This may sound like a stupid question, but

I'm sorry, this may sound really stupid, but I was wondering if spyware/viruses/whatever could survive a change of hard drive. I asked one of my friends and he said that theoretically it could happen, which means nothing to me because I don't know that much about computers, so I was just wondering if it was possible or not. Thanks for your time.

 

Im not sure but I have personally met hackers that say they can spread to ur other parts...like vc,sc,motherboard.

 

As I learned here in MG stupid questions are only those that are never asked . About your question I am pretty sure that it's impossible for malware to survive a hd change, even a reformat. Did the new and old hd work together for a while, to backup some files for example?

 

No, I'm more just wondering, because I am switching out an infected hard drive and I want to make sure. My friend said something to the effect of what volumeone0686 said, that they've maybe heard of it or something, but I want to know if its actually possible.

And, if they could infect your motherboard, sc, vc, etc, how would you even check for that? anti-virus and anti-spyware stuff only scan the hard drive. I actually find it pretty hard to believe that it's possible, but if someone tells me its definitely true, can someone tell me how to prevent it from happening?

 

There are some viruses that will persist but they are VERY rare nowadays. Older BIOSes had scanners for this purpose but you don't see it a lot anymore. You'll likely be fine.

 

so just viruses? What about spyware stuff? sorry, I'm uniformed/paranoid, which is probably the worst combination ever. (i.e. most likely be fine, which assuages normal people, doesn't make me feel better.)

 

There are types of malware called "rootkits" that can work their ways into low levels of the system, and survive hard drive changes*. See this link for a more detailed explanation.

There is software to detect them. A few such applications can be found at this link.

*see next post

 

Wait, rootkits can survive a hard drive replacement?

 

Okay, what I'm reading now is contradicting what I've read before. Let me research this further before scaring you anymore.

 

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(sorry Mada )