Windows Vista Just a False Sense of Security

Microsoft has endowed Vista's kernel with highly restricted access, in a bid to improve security in its new operating system. This extra security has succeeded in locking out hackers, malware purveyors and has apparently locked out security software as well.

Competing security software manufacturers say Vista's security system alone is not enough to protect users from threats. Security firm, Webroot Software reported in January that its security testing of Vista revealed significant holes in its security shields. The tests showed Vista to have ineffective blocking capabilities and weak antivirus capabilities in the default anti-spyware and antivirus components within Vista. Webroot also found problems in Microsoft's Live OneCare security suite.

Webroot said Windows Defender failed to block 84 percent of a testing sample set that included 15 of the most common variations of existing spyware and malware. On top of this, Windows Defender did not perform at the level of many third-party security applications.

Is Stealing Personal and Credit Card Information So Easy?

If you didn't know this before, know it now. Hackers on the internet can steal your credit card details and use these details to buy anything they want over the internet. If you're someone with a small credit card limit this might simply be a minor embarrassment or inconvenience. On the other hand if you have a large credit card limit and somebody racks up a huge amount of debt using your name and personal details, imagine the disaster. Think in terms of what you may be required to do in order to resolve the situation, if you agree with the majority who believe that prevention is always better than a cure, you may want to start protecting yourself from harm now rather than wait to be hit by disaster in the future. Modern day living requires modern day protection and these are just some of the few things that you should concern yourself with:

Simple spyware can get all of your information

Hackers can use a simple spyware program in order to detect everything that you do when you're using your computer. These hackers can get access to all your passwords and collect your entire credit card information or information that can provide access to your bank accounts.

Antivirus Software Just Isn't Enough

There's no excuse for not using an antispyware program these days. Having one of these programs can help with spyware infestations. Whereas antiviral programs have a definitions database which focuses primarily on malicious programs, antispyware programs concentrate on ad-based trojans and malware. Makers of antispyware are able to focus more in depth on the latest adware-based attacks. Antivirus makers don't have that luxury and need to focus on more broad targets and may run a step or two behind catching the latest spyware threat.

How Can Someone Get Private Information From My Computer?

From the "Ask Booster" column in the June 17, 2005 issue of Booster's Auction News, a free ezine for online auction sellers and enthusiasts.

Dear Booster,

How can someone get private information from my computer?

Thank you,

Evan S.

Minnesota U.S.A.

Dear Evan,

Hackers can get your private information from your computer in a number of ways. Here are the top ways they do it:

* Computer viruses, spyware and adware from e-mails you've received and/or websites you've visited.

* Hacker programs that find unprotected IP addresses are subject to attack. An IP address is a series of several numbers (ex. 65.129.37.84) that identifies your location on the internet. It's like your "internet" telephone number.

* Entering your financial information (i.e., credit card info) into a website that does not offer secure order processing. Your internet browser should show you that you've entered a secure site.

* Having your financial information "intercepted" by a hacker while shopping online at a legitimate website. This is called "pharming" and is becoming a more worrisome threat.

* You downloaded software from that contained a malicious program.

* You fall victim to a "phishing" or "spoof" scam, whereby you GIVE your personal information away.

* Phishing and spoof e-mails appear as if they are coming from a legitimate website. The e-mail generally alarms the recipient with a message such as "your account has been suspended" or telling you that you need to "verify your account." Most eBay and PayPal users have received at least one (if not several more) spoof e-mails appearing to come from either eBay or PayPal.

eBay has information showing you how to spot spoof. I highly recommend your take a few moments and visit http://pages.ebay.com/education/spooftutorial/index.html for this brief tutorial.

* Another growing threat is called "malware" which is a spyware. Malware is a malicious software which logs your keystrokes and forwards the information to a hacker. This type of software can come through viruses and is often included in downloaded applications.

The Hidden Dangers of Adware

Adware in the purest sense of the word is not a dangerous thing, designed only to display targeted advertising to you while browsing the internet. It was originally developed by marketers to be non intrusive and use very little system resources. You can easily recognize adware by the display of pop up advertisements on your computer screen, often appearing when you perform searches or land on different websites.

Adware can be very annoying, and in the past few years much of adware's functional characteristics have begun to resemble spyware. A large percentage of adware today includes code that tells the advertiser something about you. It often relays information about which sites you visit on the internet, how much time you spend on each site, and what type of content you viewed. Although marketing people consider this information to be harmless to you, most users consider this type of data gathering to be an invasion of privacy. Adware that is delivered in the form of email often tells marketers when you opened the mail, how long you looked at it, and what you did with it.

