Believe it or not, Google is nearly 15 years old. It’s still hard, no matter your familiarity with the internet, to envision what the web actually looked like in 1998. We’ve certainly come a long way in a very short time — remember GeoCities, anyone?

But just as technology improves, those things that pose threats to our comfortable web surfing tend to improve right alongside it. Hazardous content like viruses, spyware and other types of malware are consistently changing in order to keep up with our ever-expanding web security measures. If your company doesn’t make its own network security a priority, who will? The answer is the best intrusion detection system you can find — as provided by a leading network security company.

Understanding malware

Simply defined, malware is any type of malicious software that creeps onto your computer and harms your system. It’s not always easy to tell where this kind of harmful software comes from, either, which is what makes it all the more dangerous to your entire operating system or server. Malware can include any of the following types of harmful material (and even others):

• Adware: software that automatically generates advertisements on your system
• Worms: self-replicating malware designed to spread to other computers
• Trojans: sneaky malware often designed to steal important data
• Spyware: not always malicious, but capable of sending information to unknown sources

Preventing and fighting malware

The best software requires the best intrusion detection systems to help it stay that way. That’s why comapnies that specialize in offering advanced malware protection are so sought-after by businesses both large and small. In 2011 alone, a reported 42,887 instances of stolen data and other privacy breaches occurred in the United States alone. When these kinds of strikes happen, it often takes the victim nearly a year to completely rebuild and recover the lost data. For a company, this timeframe can be utterly detrimental to its plans for growth.

It’s 2014 now, and more companies are looking toward what’s called “next generation” protection for their servers. Computer viruses can spread just like real viruses affecting humans — and they can also learn to become more resistant to our attempts at getting rid of them. It requires the best intrusion detection system possible in order to keep your business running smoothly and without major types of security breaches. So, how safe is your server?