Keeping your PC healthy
I've had a few people email and 1 person comment about how to keep your PC healthy so here is a run down for you. The best security you could ever have would be Linux as the operating system. Windows has almost 100,000 viruses and dozens and dozens of security flaws. Linux only has 1 or 2 viruses (both of which were made inaffective years ago!). Linux has had a few security flaws but all get fixed in super fast time. No operating system comes anywhere near as secure as Linux.
Very quick story: Microsoft's windows update site was attacked by a virus that, once it has infected a home user PC, would launch a "Denial Of Service" attack. Microsoft had to put in a Linux server so the site didn't stay down. Doesn't that say something?
What slows your PC down
Every time you install something onto your computer it takes up hard drive space and often installs files into the system directories. The Add/Remove feature doesn't remove everything so once a programme has been installed there will nearly always be traces of it after it's gone. You should only ever install what you can't be without.
Don't buy PC magazines and install all the cover CD programmes onto your machine. If you have to make sure its a fully functional one and not shareware or time limited.
Some software will slow your PC down by default because they are always running; a virus checker for example. Norton gets bundled with most PC's but that doesn't mean its the best. Unless your machine is super duper fast Norton will have an impact on the speed of your machine. I don't like Norton and never have done. AVG [ http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/ ] is a free virus checker that will never charge you for anything and it will often pick up viruses Norton has no idea exists. It doesn't have any notable hit on the speed of your PC and they update the virus list almost daily.
Some computer companies don't like AVG but is this because they can't make money out of it? I have the ability to be able to manually check and remove viruses and in the years I've been using AVG I've never once found a virus on my machine. I have repaired two PC's in the last two days and both had more than 10 viruses which Norton didn't know about but the second I installed AVG and ran it good old AVG found the lot! I then checked by hand if any more viruses were about but AVG had cleared the lot. A great little proggy and best still, it's free!
I spend hours and hours each day on my PC and I make my living out of it. I still only have less than a dozen programmes on my machine. It’s hard for a programme to conflict with another or slow my PC down when so few programmes are installed.
PC SECURITY
This may come as a surprise but your computer is being attacked and probed every couple of seconds 24/7, 365 days a year.
Software firewalls are not very good because the attacks are still happening on your own PC. A router is a much better option because they attack the router and not your PC.
Windows XP has a built in firewall but in service pack 1 it’s next to useless. Service Pack 2 version is a little better but as I said, the attacks are still happening on your own PC which is more risky.
Run a check for open ports on your PC using
http://scan.sygatetech.com/ and see if any ports are open and can be seen you’re the outside. With my router protecting me this is what it says:
Trying to find out your computer name...
Unable to determine your computer name!
Trying to find out what services you are running...
Unable to detect any running services!
Now run this port scan and you’ll see exactly what ports are open to hackers and Trojans:
http://scan.sygatetech.com/trojanscan.htmlAgain with a router this is the result:
“You have blocked all of our probes!”
Well I haven’t, but my router has. In other port scanners every single port comes up as not found or stealth meaning it can’t gain access to it.
INTERNET EXPLORER IS NAFF
IE has many security and spyware problems and personally I would never use IE for anything that requires a username or password (online banking or paypal as the big examples).
Firefox is a much better alternative to IE and can be downloaded here:
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
The security on this browser is very, very good. Firefox keeps your computer safe from malicious spyware by not loading harmful ActiveX controls. A comprehensive set of privacy tools keep your online activity your business. Google Search is built right into the toolbar. It has many other features and while even Firefox has had some security issues it’s still a million times safer to use than IE.
PART TWO – VIRUSES
Viruses have many ways of entering your PC. Still the single most common is people receiving an email from someone they think they know which has attachments so they open them.
I can’t emphasise this enough; NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER open a file attachment UNLESS YOU’RE EXPECTING IT. I’ll explain why:
Let’s say you have a friend called Fred who’s been infected with a virus. A lot of viruses will then go through his email address book and start sending out emails from him to everyone in his address book. You get the email and it says it’s from him and the email will say something like “thought you’d like to see this”. The thing is though, it wasn’t him; it was the virus PRETENDING to be him.
Unless Fred emails or phones you and says he’s about to send you an email with an attachment DO NOT OPEN IT!
Outlook express is probably the widest used email programme in the World but the security in it sucks. If you use it make sure you receive ALL emails as plain text only. Some clever people have found a way of launching Trojans and viruses from within an html email. You don’t even have to open it. Just by clicking on it to delete the email will result in your getting infected. By only using Plain Text you protect yourself from this problem.
DON’T FORGET:Update the virus list (called virus definitions) at least once a day!
Windows has almost 100,000 known viruses with dozens of new ones coming out each day. A virus checker is USELESS unless you update it every single day. If you go away for a week the very first thing you do is update that list when you first boot your machine up.
SPYWARE
A general term for a program that surreptitiously monitors your actions. While they are sometimes sinister, like a remote control program used by a hacker, software companies have been known to use spyware to gather data about customers.
If you followed the above advise and have installed Firefox you’re already well protected against spyware. If you insist on using IE then you need AT LEAST one spyware programme on your PC, preferably two. The two better ones are:
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.htmlBy installing both of these and running them at least once a week you’ll be more protected.
Was this useful to you? Is there other stuff you'd like to see in Part Three? Use the comments below and tell me what you think so far! MORE LATER!