Who's Watching What You Type?

If someone entered your home, uninvited and installed numerous cameras and listening devices in order to monitor your activities, you would quite rightly be outraged. While such a situation, unless you are living in the Big Brother House, would be considered ridiculous, the same cannot be said for the humble home computer.

Recently released research alarmingly shows that home PC’s are increasingly likely to host software which can watch each and every keystroke the user inputs. According to the research compiled from an audit conducted jointly by the software firm, WebRoot and services provider, EarthLink, the average home PC hosts 28 so-called spyware programs.

Whilst the worst examples of spyware are written by virus writers to steal passwords and hijack computers to launch “denial of service” attacks against web-servers, the vast majority are used to collate marketing information and then target advertising according to the end-users web surfing habits.

The WebRoot/EarthLink audit surveyed more than 1.5 million PC’s during the last 12 months and discovered an amazing 41 million incidents of spyware; adware, Trojans, tracking cookies and other undesirable programs.

Most of these programs are loaded into the computer memory when the PC is started up. From here, the program will work silently, often giving no clues as to its existence. However, unexplained browser window pop-up’s, often advertising adult services and mysterious alterations to the browsers homepage setting are more often than not an indication that spyware is present and active on a computer. One particular piece of spyware, which is proving to be very expensive for many home users, is that of Trojan Diallers. Diallers, often without any warning to the end-user, hangs up the current net connection and then automatically reconnects using a Premium Rate telephone number, thus running up huge telephone bills. The activities of companies using this technology as a revenue stream are currently under investigation in the UK by government watchdogs.

A hard-disk and memory overflowing with spyware used to be one of the unfortunate consequences of visiting sex and adult orientated sites; a kind of eSTD. Like most Internet marketing technologies, from the pop-up to the pop-under and the first snowball of Spam, spyware began life serving the adult industry. Then, just like pop-up, spyware filtered through all aspects of ecommerce. In an interview to the BBC, David Moll, CEO of WebRoot, said that spyware has now become so common across the whole of the Internet, that it can be contracted from nearly anywhere.

So-called “drive-by downloads” are now responsible for most infections of spyware. The term “drive-by” refers to the casualness of the infection. By simply visiting an ordinary webpage a user can unwittingly initiate an automatic download of spyware onto their computer. There are no clues and no warnings.

In a recent, carefully controlled and closed demonstration, it took me less than 20 minutes to create a spyware program and embed it into a webpage. Using colleagues who had previously been made aware of the nature of the experiment, I invited them to take a look at this “special” but very ordinary looking webpage. Within seconds of visiting this webpage, the spyware went to work taking a snapshot of their hard disk, a snapshot of their Favourites folder and a copy of their browsing history. Before they had even finished reading the webpage, the spyware was already transferring their information to my server. It’s as easy as that! Equally that same code could be manipulated to perform a total trash of the hard disk or some other equally miserable and criminal act.

Speaking to the BBC, David Moll explained.

"Some (spyware programs) lurk on misspelled URLs and strike those that type faster than their fingers can carry them. As a result you do not end up where you expect to be."

Alarmingly, users do not even need to visit a website to contract spyware. The preview window in Microsoft’s Outlook Express allows emails containing HTML and any other code which can be placed on a normal webpage, to be loaded, without warning. Companies looking to implant spyware using the “drive-by” principal are regularly exploiting this glaringly obvious flaw in the design of Outlook Express.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/16154

Top Antivirus: What Are the Top 3 Antivirus?

When looking for antivirus software for your PC, you'll find many antivirus programs that promise to protect it from all malware threats. Unfortunately, with many of these programs you won't be able to test their features. And that's because they don't offer trial or free versions.

There are a few that do of course, but many of them are not as effective and you want the right antivirus software program for your PC quickly. Your starting point should be reading antivirus software reviews of the top programs in the industry. And these reviews should be written by customers and experts so you can get an impartial evaluation of these products.

Identifying the top antivirus programs isn't hard. You can find this information on reviews, comparison sites and on reputable online retailer websites. And from these you can choose the best antivirus software for your PC.

