Posts tagged malware

FT.com / Technology – Apple Macs hit by scareware attacks

0
257 days
by in Internet, Mac, Personal Computing

I knew it would happen sometime.. scareware that has been common on pc platforms is now showing up on Macs.  Read on..

FT.com / Technology – Apple Macs hit by scareware attacks.

Know your Antivirus/Anti-Spyware software..

0
425 days
by in Internet

I got a call from a very freaked-out relative a few weeks ago.. this person was very, very worried because out of the blue a program was telling them that they had a ton of viruses on their system and they were being warned that their personal banking information had been exposed to hackers. I got this person to calm down a bit and asked if they had clicked on anything in that window.. and luckily they hadn’t. This person had nearly fallen prey to a type of potential malware called “scareware”.boo

What is “Scareware”, you ask?  Technically speaking.. it is a piece of software designed to fool the average computer user into paying for a service that they don’t need by convincing them that they do in fact need what the scammer is selling.  The most common scareware I’ve seen in the past few months is the very same one that my relative stumbled upon.. a fake antivirus program that looks very, very real – all the way down to the Windows Vista-styled icons.  In this case the fake AV program was only a pop-up ad, albeit a very dangerous one.. click anywhere in the window and, voila – spyware infection.  This is the very reason that you need to know exactly what antivirus and anti-spyware you have installed on your system.. if something different comes up you can kill it via the Windows taskbar.

If you’re not sure what antivirus or anti-spyware software you’re currently running is called I’ll be happy to help you.. just drop me a line.

Read PDF Files? You might be asleep at the wheel and headed over the cliff..

3
580 days
by in Internet, Linux, Mac, Personal Computing, Windows 7

Back in March of this year a security expert figured out a way to use a specially-crafted Adobe PDF file to cause your computer to run an executable file embedded in that PDF document.  If you understood what I just wrote there’s a pretty high likelihood that you heard about the flaw and did your Adobe update last week when the patch was released.  If you didn’t really get any of that you’re probably one of millions of people who don’t pay attention to the little blinking update icons sitting down there in your system tray.  If that’s you, you need to change your ways!  Most of the virus and malware issues I see are a result of two things: outdated virus subscriptions and missing system updates.  Updates, especially Windows updates can be tedious.  This is one of those things that you just have to do, so make the time!

Important Updates to do:

  • Antivirus (it should be doing this automatically)
  • Windows Updates (I’m not a fan of auto-applied updates – do them manually as the icon pops up)
  • Java updates (these are less frequent, do them as they come up)
  • Adobe updates (also infrequent, so catch them when they arrive)

Software updates are a fact of life on any platform – including Mac and Linux.  In fact.. Linux updates come out much more frequently than Windows updates.  Manage these little annoyances and you’ll have fewer computer issues!

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