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Mar 19, 2008
How to Secure Your PC?
by windshell / General
There are different advices how to secure your PC and your data efficiently. Is it enough just to put Firewall, or just occasional scans with your AntiVirus or AntiSpyware software? Is every email who passes AV filtering safe? Can you recognize and find all threats? In my opinion, it all starts with browser choice. Secure Browser Although being marked as ‘bad’ for security, it seems that the Microsoft Internet Explorer is still very popular choice among users. Regarding security, it offers refined protection through 4 security zones, which can be configured independently: • Internet zone - is the default zone for all sites that are not listed in other zones • Local Intranet - Reserved for local files from local networks • Trusted Sites zone - for sites that users visit frequently, and from where they download files, play Flash animations and employ active scripting • Restricted Sites zone - used for most of the sites to block pop-up advertising, minimize the use of cookies, or restrict other actions allowed by listed sites Second, but not less popular choice is the Mozilla Firefox, has the same way of whitelisting of trusted sites. It provides useful addon, called NoScripts that helps whitelisting a lot. Opera browser offers the settings of global preferences, as well as settings on a site by site basis. But Browser cannot help you. You must have good AntiVirus in order to protect yourself and your PC from the most vicious attackers. AntiVirus Software First dilemma is what is better: Free AV software or paid one? Whatever you choose, you’ll have much more protection. The best AV software by reviews are BiTDefender, Kaspersky, NOD32 and many more you have to pay for. If you prefer free AV, then AVG, Avast or AntiVir would be excellent choice. Of course, even those free options, unlock some advanced features for certain amount. But, they still work very well in free editions. There are a lot of online AV scanners if you want to seek for ‘different opinion’. You think you’re safe with antivirus? You’re wrong. What you need is a wall, a big one. Preferably, made of fire. To stop all intruders, viruses, etc. from entering your PC. Firewall The simplest solution is to activate and to use Windows firewall. If you prefer something else, again, you have paid and free alternatives. Whatever you choose, it will keep intruders outside. First of them is ZoneAlarm. It will always be there to protect you. If you look the best free solution, then Comodo Firewall Pro 3.0 is the right choice and if you want pay some quid or buck then reviews say that Outpost Firewall is the tool for you. Ok, you’ve installed AV and Firewall, but something is still in there. Some kind of worm? AntiVirus won’t help you sometimes with worms, trojans and some types of spyware. Some of them will pass through the Firewall protection. The solution is to install one of the Anti-spyware solutions. AntiSpyware Software Some AV software offers antispyware protection as well, so it’s easy to integrate all features with simple paying for AV only. Those AVs are Norton, AVG or McAfee combo. If you like free options then AdAware or Spybot - Search & Destroy are for you. They can work together as well, which is not case with combination with two or more AV programs or Firewalls. But, that’s not all. You surely forgot rootkits. Those nasty little things that integrate into your system and open doors for other intruders. Especially bad is rootkit which hides into Windows master boot record in order to take control of your PC. Scared? You should be. Fortunately, there are a lot of AV and AntiSpyware programs that offers anti-rootkit scan and removal, as well as stand-alone Anti-rootkit scanners. Ok. Did you check your emails? Just turn HTML off and don’t trust the suspicious email even if known address (just address) is in the header. Never open suspicious mails and never ever click to claim win on lottery, to see message of love that someone sent to you or click on suspicious links. Fortunately, most of AV programs offer scan of email. You’ve got a headache? But I didn’t list all of the threats. Nevermind. Some other time. This will be enough for the start.
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