Secure Yourself

Computer security has been defined as; “The concept of attaining a secure computing environment by mitigating the vulnerabilities associated with computer use.” This statement is applicable to Computers, Web Servers, Networks and even Mobile Devices.

A range of measures may be taken to ensure the security of these aspects of computing, and the following guide will briefly address them. This guide will not hold your hand through everything described. Much of the guide is personal opinion. Keep in mind I do not simply recommend one program for each angle of infection and attack. These are the tips i suggest for a total computer security.

Install and use Anti Virus Program(s)

You need to use antivirus software to protect your own computer, and to prevent your computer from being infected or being used to gain infections to infect others, if you use the internet and don’t take responsibility, you’re going to get infected. If you don’t care about getting infected then look at the financial side of things your system most likely costs around $500 – $1000 and that is just going to be a waste from a stupid infection which you could of easily prevented by using a simple anti virus.

Another-BloodyBlog.blog.com recommends the following anti-virus software:

             

Install and use a firewall program

A firewall is a program that blocks all the information coming through the internet to your network. It will prevent harmful information and software from coming through your private network. A firewall is extremely vital for any home connection, and especially in big workplaces where there are several connections to the internet. This is usually the reason why they limit it to around 20 connections to the FTP server.

Another-BloodyBlog.blog.com recommends the following firewall software:         

                   

Use strong passwords

Using strong passwords is extremely vital when browsing the net, there is many ways they can hackers can get your password, but the best way to avoid it is not using a common word, or if the hacker knows some information about you he’ll try and guess your password, so you should use something only you know. It doesn’t need to be very long although that is a always recommended a strange word that only you know will do, you could always use generated passwords too but this will only work on certain websites.

Take care when downloading and installing programs

This is the most common way of infecting people. ONLY download a program if you trust the person. I have experienced being infected by this and it’s really common, most files you download that are infected, if you went ahead and downloaded a program and you weren’t sure if it was safe just quickly run a scan on your anti virus and see if there is harmful software or not, try your spy net if again nothing is found it means there is no infected file or the file is FUD (Fully Undetectable). So if you are downloading a program from a forum wait for an OK from an experienced user and go ahead with it if he seems satisfied but that doesn’t 100% mean it’s not, just be careful.

Keep Your System Up To Date

Keeping your system patched and software updated is extremely important. Companies release updates and patches for software to fix any exploits and vulnerabilities, this means if you’re running on an unpatched version, you are vulnerable.

A great website to check whether your software is up to date is www.secunia.com. This scans your system to see whether any software is out of date, if software is, then it provides you with the links to update it.

Once things like Java have been updated, you should always delete the old version. This is because malicious exploitation could still be acted upon.

Reading Emails

While reading emails you should be careful, don’t open attachments unless you know what it is, even if the email is by a friend.

The bigger risk though is phishing emails. A lot of emails can look legit, when they’re not. Even if it says, for example “sent by support@jagex.com” that doesn’t cut the risk of it being a phishing email.

Remember that banks don’t ask you to update your details via email, that games usually don’t either. When clicking a link outgoing from an email ALWAYS remember to check the address in the top of your browser.

Make backups of important things

I’m sure everyone has important files on their PCs. That is why you should back them up, on an additional hard drive, USB or even an online service such as Amazon Cloud.

This ensures that if for example your computer got stolen, broke or something restricts your access to the hard drive. You won’t have to worry, as you have some back ups.

Encrypt Your Files

Encryption of your files protects them, whether someone intrudes your PC online or off, they won’t be able to access those files.

Some good file encryption programs you may want to look into are BitLocker, TrueCrypt.