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COMPUTER Tips and Tricks |
Part 1 Email Maintenance Part 2 Protect Part 3
Update Part 4 Clean up Part 5
Backup
Part 2a: Protect
your computer against Spyware
It is
hard today to pick up any newspaper or magazine and read any news report about
computers without encountering the words “virus”, “spyware” or “adware”. This week we'll talk about spyware and next
week we'll tackle viruses.
Spyware
covers a range of programs that gather and report information to an unknown
party without a user's knowledge or consent.
These information harvesters then sell the info to any number of people
or companies for sometimes nefarious purposes.
Adware is very similar except that the purpose for the collection is to
then show you advertisements on certain websites you may go to, or the
ever-annoying pop-up ads. The major
problem with spyware is that each is so small and unnoticeable that your
computer can be running 200-300 or more and all you will notice is a general
slowing down of your system.
Eventually, your computer will become so clogged that it won't even
start up. Industry experts estimate
that in the year 2005, spyware will cause far more problems than viruses. Spyware comes from a number of different
sources, but the most common is by using Windows Internet Explorer.
The best
way to fight these problems is with special software written just for that
purpose. The good news is that some of
the best software is free. Spybot
and AdAware are always ranked in the top 5 programs of their field. Both
were written by software developers who were tired of the problem on their own
machines and decided to do write programs to fix it.
Spybot {www.safer-networking} and
AdAware {www.lavasoftusa} are both easy to download, install and
run. There's no problem having them
both on your computer at the same time.
While Spybot does have an immunization feature to help prevent
getting spyware (AdAware wants you to pay for that feature), both
programs are really for cleaning up after the fact and should be run once a
week.
To
prevent getting spyware at all, it would be best to use a different browser to
view web pages. Mozilla Firefox {www.mozilla.org}
a fabulous free browser written by a collaboration of computer programmers
and users who are constantly updating it to make it better. Since the base
source code is so different from Microsoft Internet Explorer, Firefox is
immune to 75 to 80% of spyware in the first place. With its built-in pop-up blocker, tabbed browsing, better
privacy, it is fast becoming a popular choice among people who go on the
Internet. Many Fortune 500 companies
are now making it a company policy to use Firefox and stop using
Internet Explorer just because of the security issues. To download and install, go to
www.mozilla.org and click on Free Download.
If you
have any questions, or for many more tips and tricks using Firefox,
please call and I’ll be happy to help you!
Michael Shalkey
February
18, 2005