Is it enough to format a computer/phone for erase a malware/virus?

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Noob of the Maths
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I have a question about a infecting computer or smartphone:

If was infected and the contents can be viewed in real time in other equipment... its enough to format for clean the computer/smartphone? or the "ip" needs to be change or is required use a VPN?

How its infected this kind of virus/malware? i don't know about this kind of tracking and if its possible erase completely, i have a issue with a computer years ago by this, maybe i infected opening a email or image...
 

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It's sometimes very difficult to root out malware from a machine. One well-known virus would launch 3 copies of itself and each time you deleted a copy the other two would detect it and relaunch before you could get to them. It took a specially written program to get rid of the infection.

There are areas of every computer where viruses can be stashed where an end-user can't get to them. Sometimes a Rootkit is installed which can hide certain directories from view and from deletion. The only way you might know something is amiss is in a mismatch of total file sizes vs available disk space. Sony did this some years ago and was roundly castigated by the public.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal
 
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Noob of the Maths said:
If was infected and the contents can be viewed in real time in other equipment... its enough to format for clean the computer/smartphone? or the "ip" needs to be change or is required use a VPN?
Mentioning network stuff makes me suspicious that you want to do this remotely, what makes the answer a definitive 'no'. As long as the infected system running (and you won't have network access if it's not running) it's difficult to clean up even with a local antivirus software. Any remote filesystem operation is just futile.

On computers it is advised that any 'formatting' or 'cleaning' to be done by a read only boot/rescue disk.

Phones are really tricky, since by default you don't have access to all the memory: also, you can't remove the 'HDD' from the phone to be wiped or inspected on a different device. Also, there are no alternative boot devices.
 
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jedishrfu said:
It's sometimes very difficult to root out malware from a machine. One well-known virus would launch 3 copies of itself and each time you deleted a copy the other two would detect it and relaunch before you could get to them. It took a specially written program to get rid of the infection.

There are areas of every computer where viruses can be stashed where an end-user can't get to them. Sometimes a Rootkit is installed which can hide certain directories from view and from deletion. The only way you might know something is amiss is in a mismatch of total file sizes vs available disk space. Sony did this some years ago and was roundly castigated by the public.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandalhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal
 
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