Patching and Securing Your PC
General Information
- Securing your computer is of crucial importance to stop the spread of worms and viruses,
as well as to protect
you from all kinds of malware, such as keystroke loggers that might be used to steal your
credit card numbers, etc. In fact, you could more easily be the victim of the fast-growing crime of
identity theft if you do not secure your computer.
- Patch your Windows computers to protect agains worms and other malicious software by
going to windowsupdate.microsoft.com.
That it is critically important to patch your computer is born out by
reports
from the Internet Storm Center that the "survival" time of an unpatched computer when connected
to the Internet is only about 20 minutes on average!
- Also patch MS Office by going to
office.microsoft.com/officeupdate and
clicking on the "Check for Updates" link. (This second web site is only for Windows 2000,
XP, and 2003.)
- With both web sites, be sure to check twice as some patches might have to be
installed first, so that the others only show up on a second visit.
- It is also best to check that you are running the latest version of Sun's Java Runtime
Environment (JRE). This is the software that allows your browser to run Java applets.
Installing the most recent JRE makes it less likely that an attacker will know a successful
way to attack your computer by way of the JRE. See Sun's
Java webpage to download the latest JRE. Currently, this is under a button that says
"Java Software for the Desktop, Looking for the Java Virtual Machine?". You should also read
Sun's description of how to switch
to their Java Virtual Machine.
- If you run Linux, check for security updates and patches for both the operating system
and the applications that you have installed under it.
For Red Hat, check out their security web page and
their Security Resource Center.
- If you want to read security advisories and tips on improving computer security,
a good place to start is CERT.
- Get a good antivirus product, perhaps
Symantec's Norton Antivirus
or McAfee Antivirus. Be sure to configure
it to update its virus definitions weekly, to scan incoming email and chat, and to automatically
scan your drives on a regular basis. If cost is a problem, try a free antivirus product
such as AntiVir Personal Edition.
- Some companies offer free scanning for viruses and other pests via the web. However,
this will only tell you what infections the scan found. It will not remove any of them.
Here are some sites that provide these free scans:
- A program that specifically scans for malware is also helpful. For example, check out
PestPatrol
or CounterSpy.
Freeware for removing spyware includes spybot
and Ad-aware. All of these software items need
to be periodically updated.
- The freeware program SpywareBlaster can keep a lot of
spyware off your computer in the first place (whereas some others are
designed more to remove spyware after the fact). Again, remember to update this software as
old software only handles old pests.
- Consider placing personal firewall software on your PC. Here you might look at
the free ZoneAlarm or the commercial ZoneAlarm Pro from
http://www.zonelabs.com.
Other possibilities include Kerio
Personal Firewall, Sygate Personal
Firewall, and Outpost Firewall (either
the free or the pro version). Note that it takes some tinkering to get a firewall properly configured
so that you can do your work but other access is turned off.
- See Bruce Schneier's article, Who says safe computing must remain a pipe dream? for an expert's
perspectives on PC security.
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