Computer Security Tips
Passwords
Never give any passwords to anyone. Email scams asking for account information (usually bank info)
usually contain phishing viruses. They will even have official logos.
Do not respond to the email. Do not click on any links. No one, that is legitimate,
will ask you to email account information. Report them immediately.
Always use passwords with 6 or more characters. Use
a combination of letters and numbers for better security.
Email
Fraudulent Paypal and Ebay emails requesting you to follow specific links are
the most common. Another, emails stating you have won a huge prize or inherited
a large sum of money, you are just wasting your time with a well known check
scam where they ask you to send them a check first to cover costs of the
transactions.
Unless you know where it come from, just delete it, and don't dare open it.
Antivirus / Spyware
Always install antivirus software. Want a free
antivirus program? Go to
clamwin
and download a Windows based program. The only things we have
noticed that are kind of annoying is the
splash screen when opening the email program and the lag while it is scanning
emails. Other than that, user friendly, easy to download, and free.
So much spyware is out there, sometimes it's hard to detect until
it's too late! The best programs we can recommend are
Spybot and
AdAware.
The great part, they are free of cost and free from adware and
spyware. Also be aware that a lot of freeware
contains spyware. NoNags website offers good freeware that has passed spyware
tests, so feel free to download from their site. Go to our free software page
for NoNags link. One popular site to be cautious with is download.com. Numerous
"free" programs contain spyware and adware.
Using the right internet browser can prevent spyware from infecting your computer.
Mozilla FireFox is a very secure browser and it's free. It also comes with some
very cool webmaster tools. Do not waste your time with Apple Safari. Our trial
of the beta version for Windows was terrible. Too many error dialog boxes to
mention.
isearch Toolbar
- This nasty sypware program is very difficult to get rid of. As an added bonus
this scum of the software industry also installs 180 search assistant for your
unwanted pleasure. One symptom of this toolbar is a popup window calling for
SuperMWindow to shutdown. The company claims that it is not spyware. But they
are gracious enough to offer a removal tool for the program at a cost of $29.
How nice of them. Do not install this toolbar or you will most certainly regret
it. We have tried all the registry fixes on the news posts and all the well
known cleaners. It does not work. The best and quickest fix for the SuperMWindow problem is
to reformat the hard drive.
Data
Make frequent
backups of data that is important. We cannot over emphasize this enough.
This is one of the most important things you can do if losing data is not
an option. Not only will a virus cause you problems, but hardware failures
can catch you by surprise. Windows comes with an easy to use backup
feature.
As most people are running Windows, let Microsoft do their job.
Run the automatic updates, as this will keep
bad things from happening in the first place.
Always ensure that an old hard drive is clean
before discarding. Just because a file is deleted does not mean that it cannot
be recovered. Darik's Boot and Nuke can be downloaded at dban.sourceforge.net.
The program will properly destruct data.
Use a Firewall - 1)hardware firewall - use a router
capable of encryption. 2) Software firewall - Windows XP SP2 comes with a software firewall. Turn it on.
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