Gadgetory

server not found this is the computer screen thousands of Internet users could wake up to on Monday morning if your computer's dns settings aren't set properly if they've been altered by the malware then you're not going to be able to connect to the internet even if everything else is working in this case the malware is called DNS changer and it's wreaked havoc on hundreds of thousands of computers worldwide when you type in a URL like cnet com you think that it's going to seen it and it's actually going to a different IP address which is serving up malicious ads and they're trying to basically fish your personal information or just get you to click on the ends and give them money the FBI brought down the ring of hackers last year but they couldn't completely disable the operation or the internet would have gone down for thousands of affected users including some fortune 500 companies so the government created a safety net to correctly direct internet traffic but that costly program ends at 1201 eastern time monday morning it could have been a lot worse it could have been a huge exposure to a very large number of people it might have turned into that if law enforcement hadn't acted when they did so I think I think it's more crisis averted rather than rather than internet meltdown the easiest way to know if your computer is infected is to log on to DNS dash ok dot us ideally before Monday morning in San Francisco I'm Kara Tsuboi cnet.com for CBS News