As use of the Internet continues to expand exponentially, banks and other financial institutions have increased their use of the Internet to deliver products and enhanced financial services, or simply to improve communications with consumers.

The Internet, despite its fundamental flaws, does offer the potential for safe, convenient, and new ways to shop for financial services and conduct banking business, any day, any time.

While it’s true that the Internet has the “potential” for safe and secure financial transactions, safe banking online relies on you making good choices and decisions that will help you avoid costly surprises, or even carefully crafted scams and phishing schemes.

Despite all the hype concerning inpenetrateable system security, we have learned, much to our detriment, that no such inpenetrateable systems exist. The inescapable fact remains; you are your own best protection while conducting financial transactions on the Internet. So it’s important that you learn about, and take advantage of, security features offered by your financial institution.

Some examples are:

Encryption is the process of scrambling private information to prevent unauthorized access. To remind you that your transmission is encrypted, most Internet browsers display a small icon on your screen that looks like a lock or a key, when you conduct secure transactions online. Avoid sending sensitive information, such as account numbers, through unsecured e-mail.

Passwords, or personal identification numbers, should be used when accessing an account online. Your password should be unique to you, and this is extremely important, you should change it regularly. Do not use birthdates or other numbers or words that may be easy for others to guess.

Always carefully control to whom you give your password. For example, if you use a financial company that requires your passwords in order to gather your financial data from various sources, make sure that you are aware of the company’s privacy and security practices.

General security over your personal computer such as virus protection and physical access controls should be used and updated regularly. Contact your hardware and software suppliers, or Internet service provider, to ensure you have the latest in security updates.

Tips on safe computing practices when conducting your online banking at home, or at a public computer:

Never leave your computer unattended once you have signed in to online banking.

After completing your transactions, ensure that you sign out of online banking, clear your cache, and close your browser. Often, it is easy to forget to sign out of an online banking session

Keep your password and card number safe. This seems like a no brainer, but surprisingly many users do forget this critical step in the process.

Do not share, disclose, or provide your bank card number, or password, to another party or website other than your bank. Most banks will not send you an email requesting this information. If your bank practices this very unsafe routine; you should change banks.

Do not save your bank card number or password on a publicly accessed computer.

If you do use a public access computer such as at an Internet café or public library, to be safe change your password after completing your session by calling your bank’s telephone banking number.

When selecting a password, choose a series of characters that cannot be easily guessed by anyone else. The best passwords are made up of an alpha-numeric combination that’s more than four characters long and a combination of capital and lower case letters.

This is an example of an Online Banking email phishing attempt.

Don’t use:

A password you use for any other service.

Your name or a close relative’s name.

Your birth date, telephone number or address, or those of a close relative.

Your bank account number or bank card number.

Do not share your personal verification question answers with anyone, and do not disclose them in any emails. It’s simple; giving your password answers to another person, or company, places your finances and privacy at risk.

Because I’m an extremely security conscious computer user, justifiable so, I’m greatly interested in any new tool that can assist me in keeping my machines free of harmful, or potentially harmful, processes or services.

I’m also very much a tinkerer when it comes to getting the best performance out of my computer systems by reducing system overhead. To do that, I need to know exactly what’s running in the background on my machines.

If you’re a highly skilled computer user it’s probable that you’re aware of every process running in the background, the application or service that is responsible for launching it, and the function it performs. Better yet, you probably have the know-how to selectively kill processes to optimize memory use and trim your machine for maximum performance.

But what if you’re a novice or casual computer user? Where can you get the information on running processes so that you can make an accurate assessment on whether to kill a process or not?

Fortunately, there are a number of free tools available that will help any computer user, novice or not, to determine which process/processes are safe/harmful and which process/processes can be safely shut down.

ProcessLibrary.com (a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner), the company that offers what has often been called the world’s leading and most definitive process listing service available for Windows users, recently released ProcessScanner.

This small, free executable scans your Windows computer for all running processes, and by connecting to the ProcessLibrary.com site, provides you with information on what processes are running, what each process is associated with, and most importantly, a risk analysis of each process using a color coded reporting system.

A range of risk from safe to dangerous is provided for each running process, followed by advice on appropriate action you should consider taking regarding the listed processes.

The information derived can be used for multiple purposes.

ProcessScanner can warn you of potentially harmful processes running in the background.

ProcessScanner provides information from which you can determine which non-essential processes are running.

For example, I continuously notice on machines running XP Professional particularly, the large number of unnecessary processes or services that load on startup, which add limited or no functionally, to the specific computer.

