Unfortunately, Wednesday I ran into a problem with viruses on my computer so I had to spend that day trying to fix it all, a task that was only completed today, so I didn't really feel like nor did I have the time to start what I promised in the last update. I'll be back Friday afternoon with that. In the meantime, here is something I copied and pasted from my blog concerning ways to safeguard your computer.
No, this is not a blog where I discuss how to avoid those MySpace spammers or anything related to that site*, but rather, how to safeguard your computer in general against viruses, Trojan Horses, or whatever. *Although, the best advice I can give towards that is that if you're logged in, you click on a page and suddenly it shows that you're logged out and you have to re-enter your username and password… don't do it! Go back to the preceding page. I've heard that's the most common way people end up getting those spam bulletins that go out under their name.
Now, way back in the past when my family first had a computer (back in the late 90's) we (not even me!) was that "tech-savvy" so we did get "bit in the bum" with problems concerning viruses and a Trojan Horse. Luckily I found a program that deleted the Trojan and since then I've made sure that both my and my parent's computer had an anti-virus program (such as Norton's or McAfee's; I've used both; if you can choose between the two then get Norton, although McAfee is just about as good) that was updated on a weekly basis (THAT is an important step you can't neglect) and since then I haven't had any problems… until yesterday. Note that I'm very careful in what I download and look at and if something does go wrong, then almost always Norton will note it and give me a warning not to download it, and/or it will prevent me from downloading it. Well, disaster happened yesterday due to one very sneaky and well disguised program and it took me whipping out the credit card and having to buy more than one program online in order to get rid of the viruses… Holy Christ was it ever a nightmare but finally, after a lot of hard work I believe that I got rid of everything (and along the way also deleted some minor adware and similar programs that were causing minor headaches for me, so it turned out well in the end). Yeah, it did cost money, but I know it would've been cheaper than having to mainframe taken in to have it all erased, as everything on the hard drive would be erased so you would have to burn the stuff you want to save on disc first, and yeah it was so well worth it to try and thankfully be able to fix everything on my own. Now, besides the advice of keeping everything updated, here is some recommendations on free programs and programs that cost money that you may at least think about getting, especially if you're experiencing virus trouble and what you have already can't get rid of it:
Free stuff:
Spybot Search & Destroy (http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html). It will get rid of most of the minor adware stuff.
VirtumundoBeGone (http://www.knight47.com/downloads/Mundo-b-Gone.exe) If you do your scanning and discover that you have this nasty little bugger on your computer, then the only way I know to fully get rid of it for good is by downloading this program. Yeah, it will cause the dreaded "blue screen" to pop up after you're done, but in this case it's good. You just manually start up your computer again, and the virus is gone.
AVG Anti-Spyware (http://www.grisoft.com/doc/download-free-anti-rootkit/us/crp/0) This is another tool to get rid of adware that other programs may not find.
Shit you have to pay for:
Trojan Remover: (http://www.simplysup.com/) This is supposed to be something that's free for 30 days, but I couldn't get it to work without spending 30 bones on it. It's ok, as it's well worth the cost. I've used it in the past to get rid of crap, and it's always worked (including yesterday).
Spyware Doctor (http://www.pctools.com/spyware-doctor/) This will get rid of the "heavy hitters" that are on your computer that Norton can't delete. It's another 30 bones to get, but again may be well worth the cost to you.
The main thing that I have to stress is… be careful and never let your guard down.
I'm sure I'll be back sometime during the weekend with a new blog.
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