What Are Drive-By Downloads?

• Drive-by downloads are used to describe malicious programs that are downloaded to a user's computer when they visit a website. Some downloads take advantage of unpatched computers, exploiting known vulnerabilities in the browser and operating system to install software silently in the background, without the user's knowledge. Other downloads are performed by tricking the user into downloading the software, by appearing to be the download of an essential plugin or other seemingly legitimate software. Fake anti-virus software is common, which claims to have detected a virus on the user's computer, and offering an application to "remove" the virus. This technique plays on the fears of computer users, to trick people into installing the very software they are trying to remove.