This free service from ProcessLibrary.com can help you determine which of these processes or services you can turn off. However, be careful in turning off services. Spend some time on the Internet investigating which services are safe to turn off. Turn off the wrong one(s), and you may find that you are unable to boot your machine.

Quick facts:

No installation required

Portable device compliant

Fast scan time

Identification of all running processes

Threat level of all processes

Free

If you’re like me, and you are always looking for additional applications to add to your security toolbox, or you are simply curious about what’s happening behind the scene on your machine, then I highly recommend you download this program.

System Requirements: Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista

Download at: Uniblue

Many of us now own, and use, a paper file shredder to destroy documents and personal and financial papers that we don’t want to fall into the hands of identity thieves, or anyone not entitled to have access.

So what about those files on your computer that you’ve just deleted and sent to the recycle bin? When you delete a file from your computer it’s gone forever, right? Well if you’re a typical computer user, you quite likely do believe that it’s gone forever since the deleted file can’t be seen in Explorer.

But this is not the case. Instead, what does get deleted is the link pointing towards the file, but not the file itself. Surprisingly, it is relatively easy to retrieve the deleted file using specialized file recovery software, which takes advantage of shortcomings in the Windows operating systems.

In order to delete or shred files permanently, to protect your privacy and potentially your security, you need a program such as File Shredder 2 that is capable of rewriting the file with a random series of binary data multiple times. This process is often called shredding. That way, the actual content of the file has been overwritten and the possibilities of recovering such a shredded file becomes mostly theoretical.

File Shredder 2 is a simple but powerful program, with a straightforward interface, that many users judge to be better than some commercial file shredders. With File Shredder 2 you can remove files from your hard drive permanently, and feel confident that the file can’t be recovered.

Running the program allows you to choose between 5 different shredding algorithms, each one gradually stronger than the previous one. As well, it has an integrated Disk Wiper which uses a shredding algorithm to wipe unused disk space. I use this feature frequently, to clean up my drives and to destroy any leftover fragments of previously deleted files.

If you’re looking for a great free file shredder application that does what it says it does, in an easy to understand manner, I highly recommend File Shredder 2.

Operating Systems: Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista

Download at: Download.com

I have always been a big fan of Adobe Photoshop, the trendsetter/innovator for all photo editor and image manipulation software.

The downside for typical users though, (other than its price – which is formidable), is it’s huge size on disk, it’s very challenging platform requirements, and an extreme learning curve which demands time and training.

Most of us don’t need the flexibility, or the power of a high end (read expensive), photo editor. Instead, we’re looking for an application that’s small, fast, and free with an intuitive interface that’s very easy to use; especially for those with only modest previous experience.

IrfanView which is one of my favorite photo applications (not just mine; there have been over 34 Million downloads), is not just an image viewer, but an image browser, converter, and an editor as well. Best of all, you’ll find the interface intuitive and very easy to use. If you’re curious, this application is named after its developer Irfan Skiljan.

With IrfanView you can fix and enhance digital photos including resizing, cropping, correcting red eye, flipping, and rotating. As well, you can perform a wide variety of image adjustments, including brightness, contrast, and applying special effects such as sharpen and blur.

I have been using this neat little program for years and with every new release it just keeps getting better. The latest version - version 4.20, released July 16, 2008, includes plug-in support for most image, video, and sound formats, including MP3, AVI, audio CD, and WMA. An added bonus in the latest version is you now have the ability to Draw, Erase, Fill, Rotate, and Draw an Arrow.

Fast Facts:

Free

Small – only 1.2 MB

Many supported file formats

Multi language support

Thumbnail/preview option

Slideshow (save slideshow as EXE/SCR or burn it to CD)

Show EXIF/IPTC/Comment text in Slideshow/Full screen etc.

Support for Adobe Photoshop Filters

Drag & drop support

Fast directory view (moving through directory)

Batch conversion (with image processing)

Multipage TIF editing

Multimedia player

Print option

Change color depth

And much more

Unless you have unusual image editing requirements, IrfanView should more than meet your needs.

System Requirements: Windows Vista, Windows XP

Download at: Download.com

FrostWire (newest version: 4.17), July 2008, is free, open source Peer to Peer software, for the Gnutella and BitTorrent protocols. To insure broad appeal, FrostWire is a multi platform program running on Windows Vista, XP, 2000, NT, Mac OS X 10.4 or later, Linux, and some flavors of Unix.

