What do you think is the most dangerous virus?

[bill the pc]

I want to be aware what to stay away from.

Work Smarter, not harder.

[madanchi]

depends, so many out there to chose from, I know smitfraud is bad but besides that little nasty bugger, I'm not sure. I heard something a while ago about hacking the person your talking to through msn with hex editing stuff, but i have no idea tbh, i'll leave it there

[Cadsorin]

Me, just kidding but one that erases every thing on your computer

[Theory5]

well, technically the most dangerous is the Stuxnet but that is only dangerous for computers that have controllers for industrial equipment, and it was built to target two Irainian Nuclear Facilities.

My least favorite personal computer virus however, is the type that holds your computer hostage until you buy their "anti"-virus software. Like Anti-Soft.

[detox]

anyone of them that pisses me off.
Thou, I actually don't get viruses all that often. once a year at the most. But I usually format my boot drive once a year anyway.

[~Darkseeker~]

the majority of Trojans and rootkits these days are pretty devious little buggers.

[Warren]

Sort of depends on what you rank a really bad virus on.

I guess the major characteristics of a bad virus are:

Damage/Payload

Ability to replicate

Stealth/Not be easily detected by AV

Hard to delete

For example, a nuker virus like cadsorin mentioned would rank like this:

Catagories 1,2, and 4 would be 5/5.

It's incredibly powerful, very hard to detect before it strikes, and the fourth category really doesn't apply.

However, it really can't spread, since if it instantly wipes the drive, it cannot replicate to other machines. The only way it would get around is through fake downloads or torrents, and it would hit a hundred computers at the max.

A bad Trojan would really excel in all categories, since it can steal personal information, remain hidden even to good AVs and can be incredibly resilient.