New Year’s Resolutions: safer Internet usage

Celebration of the New Year is a time of looking back at the closing year and looking forward to the new year. This is often a time when we set new personal goals for improving our lives in meaningful ways.

Given how much we all use personal computing (you do if you are reading this), all of us can stand to make one or more improvements in our computing hygiene, making us safer and better off.

This article contains categories of ideas that you can choose from. Read through these and decide which of them will be best for you to adopt as a resolution.

Home computing

• Back up your data, so that you can recover it in case of theft, disaster, or other loss.
• Keep your anti-virus working and healthy.
• Configure your computer to automatically download and install security patches.
• Use an online virus scanner to scan your computer, in case your install anti-virus misses one.
• Use different user accounts for each family / household member.
• Use OpenDNS to help prevent visiting phishing sites.
• Use OpenDNS to restrict the types of sites that can be visited from your home (or office) network.
• Tune up your home firewall (which may be in your DSL router or cable modem).
• Use different passwords for each online site you log in to; use a password vault to remember your passwords.

Safe smartphone usage

• Choose a good unlock password for your smart phone. If you insist on using numeric only, use 8 or more digits.
• Set your smartphone auto-lock to 15 minutes or less.
• Keep track of where your smartphone is at all times.
• Install a “find my smartphone” app to discover its location if lost or stolen.
• Do not save any passwords on your smartphone.
• Limit your access to sensitive / valuable information (e.g. online banking) from your smartphone, especially if it is Android.

Protecting your identity

• Keep your anti-virus working and healthy.
• Check your credit report at least once per year (or, more ideally, every four months by checking your credit report for a different bureau each time).
• Be conscious of where and how you provide personal information (name, address, date of birth, etc.) to online sites.
• Resist the urge to click on links or documents in suspicious looking e-mail messages. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is a scam.
• Carefully review all financial statements from banks and credit cards. Consider closing some accounts if you have too many.
• Get a home safe or use a bank safe deposit box to store valuables such as passports, birth certificates, seldom-used credit cards, and other valuables.
• Use a home shredder to shred documents containing sensitive or personal information.

If you feel you need to starting doing all of the above, I suggest you choose the few that are most important and establish them as good habits. Then, return to this list and choose a few more to implement. If you attempt to make too many changes at once, you might become frustrated by all of the changes and revert back to your old ways.

New Christmas computer, part 2: anti-virus

You are savoring your new PC and visiting your usual haunts: Facebook, Netflix, Hulu, and more.

But if this new PC does not have anti-virus, a firewall, and other precautions, the glitter will soon be gone, and you’ll soon wonder why the problems you’re having in 2013 are related to that new PC.

New machines are a good time to develop new habits. Sure, there’s a little trouble now, but you’ll save hours of grief later.  Think of this as the moments required to fasten the seat belt in your car and perhaps a bit of discomfort – but compare that to the pain and expense of injuries incurred in even a minor crash if you weren’t wearing it. Minor decisions now can have major consequences later.

Habit #2: Install and configure anti-virus

While many new computers come with anti-virus software, often it’s a limited “trial” version from one of the popular brands such as Symantec, McAfee, or Trend Micro. If you don’t mind shelling out $40 or more for a year (or more) of anti-virus protection, go ahead and do so now before you forget. Granted, most of these trial versions are aggressively “in your face” about converting your trial version into a full purchased version.  Caution: if you get into the habit of dismissing the “your trial version is about to run out!” messages, you run the risk of turning a blind eye when your trial anti-virus is no longer protecting you.  Better do it now!

If your computer did not come with anti-virus software, I suggest you make that the first order of business. There are many reputable brands of anti-virus available today, available online or from computer and electronics stores. For basic virus (and Trojan, worms, key loggers, etc.), all of the main brands of anti-virus are very similar.

My personal preference for anti-virus programs (in order) are:

1. Kaspersky
2. Sophos
3. AVG
4. Norton
5. McAfee
6. Panda
7. Trend Micro

Note: if selecting, installing, and configuring anti-virus seems to be beyond your ability, consult with the store where you purchased your computer, or contact a trusted advisor who is knowledgable on the topic.

Key configuration points when using anti-virus:

• “Real time” scanning – the anti-virus program examines activity on your computer continuously and blocks any malware that attempts to install itself.
• Signature updates – the anti-virus program should check at least once each day for new updates, to block the latest viruses from infecting your computer.
• Periodic whole disk scans – it is a good idea to scan your hard drive at least once a week. If you keep your computer on all the time, schedule the scan to take place when you are not using the computer, as a scan can slow down your computer.
• Safe Internet usage – many anti-virus programs contain a feature that will try to warn you or steer you away from sites that are known to be harmful.

Many anti-virus programs also come with a firewall and other tools. Some of these may be useful as well – consult your computer retailer or a trusted advisor to see what’s right for you.

Part 1: password security

Part 3: data backup