Safety Tips

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Now that we have everything up and running, there are a few things we have to change about our surfing habits. Following these tips will help make sure that you are as protected as you can be.

• Gambling and pornography sights are notorious for infecting your PC with spyware and malware. Try to stay away from them.


• Make sure you are using a firewall. Windows comes with one pre-installed and will usually tell you if one is not running.


• Have an anti-virus program installed and up to date. I suggest using Avira. It is free and can be used along with CCleaner and Spybot.


• Don't click 'Yes' or 'OK' to everything that pops up. A lot of times, spyware and malware will notify you in some form that it is trying to install itself. Make sure you read what you are agreeing to, and always verify the source.


• Be wary of links in that they may be to fake websites or silent downloads. Pictures with links embedded in them can also lead to an unwanted install. Jokes, donations and personal ads are notorious for this.


• With the age of Twitter and Facebook has come what is known as link shortening. What this does is takes a link such as http://www.pcworld.com/article/163589/firefox_addon_fights_social_network_phishes.html and shortens it to http://tinyurl.com/cfh47c. The downside to this is that malicious links can be hidden from view until it is too late. I use http://longurl.org/ to preview links before I open them.



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