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Computer Security - Beat The Hackers The Easy Way
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Technology has come so far in the past ten years. It is hard to even imagine that it was only within the last thirty years in our history that personal computers came into existence.
As I write this, we have become a society that runs on computers and everything is at our fingertips. The modern computer gives us access to a virtual world, filled with information and multimedia and we can almost do anything we want to using a computer.
Along with these amazing new technologies and exchange of information and data, we have also had to bear the unfortunate dilemma of dealing with the misuse of technology by hackers, almost from the inception of personal computing itself. It often seems like We are at the mercy of hackers, and we need to know how we can make sure our privacy and computer security is maintained.
The sad fact is that there is a growing number of people, who are bent on hacking into business or personal computers in order to delete or steal private information.
Financial gain from the theft of personal information is rampant now, and identity theft is becoming a more common form of cybercrime. Most hackers are content to delete or destroy the information on a computer or to take a computer over and turn it into one of their own hacking devices. Generally, these types of attacks occur without the user's knowledge.
What can we do then to protect ourselves from all these problems? The best protection against phishing, spam, viruses, trojans and spyware attacks are to have two software applications installed that are especially designed to fight off these intruders. One is a Firewall and the other is an AntiVirus program.
The Firewall is a piece of software designed to act just like the Firewall barrier in a car, which protects the car's passengers against fire in the engine. Firewalls can be complicated to set up, but they are essential. Once operating, they will safeguard the user from getting viruses through the internet because of this layer of protection.
Next important is the AntiVirus software. We have so many new viruses appearing daily, that there are AntiVirus software companies that, solely, check for new viruses, build into their software an antidote and then issue these updates to owners of their product. The AntiVirus software is designed to prevent any viruses from being executed on the computer, thereby, preventing disaster.
There are many other methods that can help us to protect ourselves against spam, viruses, trojans and spyware and, for the most part, these involve us being educated and careful about what we do online and what we access. Opening emails with attachments is basically a no go zone these days, and we should use caution with what websites we go to. Hackers are now offering us what looks like legitimate AntiVirus software filled with viruses and trojans, so we need to make ourselves aware of these tricks.
The way a bank teller learns to differentiate counterfeit money from real money is by studying real money, so they can pick out a fake at forty paces. In the same way, We need to make sure we are informed about what the best practices are with our computer use, so we avoid making mistakes that could cost us our data. We need to learn and talk to people who are knowledgable about these things. If you do this, you will keep a step ahead of the hackers.
About the Author
About the author: Sam Johnson is an IT Professional with many years of experience in computer security. For lots more advice and helpful tips on all aspects of computer security visit our website at TimeSaverGuides.com.
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