This application has been developed by the open source community to avoid the threat of potential legal action faced by LimeWire, from which it has been forked, and to maintain the freedom that P2P users have come to expect (right or wrong), in the sharing of copyrighted material. Some reviewers have compared FrostWire to the old Napster, the controversial file-sharing pioneer.

The project was started in September 2005 by members of the open-source community, after LimeWire’s distributor considered placing blocking code into LimeWire, which it was developing in response to RIAA pressure. It has been reported that if this code was activated it would block users from sharing licensed files.

FrostWire includes all of the free LimeWire version’s functionality as well as a number of the features of LimeWire Pro including multi-threading downloads, and Turbo-Charged connections. An added benefit in using FrostWire; you won’t have to put up with LimeWire’s nag screen or ads.

With over 8,000,000 downloads at Download.com alone it would be difficult to dispute the continuing popularity of file sharing applications.

Fast facts:

· Open-source

· Firewall-to-firewall transfers

· Built-in community chat

· Connects to more sources

· Creative commons license support

· Broadband network connection

· Junk result filters

· Turbo-Charged download speeds

· iTunes integration

· Gnutella support

· BitTorrent support

· Proxy Support

If P2P file sharing is one of your interests, then you’ll find that this program should meet all of your needs.

Download at: Download.com

You should consider the trade-offs and the very real risks involved in Peer to Peer file sharing however.

Peer to Peer file sharing sounds promising, right? Maybe, but make sure that you consider the trade-offs and the very real risks involved. The number of times I have been called upon to rescue a friend’s computer because of system damage caused by peer to peer downloading, has convinced me to give this form of file sharing an automatic “thumbs down”.

Privacy: When you are connected to file-sharing programs, you may unintentionally allow others to copy confidential files you did not intend to share. So be sure to setup the file-sharing software very carefully. If you don’t check the proper settings when you install the software, you could allow access not just to the files you intend to share, but also to other information on your hard drive, such as your tax returns, email messages, medical records, photos, and other personal and financial documents.

It’s extremely important to be aware of the files that you place in, or download to, your shared folder. Don’t put information in your shared folder that you don’t want to share with others. Your shared folder is the folder that is shared automatically with others on peer to peer file sharing networks.

Copyright Issues: You may knowingly, or otherwise, download material that is protected by copyright laws and find yourself caught up in legal issues. Copyright infringement can result in significant monetary damages, fines, and even criminal penalties. Some statistics suggest as many as 70% of young people between the ages of 9 – 14, regularly download copyrighted digital music. I f you are a parent, you bear the ultimate responsibility for this illegal activity.

Adult Content: Again, if you are a parent you may not be aware that their children have downloaded file-sharing software on the family computer, and that they may have exchanged games, videos, music, pornography, or other material that may be unsuitable for them. It’s not unusual for other peoples’ files to be mislabeled and you or your children can unintentionally download these files.

Spyware: There’s a good chance that the file-sharing program you’re using has installed other software known as spyware to your computer’s operating system. Spyware monitors a user’s browsing habits and then sends that data to third parties. Frequently the user gets ads based on the information that the spyware has collected and forwarded to these third parties. I can assure you that spyware can be difficult to detect and remove. Before you use any file-sharing program, you should buy, or download free software, that can help prevent the downloading or installation of spyware, or help to detect it on your hard drive if it has been installed.

Viruses: Use and update your anti-virus software regularly. Files you download could be mislabeled, hiding a virus or other unwanted content. Use anti-virus software to protect your computer from viruses you might pick up from other users through the file-sharing program. Generally, your virus filter should prevent your computer from receiving possibly destructive files. While downloading, you should avoid files with extensions such as .exe, .scr, .lnk, .bat, .vbs, .dll, .bin, and .cmd.

Default Closing Behavior: It is critical that you close your connection after you have finished using the software. In some instances, closing the file-sharing program window does not actually close your connection to the network. That allows file-sharing to continue and will increase your security risk. Be sure to turn off this feature in the programs “preferences” setting. What’s more, some file-sharing programs automatically run every time you turn on your computer. As a preventive measure, you should adjust the file-sharing program’s controls to prevent the file-sharing program from automatically starting.

Arguably, the Hard Drive is the most important element in a personal computer because it holds, in many cases, an accumulation of information that is of real and perhaps irreplaceable value: documents, digital photos, email messages, personal and business related work and important private data.

