Protecting Yourself on the Web

Thursday, 29 March 2007

Now more than ever, you can never be sure of what evil lurks in the digital world, ready to wreak havoc on your computer—and your corporate firewalls won't always protect you from identity thieves or hackers while you're on the road. Here are some steps to protect you from the dangers of surfing the Web: 1. Stop Wi-Fi Hackers In spaces with public Wi-Fi, hacks are setting up fake access points and luring in unsuspecting victims to get onto their computers or grab credit card information. When you're on the road, disable your WiFi connection until you are ready to log on. Set your computer to only seek out infrastructure access points, which are "official" hotspots, vs. peer-to-peer networks. And never plug in credit card information for a Wi-Fi provider if you think the site looks suspicious, or if it asks you for the data again after you've already logged on and paid for that period. 2. Beat Phishers Phishers, or those Internet thieves who send you false e-mails asking for personal information, are getting more sophisticated all the time, and their e-mails aren't always chockfull of misspellings or bad corporate logos, as in the early days of phishing. If you get an e-mail from a service provider, it's safest to log into your account from the official Web site, rather than through a link in the e-mail. And always make sure any site you go to asking with sensitive information is preceded by https—the "s" means it's a secure site. 3. Lock-out WiFi freeloaders At the very least, letting unauthorized Wi-Fi users on to your connection bogs down your service. At worst, these folks can be using your network for shady Web surfing or even to access your personal computer. Home office workers need to secure their WiFi with, at the very least, WEP encryption, although the safest bet is to always try and use a virtual private network. 4. Keep security measures up to date This is the most obvious way to protect your computer from viruses and hackers, but many people ignore their virus protection software's update alerts or simply click past the authentication certificates for Web sites they visit without giving them a proper once over. Don't neglect any security measures you should be taking. The few minutes it takes to keep on top of these things will prevent a meltdown down the road. Source: TrainingMag

 

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