Computers: The Importance of Protecting Your PC from Viruses and Spam

The Importance of Protecting Your PC from Viruses and Spam

Written by Ken Katz

Today repparttar

internet is a mine field of malicious code looking to harm your computer. Hackers want to have access to your PC for both fun and profit. You must be diligent in your ability to detect and then protect your important computer data.

Understanding what hackers are looking for, what doors they use to gain entry into your computer and which programs are available to help you protect your PC against any illegal entry will give you greater peace of mind and protect your valuable data.

There are three types of threats to your computer that you need to be concerned about. The first are viruses. The definition of a computer virus is a piece of code or a program that is that is loaded onto and run on your computer without your knowledge. They can attach themselves to other programs on your computer. Some Virus’ can reproduce at a great rate and in turn use up a lot of your computer memory. This eventually can cause your computer to crash. You get Viruses most commonly via email or downloading programs and files. One way is in form of .exe files. If you receive an .exe file you should never open it unless it has been checked and approved as safe by your virus protection program.

Viruses can come into your computer in many other forms. You have to be careful with flash files, movies, mp3 and even .jpeg files. This is a good reason to have virus protection software installed on your computer. Companies like Norton, McAfee (McAfee.com), Trend Micro who makes PC-cilliin (trendmicro.com) and Grisoft (grisoft.com) among others make excellent virus protection products. Grisoft makes AVG Pro which is competent virus protection software. They have a personal edition which is free to use and is very good.

The next piece of software that is needed to protect your PC computer is a firewall. A firewall is used to block illegal access to your computer or network. It will block suspicious data from flowing into your PC and block unapproved programs outside your computer from taking data from your PC.

Simple Tasks to Boost PC Performance

Written by Willie Long

Many people wonder why their computer seems to get slower and slower as time passes. Just like a car, a computer needs routine maintenance to continue running properly. Here are several steps to get your system back in order.

Check Your Hard Drive for free space

If you are running out of storage space, your computer will definitely slow down. You can simply double click My Computer, right click your hard drive, and select properties to view your used space and free space. If you are running low on space, now is repparttar time to delete any old programs you no longer need.

Uninstall Old Programs

Click your start button, then head to Control Panel- Add/Remove Programs. Here you will see a list of programs that are installed on your machine. Read through repparttar 150335 list and uninstall any programs you no longer need. If you aren't sure what something is, it is best to leave it for now. You can use an internet search engine to find out about it later.

Clean Out your Web Browser's Cache

Many people fail to realize their browser usually keeps a record of repparttar 150336 sites that they visit daily. You may want to get rid of this for several reasons. For repparttar 150337 purpose of this article, we want to get rid of all repparttar 150338 temporary files, history and cookies. You need to know beforehand that a full clean-up may get rid of some of your saved usernames for specific sites. Internet Explorer users should click, Tools, Internet Options, and repparttar 150339 General Tab(Default). Here you can delete your cookies, delete your temporary files, and clear your history.

Scan your computer for Spyware and Adware

This is by far repparttar 150340 most common problem I encounter. If you constantly get pop-up windows from sites you have never visited, you may be infected. Spyware and Adware are programs installed on your computer that track repparttar 150341 sites you visit and send you unsolicited ads related to your frequently visited sites. You should download two programs to remove these programs; Spybot Search and Destroy and Ad-Aware. You can find both of these programs by visiting www.download.com and searching for their names. After downloading and installing repparttar 150342 programs, make sure you run them. You may be surprised by what is installed on your computer without your consent.

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