Best Internet Security Software

Ten Internet Security Tips

Today, more and more people are using their computers for everything from communication to online banking and investing to shopping. As we do these things on a more regular basis, we open ourselves up to potential hackers, attackers and crackers. While some may be looking to phish your personal information and identity for resale, others simply just want to use your computer as a platform from which to attack other unknowing targets. Below are a few easy, cost-effective steps you can take to make your computer more secure. Always start with the best internet security software.

1. Always make backups of important information and store in a safe place separate from your computer.
2. Update and patch your operating system, web browser and software frequently. If you have a Windows operating system, start by going to www.windowsupdate.microsoft.com and running the update wizard. This program will help you find the latest patches for your Windows computer. Also go to www.officeupdate.microsoft.com to locate possible patches for your Office programs.
3. Install a firewall. Without a good firewall, viruses, worms, Trojans, malware and adware can all easily access your computer from the Internet. Consideration should be given to the benefits and differences between hardware and software based firewall programs.
4. Review your browser and email settings for optimum security. Why should you do this? Active-X and JavaScript are often used by hackers to plant malicious programs into your computers. While cookies are relatively harmless in terms of security concerns, they do still track your movements on the Internet to build a profile of you. At a minimum set your security setting for the “internet zone” to High, and your “trusted sites zone” to Medium Low.
5. Install antivirus software and set for automatic updates so that you receive the most current versions.
6. Do not open unknown email attachments. It is simply not enough that you may recognize the address from which it originates because many viruses can spread from a familiar address.
7. Do not run programs from unknown origins. Also, do not send these types of programs to friends and coworkers because they contain funny or amusing stories or jokes. They may contain a Trojans horse waiting to infect a computer.
8. Disable hidden filename extensions. By default, the Windows operating system is set to “hide file extensions for known file types”. Disable this option so that file extensions display in Windows. Some file extensions will, by default, continue to remain hidden, but you are more likely to see any unusual file extensions that do not belong.
9. Turn off your computer and disconnect from the network when not using the computer. A hacker can not attack your computer when you are disconnected from the network or the computer is off.
10. Consider making a boot disk on a floppy disk in case your computer is damaged or compromised by a malicious program. Obviously, you need to take this step before you experience a hostile breach of your system.

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Best Internet Security Software: Botnecks

“A botnet is comparable to compulsory military service for windows boxes” – Stromberg (http://project.honeynet.org/papers/bots/)

Botnets are networks of computers that hackers have infected and grouped together under their control to propagate viruses, send illegal spam, and carry out attacks that cause web sites to crash.

What makes botnets exceedingly bad is the difficulty in tracing them, sometimes even with the best internet security software, back to their creators as well as the ever-increasing use of them in extortion schemes. How are they used in extortion schemes? Imagine someone sending you messages to either pay up or see your web site crash. This scenario is starting to replay itself over and over again.

Botnets can consist of thousands of compromised machines. With such a large network, botnets can use Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) as a method to cause mayhem and chaos. For example a small botnet with only 500 bots can bring corporate web sites to there knees by using the combined bandwidth of all the computers to overwhelm corporate systems and thereby cause the web site to appear offline.

Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Service on January 19, 2006, quotes Kevin Hogan, senior manager for Symantec Security Response, in his article “Botnets shrinking in size, harder to trace”, Hogan says “extortion schemes have emerged backed by the muscle of botnets, and hackers are also renting the use of armadas of computers for illegal purposes through advertisements on the Web.”

One well-known technique to combat botnets is a honeypot. Honeypots help discover how attackers infiltrate systems. A Honeypot is essentially a set of resources that one intends to be compromised in order to study how the hackers break the system. Unpatched Windows 2000 or XP machines make great honeypots given the ease with which one can take over such systems.

A great site to read up on this topic more is The Honeynet Project (http://project.honeynet.org) which describes its own site’s objective as “To learn the tools, tactics and motives involved in computer and network attacks, and share the lessons learned.”

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Best Internet Security Software: Remove Spyware

Never misinterpret the benefits of the anti spy software in your entire life. It is not because you know nothing about the technicalities of how the computer system works means you must just shrug your shoulder off on these things. Remember—you are a computer user. And when a spyware gets its way into your computer files and activities, you probably know what will happen next. The thing is—you need an anti-spy software! You need to remove that spyware from your computer network stream!

You cannot be so sure to yourself that all of your records are kept safe as you look through your mailbox, folders, and computer files. You are not even one fine superhero who can put a stop to the evilness of the spyware programs thriving your computer system. Therefore, totally forget about eliminating the spasm and spyware presence with your own bare hands. You will definitely need the use an anti-spyware software to remove the spyware program and to work things out smoothly for your own benefit. Taking into account the conventions, the anti-spyware software programs come in three forms which can vehemently remove the spyware that is actively crawling through all your data and files. They do come as email plug-ins, stand-alone programs, or as server-based email filters.

What are they all about? How do they remove the spyware? Basically, each of them has its own task to deal with, so to speak. There are some particularly well-known anti-spyware software programs which can really remove the spyware that is present in your computer system. They are McAfee’s Spyware Killer, the Bayesian filtering, the Spam Agent and the Email Protector of Anti Spam Software.

How do these things come to terms with the removal of the spyware programs? Generally, through these anti-spyware and anti spam software programs, the mail inboxes are protected against junk mails, the spam IP addresses are blacklisted, and more so, all of the unwanted messages are hence eliminated from coming into the mailbox. The anti spyware software programs work like the policemen. They investigate, scan, and look for proofs of suspicious codes which are present in the computer operating system and therefore eliminate them as soon as they prove to be harmful for the data system.

What is meant then by removing spyware software programs for free? As you know, the Internet is a host to several products. The online market is a portal to free trial versions of at least a thousand products. The anti-spam and anti-spyware software programs are among them. Of course, free trial versions of these products from the most reputable firms are offered for free. What should you do then? You can surf the net and browse through a lot of websites and find one that offers a free trial version of the anti-spam and anti-spyware software programs. There is no harm in trying these free trial versions. After all, these stuffs really exhibit tremendous prices. But then you must be cautious too. Make sure that you download one that is offered by the trusted companies as there are times when those which are prompted in the ads are the disguised spyware software programs themselves! And when you get to download them—you are dead meat! Therefore, always be on guard fro your files and personal information. You surely do not want to be a victim!

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