How To Avoid Hazards Of The Internet
Posted: Sunday, February 08, 2009
by Joel Hendon
http://hebronics.org/index.html
It is difficult to put one's finger on the exact date of the birth of the Internet. It was created sometime during the early 1970's and in only slightly more than 3 decades, has grown from the connecting of those who originated it (And Al Gore wasn't one of them), into almost infinite numbers. The stats for December 2008 from "Internet World Stats" covering 233 nations and regions, showed 1,565,000,000 internet users. Or a little more than one of every five people in he world. That shows an huge increase in 13 years from 16,000,000 in 1995.
It is such a shame. I often wish, when I get one of those scam attempts or a phishing attempt, that my computer was equipped with a program that would fire a taser charge right into the sender's face.
Two of the most common occurrences are (1) the old "Nigerian" money offer. You have been chosen to receive 14.5 million USD from an aged dying widow who only wants to help you in some worthy project. (2) The phishing email where some financial institutions logos and/or stationary have been copied and used to look like a very legitimate letter from your bank. They will want you to click on a link in response, and if you do, they will be able to harvest your email address, and anything else that is shown. If they ask for your SS number, or bank account number, and you give it to them, you are in deep trouble.
My first receipt of a phishing nature was several years ago and I would have fell for it big time, had it not been from an institution which I had no account and never had. So I notified that institution and received their thanks. I have received several since, some of which I did have an account, but having been alerted by the first one, I never fell for one. I always look up the real institution's website and send them a copy of such letters, with a brief explanation. Your bank, credit union or even online institution such as PayPal will be quick to tell you they will never send such an email. If there is such a problem, they will only ask you to log into your account, with the information you already have.
Also beware of proxy ISP's. Some ISP's have their own proxy servers which use cookies to cache website URL's you visit. This enables faster loading of those pre-visited sites and, if your own ISP is reputable and has proper security features, there is no real harm for them to do that. And, there are also good and secure proxy ISP's that you may use, but take care that you know how secure they are before utilizing them. And don't try to pull something crooked by using the proxy IP address. There are means that some agencies have of determining your real address.
All children and teens should have computer supervision. That may sound old fashioned to you but take my word for it, it is better than having one stalked, raped or murdered. There are means of screening the sites available to them. There is little good to be found in most chat rooms or other interactive sites. Most of them are filled with vulgarity and stuff that young people have no business being involved in.
Certain things you need to keep down much unwanted traffic and dangerous emails or websites are an Anti Virus program, many computers come with a number of safety programs built in, check them out closely and see if they have an anti-virus protection, a good firewall or other such programs and be sure they are enabled to protect the machine. If not, check with Norton or some other reputable anti-virus programs organization. Read your computer's manual and determine which settings you prefer that will allow you to access those sites which you want, and eliminate those you don't want.
Also find out if there is already a program on your computer which will remove tracking cookies or other undesirable programs such as spy ware, ad ware, etc. If it doesn't, you may find a free downloadable program such as "Window's Defender", "Lavasoft Free" or any of the other reputable programs. Most of the free ones will do a reasonable job of finding and removing those undesirable programs, but usually do not stop them from being implanted on your hard drive, nor do they run scheduled scans. But for a reasonable fee you may purchase those that do have those features.
One final caution, beware and be careful when searching for free stuff. Those that offer free stuff, especially that of some value, have to have a means of recouping their money. Many will steal your email address (required in order to do business with them), and your other personal information, ie., mailing address, phone number and anything else they may ask you for. Others will sneak spyware or adware onto your hard drive unless you have a really good program to prevent it.
I once had my hard drive so loaded with adware programs, each time I went online, I was bombarded with pop-ups, sometimes it took me two or three minutes to delete them all. And if you visit some sites, they will put porn pop-ups onto your hard drive. So, unless you have proper protection against these adware programs, it would be much safer not to attempt to access those sites advertising free products.
And one final solution for avoiding excessive spam email. If you don't already have an online web mail address, get one. There are several offered free. Then when you visit a site and have an interest in something they have, use your web mail address for it until you are convinced they have not put you on an opt-in email list. Then your web mail will take the brunt of spam, keeping your regular mail from being so overwhelmed with unwanted mail.
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Top-level comments on this article: (5 total)Hi Joel.Lots of excellent advice and warnings.Thanks,DianneThanks Dianne, I appreciate your reading and comment.
Howdy Joel, good internet history in the beginning, and wonderful sound advice throught the article....wonderfully said, wonderfully done. I have received such letters you referenced about getting that 14.5 million that some politician was assinated by terrorist, and they, whoever they is....want to send me all of this money that this politician had, so that it does not fall into rebel hands for their cause....my do I feel important!!!! Ha ha.....Great article, great advice, and well done.....Your pal in pen....Gary.Thank you Gary, it is good start the day with one of your flattering comments. And I appreciate them too much.Joel
Joel, I agree with Dianne and Gary, very sound advice. Thanks also for the history lesson on the Internet. I had some notions but not many facts. If the Internet were around when I was a kid, it would have been my problem area, not the telephone. I say that but I guess more accurately, my parents would have been because they were obeyed! *smiling*
Blessings to you!Thank you so much Avis, for reading and commenting. I appreciate your kind words.
Interesting article, and some good advice. You're right to point out the dangers of searching for free security software - there's a lot of dodgy software that masquerades as secutity software but is actually malware.However, you can secure your computer just fine by using reputable free software - I recommend Avast / AVG for antivirus, ZoneAlarm / Commodo for firewall (although the XP and Vista firewalls are fine), and SUPER Anti-Spyware for malware protection. Spybot Search and Destroy and Spyware Blaster are also good, but the free versions don't auto-scan or update so you have to do it manually.Whatever you decide to go for, make sure you google the name of the software first to make sure its reputable - see what other people say about it. Make sure you download it from a reputable site - download.com is generally a safe bet.One other tip is - KEEP ALL YOUR SOFTWARE UP TO DATE - in Windows, have the automatic update feature enabled. If you have security software that needs to be updated manually, make sure you update it regularly.... out of date software leaves you more vulnerable, and offers little protection against new threats.Hi Ben, you are correct, thanks for adding those thoughts that I did not.I pay through the nose to Norton for their antivirus and other stuff, but I got a worm infection one time and although it did little damage, it frightened the crap out of me and did require deleting some files which I would rather have not done. So I went to Norton and have stayed there.And you are right, the updating of your windows aids is very important. I believe, that they have most of the bases covered themselves now.
Joel, an an impressive article you have written. I find that the younger generation is geared toward the internet better than the older folks, but you are obviously an exception to that. Awesome article!
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