In Part One of “Computer Security: Understanding the Risks and Taking Action” I talked about the different types of malicious software which can harm your computer, and their four primary categories, viruses, spyware, adware, and malware. In Part Two, I am going to discuss what you need to do to protect your computer from these threats.

First of all, there is the necessity of installing antivirus software on your PC. The most popular product among our clients is Symantec Endpoint Security (Formerly Symantec Antivirus), though there are others which can be effective as well, such as products by McAfee and Trend Micro. These products have management consoles, which allow a network administrator to monitor and maintain the software from a single location; usually the server. For a business network environment, we consider this to be very important, since it’s otherwise extremely difficult to make sure all the computers in your environment are fully protected. You should also have a centralized email filtering method, either through software installed on your server, or through having all your email filtered by a 3rd party service before it arrives at your server (we offer this through our partnership with Message Labs).

Antivirus software primarily protects you from viruses, which is good, but it isn’t always enough. More recent versions of antivirus software include spyware/malware/adware protection as well. If your antivirus software product is more than a couple years old, even if you still get current virus definition updates, it probably does not have the enhanced protection you need. It should also have a malware component, or else you need separate software to protect you from other kinds of threats. Also, some antivirus software vendors charge additional money for the added protection.

Microsoft has its own product which offers this kind of protection, called Windows Defender. This is a free download and probably worth having. It may already be installed on your computer, particularly if you have Windows Vista. There are other products which have been available for some time, such as Lavasoft® Ad-Aware and Spybot Search & Destroy®.

But even if you have ample protection installed on your computer, it’s still not enough if you don’t learn to protect yourself with a certain amount of “common sense”. Don’t visit questionable web sites (we’ve found that visiting gambling and adult-content web sites poses the biggest threat to your computer, but it’s not only these). Don’t go to sites you don’t trust, and don’t allow these sites to install anything on your computer if you have any doubt at all as to its integrity. Also don’t open questionable emails, or if you open them, definitely don’t open any attachments which want to run on your computer. Make sure you know what something is before you agree to expose your PC to it.

By following these rules you will protect yourself pretty well from the various threats which are out there. It is, of course, a never-ending battle, since new means of attacking your computer are born every day. We must remain vigilant.

Please feel free to call us at 630-379-0330 for more information.