what is trojan horse.why it is called so?

Question

it is related to computer virus.

Answer 1

A trojan horse is a hostile program that masquerades as a beneficial one. So you download it thinking it's something good, but when run it also covertly goes through and alters your system or installs other stuff you don't know about.

It's called that after the famous trojan horse in the "Iliad", where soldiers hid inside a giant wooden horse so when Troy wheeled it inside their city gates the soldiers could come out and slaughter the lot of them. Hopefully your computer doesn't get slaughtered!

Answer 2

Heh, best answer I can give you is it's a virus that acts like the Trojan Horse of Greek history.

From what I understand (after having 2 of my own on my old computer), these viruses are disguised as something that may seem harmless on the outside, such as an email from a friend or a toolbar download, but when activated - such as by opening a harmless-looking attachment, for example - they cause massive damage to your computer.

Wikipedia did a wonderful job of describing a trojan horse:

"In the context of computer software, a Trojan horse is a malicious program that is disguised as or embedded within legitimate software. The term is derived from the classical myth of the Trojan Horse. They may look useful or interesting (or at the very least harmless) to an unsuspecting user, but are actually harmful when executed."

Answer 3

2

Answer 4

The Trojan Horse is part of the myth of the Trojan War. The Greeks made a huge wooden horse and hid inside it. They offered it to the city of Troy so they would take it past their wall. They stayed inside until that night and while everyone was sleeping got out and slaughtered the entire city. Im not a computer whiz but trojan viruses are probably ones that disguise themselves as other files so you dont know you have a virus until its too late.

Answer 5

Related to an incident in Troy (ancient Greece). The Trojans (i.e., citizens of Troy) gave a large wooden horse to their enemies. Inside the horse, the army of Troy was awaiting. Once the city let the horse inside their walls (this was back when cities were protected by walls), the army came out of the horse and slaughtered the people.

So, a "Trojan Horse" is something that appears to be a gift, but is really something dangerous that will hurt you.

Since viruses are sometimes like that (bad things are smuggled into your computer via a seemingly benign source), that's where the name came from.

Answer 6

In computers, a Trojan horse is a program in which malicious or harmful code is contained inside apparently harmless programming or data in such a way that it can get control and do its chosen form of damage, such as ruining the file allocation table on your hard disk. In one celebrated case, a Trojan horse was a program that was supposed to find and destroy computer viruses. A Trojan horse may be widely redistributed as part of a computer virus.

Answer 7

When someone pretends to be your friend and gives you a "gift", maybe or maybe not something of value, that then turns out to be a trick of some sort, to embarrass you or hurt you in some way, or to lower your status.

OR

In the context of computer software, a Trojan horse is a malicious program that is disguised as or embedded within legitimate software. The term is derived from the classical myth of the Trojan Horse. They may look useful or interesting (or at the very least harmless) to an unsuspecting user, but are actually harmful when executed.

Answer 8

Read about "Helen of Troy". This is how a Trojan Horse Virus gets on your computer.

Answer 9

A Trojan horse is virus that sneaks into your system (whatever that may be) by pretending to be something harmless. Like a pop up ad for breast cancer or something, somone out there could be hiding behind the message waiting for you to open it and then, BAM, your hit by the virus.

Answer 10

A Trojan horse virus is exactly what the others before me have stated only pc-wise, it's a back door for someone to access data without your knowlege and transmit it back to their own computers (usually via email) for their own nefarious purposes.