The new millennium has presented a long list of frighteners for the computer business.

It opened with the biggest scare, the Y2K millennium bug, when experts predicted potential disasters on a global scale as the century changed. And yet nothing happened!

How could some of the world's brightest people get it all so very wrong?

Actually, they didn't get it wrong at all. Without the scare, we would still be living in a world where antiquated and unstable software was commonplace and the future for many IT dependant firms would be uncertain.

I am talking about all those legacy systems, condemned as liable to "fall over" when the clock struck midnight and now replaced by future-proofed systems that will cope with many years of hard work.

The predicted Y2K disaster did not happen because so many systems were changed. There was no luck involved here, just a lot of hard work and clever thinking.

The hyperactivity prompted by the millennium bug has now pushed the computer industry ahead of itself by orders of magnitude and we are able to reap the benefits.

Many hospitals were concerned about the effect of the bug and spent a lot of money making sure their computer systems were fully Y2K compliant.

Our own splendid Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton benefited from the sterling work carried out by computer engineers from Brighton Healthcare NHS Trust.

Patients at the Royal Sussex were unaffected by the bug, although the trust's administrators, perhaps in a moment of media-induced panic, issued a magnificent disclaimer refusing to accept any blame at all for bug-related mishaps.

Banks, too, overhauled their systems.

Water authorities made sure that water would keep flowing and the gas providers went to a lot of trouble to make sure their computers were up to specification.

In fact, a much-needed national upgrade was had by all.

So, having got the country fighting fit, what happens next?

Now we are faced with a whole new collection of digital menaces.

The evil virus writers are hitting us with some real doozies that are genuinely more threatening than the millennium bug!

There are currently hundreds of viruses out there and they are coming your way.

My own computer has just been infected with a version of the love letter virus that has thoroughly trashed my hard drive.

Let's face it, I should have known better at my miserably- advanced age than to open a file called "very funny.exe" even when sent to me by a reputable PR person.

Trust me, the computer industry offers little enough to make anyone laugh.

The virus attack started by trying to send out an e-mailshot to everyone in my MS Outlook address book, attaching an infected copy of itself to each of the mails.

I managed to stop that in time but didn't notice what it was doing to my treasured collection of digital images.

Family pictures taken over the past five years were trashed in minutes. Fortunately, I had made a back-up of my favourite files.

The virus then attacked my whole computer system and infected sensitive parts I didn't even know I had.

A complete format of the hard drive and reinstallation of all my software was the only way forward. I really hate computers sometimes.

Sadly, I suspect home users, who often don't have adequate virus protection or an up-to-date back-up, are the most likely people to get hit next.

They are accessing the internet and downloading files without a thought to the consequences of their actions.

Take my advice. If you don't have one, then go out today and buy a good virus protection package, either Norton Antivirus, Dr Solomon or Sophos. Don't think it won't happen to you because eventually, it will. Sort out some protection now - before you become a virus attack statistic!