We've identified 3 top antivirus programs with the best features and tools. And we recommend you download one of these programs for your computer:

BitDefender

BitDefender has so many good tools it's hard to find any that disappoint. One of its impressive features is the ability to monitor privacy settings on Facebook and Twitter and block any malicious links that could be pushed to you from friends. This feature is crucial as phishing and malware threats have escalated on these social networking sites due to their popularity.

Another feature you get with BitDefender is Anti-Fraud filter. It's an anti-phishing feature that detects and blocks websites that are likely to be scams like fake bank URLs, escrow scams and employment scams. And its other purpose is to monitor your credit with its credit monitoring service. It protects you from scammers who attempt to change your credit reports.

BitDefender has a multitude of other features and tools. And this is one of the main reasons it always tops the list of top antivirus software programs. It protects different types of users and this includes home users, office users, gamers, laptop users and others.

Kaspersky

Kaspersky Antivirus is recognised by all the leading test labs as one of the top antivirus software programs. One of these labs is Virus Bulletin which has awarded it VB100%, a recognition of its 100% success rate in removing 'in the wild' viruses.

Unfortunately, Kaspersky's price is a bit high and you can get cheaper software from the other top programs. But it includes a three-user license which protects three of your PCs for the price of one.

One of its impressive features is the virtual keyboard. This feature you use to prevent credit card, password and username theft. And you use it to type this sensitive information by clicking on the digital keyboard with your mouse. So this stops keyloggers and other spying programs from stealing your personal information.

Panda

Panda is a top antivirus software program with approval and certification from the leading testing bodies. They show that it's one of the most effective at detecting and removing malware threats like viruses, Trojans, keyloggers, spyware, adware and many others. AV-Test for example, gives it excellent scores and shows that it's one of the best antivirus programs.

One of its top features is Panda USB Vaccine which inoculates newly inserted USB drives and stops the spread of autorun.inf threats. This feature vaccinates your whole computer and it disables any autorun utility from USB drives.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6691306

Difference Between Computer Adware, Viruses And Trojans

In order to keep your computer clean and free from computer adware, viruses and Trojans it helps to know the difference between them. Many computer users mistakenly believe that their antivirus software isn't working, only to find out later that what their computer has become infected with isn't a virus at all, but a Trojan or adware software. Viruses, while still prevalent are by far the least common of the three.

A virus is something that spreads on its own across a network or by inserting an infected CD, DVD or floppy disk into the drive. Most antivirus software works fine to detect, clean and prevent virus infections on the PC. While it is true that Mac computers rarely ever get viruses, PC's don't get them very often either. What is more commonly seen today is known as adware and Trojans, both of which affect Mac computers and windows based PC's as well.

A Trojan is something that's taken its name from the mythological Greek Trojan horse because like the Trojan horse in the mythology a computer Trojan is a program that is designed to look like something innocent when the real function is to do something entirely different from what it appears to be. A prime example of a computer Trojan are the many variations of what's known as "fake antivirus" products. The fake antivirus Trojan infections commonly occur when the computer user is surfing the internet and sees an advertisement window pop up with an advertisement that doesn't state that it is an ad like it should, but instead has an image of what looks like an antivirus program telling the user that it has detected a virus infection on their machine and telling the computer user to click on it to remove the virus. Anyone who is not adept at spotting these type of ploys or scams may be tempted to follow the instructions that they are being given through the Trojan advertisement and when they are done they will have actually just installed the Trojan software onto their machine themselves and end up erroneously believing that their antivirus software has failed them.

Adware on the other hand is not as malicious as computer viruses or Trojans but can still have a harmful effect on the functionality of the computer. Many programs such as weather channel software, coupon printers and other seemingly useful applications are offered by the publisher in both free and paid versions. Weather reporting programs for example still have to be paid for somehow, so the publisher offers them in a free version to anyone that wants them however the free version also installs extra items onto the computer to display advertisements which they then receive a commission for displaying. These advertisements will usually slow down the computer, interrupt what you are doing to display ads and can cause conflicts with other programs if they have been poorly designed and tested as is often the case.

Knowing the difference between viruses, Trojans and adware is only the first step in keeping your computer free from them and running well. The second step which is often overlooked is to install the right security software in addition to your antivirus program to detect and remove the Trojans and adware should it find its way onto your computer. While there are many options available it is often advisable to consult your IT support staff or computer service center for recommendations as to which products to use and help you avoid installing an innocently appearing security product that is really a Trojan horse in disguise as something else.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/7728829