything about you, in order to attack you. All they need is your computer to be infected with a trojan. Once your infected, the trojan does all the work for them. Typical scenario- You're talking in a chatroom, and someone offers to send you their picture... say, mypic.exe. They tell you, "Oh, it's a self-extracting archive"... so you receive the file, open it, get some wierd error message... and brush it off like it's nothing. You may receive the file a number of ways... through email, disguised as a "game" of some sort.... or someone may physically plant the trojan on your computer while you're away from your desk. Anyways, once you're infected.... the trojan is usually set up to send a message to an ICQ#, or perhaps an IRC channel... notifying the lamer that you're computer is online, what your IP address is, and what port the trojan is running on. The lamer then uses the Client portion of trojan (Trojans have two parts... the server, which infects you - and the client, which the lamer uses to connect to the server) to connect to your computer.. and he/she suddenly has more control over your system than you do. They have access to all your stored files, passwords, EVERYTHING. Once infected too, there are lamers who will scan large IP ranges, looking for infected systems with known trojan ports open (Example, the netbus trojan commonly uses port 12345) and so when you're infected, you're just a sitting duck waiting for any lamer to come along and scan your ISP's subnet, looking for someone's system to trash. So the "hacker" doesn't need to know who you are, your phone number, ISP, or anything. Anyways, sorry for being so long-winded. I obviously have too much time on my hands. Hopefully, you have a little better understanding on how trojans work. Bottom line is Antivirus, Firewall, and most importantly.... COMMON SENSE. Be very cautious about email attatchments that are executables, or any other files that come from strangers on the net saying, "Oooh, check this out, this is really neat!". Trust no one, and you'll be alright. :) Cheers, Geek Brian www.888geekhelp.com