The upside of today’s high density disks is; modern disks allows for greater storage capacities and higher access speeds. The downside is however; with densities and capacities pushed to the extreme there is much more information to lose should the drive fail.

So what do you think the chances of a Hard Drive failing are? Surprisingly computer industry statistics seem to indicate that the real-world annualized failure rate (average percentage of disks failing per year), was much higher than the manufacturers’ estimate - an average of 3% vs. the estimated 0.5 - 0.9%.

If you should suffer catastrophic Hard Drive failure and you are one of the few, out of the ordinary, computer users who regularly and faithfully backup, you will have a lot of work ahead of you but you will recover. If you do not have a backup plan, it’s time you though seriously about developing one.

Fortunately though, today’s Hard Drives rarely fail without a warning of failure given well in advance. All modern Hard Drives are equipped with a feature known as S.M.A.R.T. that provides real-time analysis and the reporting of any developing problems and potential issues. The big question is: can you read the warnings?

The following free applications take the guesswork out of the equation, and they make it easier than ever to diagnose what’s really occurring inside the complex environment of the Hard Drive.

Disk Heal

Disk Heal is a free Windows NT, 2000, XP and Vista utility that may be able to restore the condition of your Hard Drive, or a USB Flash Drive.

This application is a very useful tool that has a host of additional capabilities, including recovering hidden files and performing system tweaks; all can be accessed with just one click.

Quick facts:

Fixes disk problems

Fixes task manager inaccessibility

Fixes folder options inaccessibility

Fixes registry editor inaccessibility

Recovers hidden files and folders

Changes the default icon of any drive, external, internal, or a partition

Security and system tweaks

Download at: Download.com

Emsa Disk Check

Emsa Disk Check is a dual-purpose utility, for disk checking (prescan and full disk reading) and also benchmarking. It scans/reads the entire contents of a disk (CD, DVD or Hard Drive; or even a floppy), and it shows any read errors that may occur. In addition, it shows drive speed information, progress statistics and so on. It was designed with simplicity in mind, but ease of use for you.

Quick facts:

Useful to quickly and fully scan removable disks like CD, DVD for surface defects like disk scratch problems, bad CD-R/RW DVD-R/RW writes, etc.

Can check CD-ROM, DVD, hard disks, even floppy disks.

Useful for benchmarking a drive: CD, DVD or HDD.

Shows ‘locked’ files on disks.

Reports progress, statistics (files, folders, time elapsed, estimated time remaining).

Reports any errors encountered (error count and log entry for each).

Download at: Download.com

HDDLife

HDDLife is a real-time Hard Drive monitoring utility with alerts, malfunction protection and data loss prevention features. This hard drive inspector is an advanced proactive hard drive failure detection system that manages all of your hard drive risks. HDDLife is S.M.A.R.T. technology based. This is not a free application but it’s 14 day trial period should provide the time needed to diagnose Hard Drive issues.

Quick facts:

Uses S. M. A. R. T. technology

Displays Hard Drive temperature

Displays hard Drive free space information and control

Current version supports IDE, Serial ATA and SCSI disks with standard controllers, while external IDE RAID and SCSI RAID controllers are not supported.

Download at: Download.com

Don’t forget, that Hard Drive diagnostic software is offered free from all the major Hard Drive manufacturers. Check out their sites.

Western Digital Support

Samsung

Seagate

Please note that since Seagate purchased Maxtor, the download sites are identical.

Maxtor

Hard Drive Maintenance: Defrag and Disk Cleanup Tools

Fragmentation is caused by creating and deleting files and folders, installing new software, and downloading files from the Internet. When you delete files or folders, the first available empty spaces on the Hard Drive are filled in randomly when you create new files and folders, as you do when you save pics from your camera, install software, save emails, or create documents.

Hard Disk fragmentation makes the disk drive heads move more than necessary when reading files which can degrade performance over time, and can lead to system slowdowns, computer crashes, slow startups and shutdowns.

Auslogics Disk Defrag

The program is extremely easy to use, does not require any analysis phase and is faster than most disk defragmentation software I’ve tested in the past, and it’s free. In my view, it’s one more maintenance process in helping me get the maximum performance out of my hardware.

Quick facts:

Improve computer performance and stability

Increase your productivity - no more waiting for files to open

Defragment disks in minutes

Disk fragmentation map and detailed fragmentation report

Download at: Download.com

CCleaner

Running a Hard Disk cleaner such as CCleaner can optimize systems by emptying the Recycle Bin, Temporary Setup Files, Downloaded Program Files, Temporary Internet Files, Old Chkdsk Files, Temporary Files, Temporary Offline Files, Offline Files, and more.

