Securing Your Computer

Why secure your computer? Fraud happens all the time on the internet. What everyone doesn't know is how criminals are using compromised computers.

We have been seeing a trend where a someone will place an order on an ecommerce site from a computer. This is obviously very common on the internet. When we trace the IP address of the ISP the computer is using, it's an ordinary broadband user. However, when we investigate further, we find that the credit card has been stolen, and that the real criminals are located in another country. In fact, they're not just using one innocent person's computer, they're using several; Tunneling through each one to make it harder to trace their origin.

Is this hard to do? Appearently not if the "innocent" person's computer isn't properly protected. Legally, they're probably innocent, but in our opinion they're neglegent. They've left their computer open to attack and use by others.

The following are some common sense recommendations that will help you secure your computer.

Windows NT/2000/XP users

1. Double-click My Computer on the Windows desktop.
2. Right-click drive C, and click Sharing.
3. Check Share name. The drive will likely be shared as C:. It is common that this parameter is defaulted to "Shared" for administration purposes. If you click the Permissions button, you should see the message "This has been shared for Administrative purposes. The permissions cannot be set."
4. Click the drop-down for Share name. If the drive is not shared with any other names, stop here.
5. If the drive is shared with a name other than C:
   Check "Do not share this folder."
   - If you do not want to remove this shared resource, click Permissions and make sure that only the required users and groups may write to it.
   - For all other shared files or folders, check permissions to verify that only required users have write access.

Windows 95/98 users

1. Right-click the Network Neighborhood icon on the Windows desktop.
2. Click Properties.
3. Click the Configuration tab.
4. Click Client for Microsoft Networks.
5. Click File and Print Sharing.
6. Uncheck both boxes, and then click OK.

We recommend Norton Anti-Virus. Keep your virus definitions up to date. See these links for more anti-virus scanning software. Some of which are FREE.

Freeware Programs

• HouseCall
• FProt
• BitDefender
• AVG Free edition
• Avast!
• Anti-vir
• Antidote Super Lite version

Commercial Protection

• Panda Software
• Dr. Solomon
• Norton Anti Virus
• QuickHeal
• Protector PLUS
• McAfee
• Solo
• eSafe
• Command AntiVirus
• AVP
• eTrust
  

Detect Viruses on Your PC While Online!

Free Online Virus Scan

Outlook and Outlook Express have a feature called the "Preview Pane" that gives you one-click viewing of incoming email. However, if the e-mail or message has harmful scripts attached to it, that simple click of the mouse is all it will take to infect your system. Always be sure to check the sender and subject of an e-mail BEFORE opening or previewing a message. Turning these previews off in your e-mail program can save you many headaches in the future.

In Outlook Express, do the following:

1. Select View, then Layout from the menu.
2. Uncheck the box Show Preview Pane in the Preview Pane section.
3. Click the OK button to save the change.
   

In Outlook, do the following:

1. Click on the Inbox folder to display its contents.
2. Select View from the menu, and uncheck Preview Pane.
3. Repeat this for each Outlook folder that contains email messages. Typically this includes Inbox, Sent Items, Deleted Items, Drafts and Outbox.

Keep Your Operating System Up To Date. Many times viruses are stopped by installing the newest security updates designed for your Windows-based operating system. What's great about this web site is that it scans your system and provides a list of updates automatically. It's a very simple task and it will improve your ability to defend your data from viruses in a very big way.

Using Windows? Click here to begin updating your system.

Our hands down favorite firewall is ZoneAlarm and it's FREE. However, we still recommend the Pro version because it's not expensive and it's an amazingly simple program to install. This program helps stop port scans, pop-ups, viruses, adware and more from getting access to your hard drive. If you don't have it, you should. End of story.

We also recommend a hardware firewall in the form of a DSL/CABLE router firewall. Available from many manufacturers.

Ad-aware is the best, multi-spyware removal utility around. It scans your memory, registry and hard drives for known spyware components and lets you remove them safely. This is awesome software!

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