Online Safety Special
As seen in The Chronicle: with extra info and links
The Internet is full of opportunities; we can do all kinds of things with it: keep in touch, research products, go shopping at the best prices, do our banking, share our photos with each other and much more. But unfortunately it also offers opportunities to unsavoury characters, who would like to intercept your email or surfing, steal your identity and take your money.
That makes it really important to protect yourself when using the Internet, but there can be a bewildering array of options and information available, and keeping up to date with it all can be a nightmare.
So below we’ve provided a simple, beginners’ guide to taking basic steps to ensure you’re protected from some of the more common scams, with information on how to get these critical programmes for free. If you have any comments, please get in contact with us here
General Safety information from the UK Government. Topics include:
- What are the risks?
- How do I protect my PC?
- Avoid Online rip offs
- Help me stop identity theft
http://www.getsafeonline.org/nqcontent.cfm?a_id=1
Visit OnGuard Online for twelve games designed to help raise your Internet safety awareness in a more interesting and memorable way. Games include:
- Beware of Spyware
- ID Theft Faceoff
- Invasion of the Witeless hackers
- Phishing Scams
- Spam Scam Slam
- The Case of the Cyber Criminal
http://www.onguardonline.gov/games/overview.aspx
Be suspicious
It’s common sense really. If you got a letter through the front door saying your bank has lost your information, please can you write it down on this paper and send it back, you’d probably think twice before doing so. ‘Phishing’ emails do exactly that, asking you to follow a link, usually with some urgency expressed and a threat to prey on your worry, for example telling you all your money will be lost if you don’t click the link and enter your username and password. Remove the ‘don’t’ and you’re getting closer to the truth. Think hard before entering your sensitive data anywhere.
Firewall
The very first bit of software you must have is what’s called a Firewall. This is a bit like an electronic bouncer that stands by your internet connection, looking the incoming websites up and down, and assessing whether they can be trusted. It’s a first barrier against those who look like they want to make trouble. Click the link below to find recommended software.
Zone Alarm (free & commercial addtions)
Anti-virus
The next most important thing is anti-virus software – in case something nasty sneaks past your Firewall bouncer, you should have anti-virus software. This sniffs out aggressive viruses (programmes which can damage your computer and replicate and spread themselves) and quickly disarms and blocks them before they get to do any harm. One of the well known types of viruses simply sends an email to everyone in your address book, pretending to be you. This doesn’t seem so bad until you realise that in a large company where every other member of staff has every other member of staff on their address book, this automated multi-mailing will soon clog up the system until it grinds to a complete halt. Click the links below to find recommended software.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Most viruses require you to open an attachment to an email, so a key piece of advice is NEVER open an attachment unless you are completely sure what it’s about – EVEN IF IT APPEARS TO BE FROM SOMEONE YOU KNOW. Check with them first.
AVG Anti-virus free edition (free)
Kaspersky Anti-Virus (subscription)
Anti-spyware
Get anti-spyware software – some criminals use software that spies on whatever you do on your computer. This will often sneak into your computer, perhaps bundled in a download you did want, or by calling itself something it’s not (ironically, illegal spyware often purports to be anti-spyware for your safety!). Once installed it can log your personal details, payment passwords, and watch your surfing habits. Furthermore, in some cases it can take over your computer entirely making it unusable, and the criminal’s tool. Anti-spyware software is similar anti-virus software and the two often come together. Click the links below to find recommended software.
Microsoft Windows Defender (comes with Vista, downloadable for XP)
Spyware search-and-destroy (free)
Ad-Aware (free & commercial editions)
Automatic Updates
Get regular updates – an important thing to remember about the Internet and computers in general is that they are always, constantly, rapidly evolving. What this means in practice is that after a few months, your software will be out of date. That’s why it’s now standard for software companies to offer updates and service packs, which bring your software in line with all the latest developments. It’s vital to accept these updates in order to patch up holes that have been discovered. Some of them will just do it automatically when you turn your computer on or off, and some will put a little speech bubble in the corner of your screen, asking if you’d like to install updates. Check the update is for a programme you have installed and then accept it. This applies to anti-virus and spyware, operating systems (such as Windows or Mac’s OS) and browsers (such as Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox).
Backup
You can take every precaution and be so careful, but still things may go wrong. That’s the nature of computers (and life in general some might say) so the golden rule is ALWAYS BACK UP. Make sure you save important documents to disks and have at least two copies of anything that’s going to be a pain to lose.
Passwords
Don’t
- Use the same one for everything
- Email them to anyone
- Use common words
Do
- Use more than eight digits
- Use a mixture of capitals and lowercase, letters and numbers
- Change your passwords regularly or use a password manager
Fake Anti-Spyware
Unfortunately, those cunning Internet criminals have caught on to the fact that they can disguise their spyware as safety software. These downloads not only do not protect you from spyware, but may add more. The main protection against this is to not trust any pop-up ads that tell you they have found your computer is infected and that you must click to protect yourself now.
Furthermore, if you’re not sure, there are lists of known fake anti-spyware here:
http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm#products
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_software#Partial_list_of_rogue_software
Think your computer is infected?
If you think your computer might already be infected with spyware, you can get a free PC safety scan from Microsoft, here:
http://onecare.live.com/site/en-us/default.htm
Email Scams
Many con artists use spam messages to trick people into revealing sensitive data and parting with money. Below is a link to a list of the ten most common email scams, which you can familiarize yourself with in order to avoid being caught out.
http://www.onguardonline.gov/topics/email-scams.aspx
Hoaxes
Many people pass on hoax emails with the best intentions, but don’t realise they are at best the butt of a joke for believing such wild claims, and at worst wasting precious time of all those they forward these emails to. Most hoaxes prey on safety fears, and feature stories of a terrifying mugging of a lone woman with some new chemical or a missing child. Before passing on emails like this, check if they are genuine or not by typing a few keywords from the email into google, along with the word hoax. The results will tell you if it is true or false. Alternatively, you can go to one of the following sites and search for it there:
http://www.hoax-slayer.com/
http://www.snopes.com/