Quick facts:

Frees up valuable hard disk space

Advanced features to remove unused and old entries

Comprehensive backup feature

System tray icon

Privacy tool

Download at: Download.com

Survey results released this past week by The Ponemon Institute, which was sponsored by Dell, indicates that more than 10,000 laptops are lost, or stolen, each week at U.S. airports. Are you as surprised as I am?

Not surprised? Well, how about this astonishing statistic from the same survey: 65% of these lost or stolen laptops are not reclaimed, despite the fact that half the laptops contain confidential corporate information.

One can only hope that the data on these laptops was encrypted, although it seems when we read news stories about a lost or stolen laptop, the pattern seems to be as follows; - 200,000 (insert your own number here), bank account numbers, Social Security Numbers, names, addresses and dates of birth were on an unencrypted laptop stolen/lost earlier this week.

Other available statistics indicate that a laptop is stolen, not lost but stolen, every 53 seconds and 97% of stolen laptop computers are never recovered.

So what can you do to increase the probability that should your laptop be lost or stolen, you have a better chance that it will be returned to you, than the above statistics indicate?

Adeona is a newly released small software client for tracking the location of a lost or stolen laptop that does not rely on a proprietary central service, and which is offered free by the Open Source community.

The developer’s website describes the application as follows:

Adeona is designed to use the Open Source OpenDHT distributed storage service to store location updates sent by a small software client installed on an owner’s laptop. The client continually monitors the current location of the laptop, gathering information (such as IP addresses and local network topology) that can be used to identify its current location.

The client then uses strong cryptographic mechanisms to not only encrypt the location data, but also ensure that the cipher texts stored within OpenDHT are anonymous and unlinkable. At the same time, it is easy for an owner to retrieve location information.

Stolen Laptop Pic from an onboard camera.

Quick facts:

• Private: Adeona uses state-of-the-art cryptographic mechanisms to ensure that the owner is the only party that can use the system to reveal the locations visited by a device.
• Reliable: Adeona uses a community-based remote storage facility, ensuring retrievability of recent location updates.
• Open source and free: Adeona’s software is licensed under GPLv2. While your locations are secret, the tracking system’s design is not.
• The Mac OS X version can capture pictures of the laptop user or thief using the built-in iSight camera.

System Requirements: Windows XP/Vista, Mac OS X, Linux

Download at the developer’s web site: Adeona

Please note: I have been advised that as of 8:00 PM Eastern Time on July 19, 2008, these files are temporarily unavailable for download.

For a primary on what happens to stolen information read, Another Advantage of Credit Cards, on my good friend TechPaul’s Blog

With Portable Apps Suite, (free to use, free to copy, and free to share), you can carry your favorite portable computer programs with you on your USB flash drive, iPod, or portable hard drive, to school, work, or your hotel while you’re taking that much deserved vacation!

The Portable Apps Suite allows you to play your media files, browse the net, compose documents, or check your email on the road. The applications can be used on any Windows computer, and on shut down, to insure your privacy, will not leave any traces on the host computer.

PAS is a collection of portable applications which includes, ClamWin Portable (antivirus), Mozilla Firefox Portable Edition (web browser), Gaim Portable (instant messaging), OpenOffice.org Portable (office suite) compatible with Microsoft Word files,

Sudoku Portable (puzzle game), Mozilla Sunbird Portable Edition (calendar/task manager) and Mozilla Thunderbird Portable Edition (email client), all preconfigured to work portably.

You can install any of three variations of Portable Apps Suite based on your preferences or your USB drive’s capacity.

Standard Suite - 260MB - All applications as noted above

Lite Suite - 105MB - AbiWord Portable substituted for Open Office

Base Suite - Basic Menu Program - add only the applications you choose

All versions of the Portable Apps Suite include the integrated Portable Apps Menu and the Portable Apps Backup utility, along with a set of custom icons, auto play configuration, folders, and a quick start shortcut.

System Requirements: Windows 95/98/Me/2000/XP/Vista and Wine under Linux/UNIX/BSD/Mac OS X

Download at: PortableApps.com

Additional portable applications offered for free download at PortableApps.com .

