Virus, malware, and security in general
Nov 30
I’m not suggesting you stop drinking coffee – I would never deprive anyone of that life giving nectar! Heck, It’s a known fact that 95% of the tech world runs on Coffee (the other 5% substitutes alternate caffeinated beverages).
What I am suggesting is that you delete, remove, and abandon Java on your computer!
Why? …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/you-should-junk-your-java/
Nov 30
If you’re anything like me you’ll have literally dozens of logins and accounts which require a password for authentication, and having lots of passwords plus a bad memory is not exactly an advantageous combination.
Anyone can easily create a very strong password in just a matter of seconds simply by typing a long string of …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/how-to-create-a-strong-password-that-you-can-actually-remember/
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/lavasoft-owners-accused-of-nefarious-deeds/
Nov 12
For the uninitiated; Steam is a games distribution platform, developed by Valve Corporation, which is very popular among the gaming fraternity. News recently hit the headlines that Steam Forums, the associated discussion board, had been hacked. Now, Valve CEO Gabe Newell has announced that the breach was more serious and in fact goes beyond the …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/a-warning-for-steam-account-holders/
Nov 11
If you haven’t updated Adobe’s Flash player in the last 23 hours you should do so right now!
Adobe has released a critical update for Flash player that addresses 12 serious security holes in the software in versions 11.0.1.152 and earlier. This affects ALL Microsoft Windows systems, as well as Mac, Linux, and Solaris.
From …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/critical-update-for-flash-player-12-security-holes-patched/
Nov 10
We all share our personal information online daily with multiple parties. Many of us, unwisely, also use the same login information for multiple sites. While most of us pay particular attention to security we have little control over the sites we contact and the practices they follow and those who are susceptible to malware or …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/11/hacked-cracked-phished-or-pwned/
Oct 19
The latest scam being utilized to propagate malware involves emails purporting to emanate from an official postal service. The emails include an attachment of course, and that is where the malware lurks. I was first notified of this latest scam just a couple of days ago by a very good friend who lives in Victoria, …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/10/beware-the-latest-email-scam-malware/
Oct 16
According to the latest Microsoft Security Intelligence Report released very recently, 45% of all malware infections are propagated per medium of social engineering techniques. These are the threats which trick users into running a malicious program and rely heavily on user interaction.
Not far behind is malware inflicted by maliciously taking advantage of the Windows …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/10/almost-50-of-malware-infections-are-self-inflicted/
Oct 05
Almost one month ago, the official distribution site for the Linux kernel was shut down following a serious malware incident. The people behind the Linux kernel discovered malware on the PC of at least one kernel maintainer, as well as on the kernel.org servers themselves.
The good news is that kernel.org is now back online. …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/10/linux-kernel-back-online/
Oct 04
Longtime Avira fans will immediately notice their favorite anti-virus software has undergone a minor name change; “AntiVir” has been dropped from the title and Avira AntiVir Personal now becomes Avira Free Antivirus. Avira may have changed the name for the latest version of their popular software but don’t expect too much in the way of …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/10/avira-free-antivirus-2012-released/
Sep 24
When it comes to security, it seems everyone has their own favorite software and preferred strategy. Some favor an integrated suite, where all components are included under the one umbrella and compatibility is all but guaranteed. Many prefer to rely on a combination of components sourced from a variety of different developers, and it is …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/09/how-to-make-firewalls-and-anti-virus-software-play-nice-together/
Sep 18
My last post was a real teaser according to some. I have to admit that was my intention; however, I meant what I said. The conventional way of looking at passwords is completely wrong. And it is wrong for one very big and completely overlooked reason. Follow these next three posts and you’ll see exactly …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/09/everything-i-said-about-passwords-is-wrong-not-the-new-password-paradigm-part-1/
Sep 12
We recently posted on the forum warning our readers about a telephone scam which has been doing the rounds and proliferating:
The scam starts with a phone call from someone claiming to be a Microsoft representative. They will tell the consumer that they have received numerous error reports from the home Windows PC and need …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/09/fake-microsoft-scams/
Aug 28
Well, not quite, but there is one fundamental thing about passwords that I and almost every other security expert has overlooked. For a long, long time, we in the security business have been thinking about maximal strength, maximum entropy, minimal length passwords; we have been saying things like “minimum eight characters, upper and lower case …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/08/everything-ive-ever-said-about-passwords-was-wrong/
Aug 17
Agnitum Software’s free security suite has been around a little while now so I thought it was about time to check it out. Please note; I have not installed and tested the software, merely collected and perused a heap of reviews to gain an overall impression.
Agnitum Software’s free security suite has been around …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.davescomputertips.com/2011/08/outpost-security-suite-free/