The Bad words of Computer Security Part 2 – Viruses
In the first Part of the “Bad” words of Computer Security I talked about Passwords. Now that you have a safe and secure password what about Viruses??? Since a computer was built by a human you will notice we take a lot of the same words when we talk about ourselves. If you get a virus, that’s not a good thing. The same goes for your computer. Now we protect ourselves from viruses, we don’t eat from the garbage, wear the right clothing when its cold and in general stay away from the things that will harm us. That is the same with computer viruses, be careful what you feed your computer. In the good old days that meant putting a disk in a drive, today that means going to a website, downloading a program or opening an email. Security experts use to say don’t open anything from strangers, but even that has changed.
Rules for protecting your computer from getting a virus:
- Install an anti-virus program. Then make sure you have the up to date virus definitions each month. PLEASE READ, yes that four letter word, READ, the information on the anti-virus companies website. Most anti-virus software comes with a subscription, when that subscription runs out then you are no longer protected from the latest viruses since you will not be able to install the latest definitions. I list Anti-virus programs at the end of the article.
- UPDATE, I know i mentioned it above but make sure that you are getting the updated definitions each day or at least each week. (Companies don’t always reales them each day.)
- Make sure you have a firewall on. Most Operating Systems (Windows, Mac OS X, Linux) have built-in firewalls.
- Run an anti-virus scan at-least monthly with of course the newest definitions. You can schedule the scan. I run mine weekly.
- That Is it…. now for those resources
Resources:
- Certs home security section – CERTS is a government funded research and development institute. They are the security experts.
- http://security.getnetwise.org/ – get net wise is a great website that has information and tools about protecting yourself on the web.
- Microsoft list of Anti-Virus clients – This is a very good and always updated list of anti-virus clients. I personally like Symantec.
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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 6th, 2007 at 6:57 pm and is filed under Advice, Internet Tools, Security, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