Accessibility

Firefox Accessibility Extension - Make Firefox more accessible

On-Screen Keyboard Portable - Easily access an on-screen keyboard

Virtual Magnifying Glass Portable - A full-featured screen magnifier

Development

Notepad++ Portable - A full-featured text editor with syntax highlighting

Nvu Portable & KompoZer Portable - The easy-to-use Nvu web editor

XAMPP - Apache, mySQL, PHP, phpMyAdmin, in one package

Games

DOSBox Portable - classic DOS games to go

Mines-Perfect Portable - a classic hunt-for-mines game with advanced features

PokerTH Portable - classic Texas Hold Em style poker at its best

Sudoku Portable - the wildly popular and addictive puzzle game

Graphics & Pictures

GIMP Portable - Photo and Image Editor

Internet

FileZilla Portable - the full-featured FTP client

FireFTP Extension (for Firefox) - a lightweight extension

Miranda IM Portable - chat with AOL, MSN and Yahoo users in a customizable interface

Mozilla Firefox, Portable Edition - the award-winning web browser that’s safe and secure

Mozilla Thunderbird, Portable Edition - the handy email client

Nvu Portable & KompoZer Portable - the easy-to-use webpage editor

Pidgin Portable - chat with AOL, MSN and Yahoo users in an easy-to-use interface

PuTTY Portable - lightweight telnet and SSH client

Sage Extension (for Firefox) - A full-featured RSS extension

WinSCP Portable - SFTP, FTP and SCP client

Music & Video

Audacity Portable - A simple audio editor and recorder

MPlayer Portable - Full-featured movie player with support for most video formats

VirtualDub Portable - video processing and capture utility

VLC Media Player Portable - An easy to use media player that plays most audio and video formats

Office

AbiWord Portable - a lightweight word processor compatible with Microsoft Word files

Lightning Extension (for Thunderbird) - A lightweight extension for your calendar and tasks

Mozilla Sunbird, Portable Edition - Calendar and task management with a familiar interface

Mozilla Thunderbird, Portable Edition (Address Book) - Email client’s built-in address book with import/export functions

OpenOffice.org Portable - word processor, spreadsheet, presentations with Microsoft compatibility

Sumatra PDF Portable - a lightweight PDF viewer

Utilities

7-Zip Portable - File archiver and compressor

ClamWin Portable - Antivirus on the go

Command Prompt Portable - Simple link to a customizable command prompt

Eraser Portable - securely delete files and data

KeePass Password Safe Portable - Secure, easy-to-use password manager

PortableApps.com Backup - integrated backup utility bundled with the platform

PortableApps.com Menu - integrated start menu bundled with the platform

Toucan - backup, sync and encrypt for advanced users

Download at: PortableApps.com

For more great portable applications checkout 100 Portable Apps for your USB Stick (both for Mac and Win) at a great web site, Makeuseof.com.

There are numerous reasons why someone would want to surf anonymously: to ensure protection from snooping web sites, annoying advertisers, employers, or curious family members.

More obvious reasons for anonymous surfing include, surfing in internet cafes, public terminals in libraries, or hotel business centers. In fact, you may want to surf anonymously on any PC where you don’t want to leave traces of your private surfing activities.

Most typical PC users are amazed at the amount of information their browser provides to web sites they visit. For example, the information below is available to every web site I visit. I have X’d out certain parameters for privacy purposes only.

Your computer is connecting to the internet at xxxxxxx, xxxx, in the xxxx, with an IP address of 24.xxx.xxx.142

Your User Agent is being reported as: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.12) Gecko/20080201 Firefox/2.0.0.12

Your Referrer is being reported as:

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&client= ient=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en

Your IP Address is 24.xxx.xxx.142

Your Host Name is d235- xxx.xxx.home1.cable.net

A trace to your phone comes back with an area code of: 0

The objective of anonymous surfing then, is to conceal this information from web sites and other computers, and typically you would use an anonymous proxy server between you and the web site to accomplish this. When surfing anonymously, your web browser talks to the proxy server; the proxy server talks to the web site. Effectively this means, the web site does not know you; it knows only the anonymous proxy server.

You have a number of choices when it comes to anonymous surfing. You can use a free proxy server service; not my personal first choice – but that’s fodder for another article!

More reliable and safer, in my view, is to download and install a client application which manages the details of anonymous surfing for you.

One such application is OperaTor, a free utility that includes the Opera browser, the Privoxy Web proxy , and The Onion Router, which is a method used for anonymous Internet communication. All components launch simultaneously.

OperaTor, and the component pieces, does not require an installer and the utility can be installed and launched from a USB flash drive. This makes it ideal for surfing at public computers.

Download at: Download.com

A second free utility is XeroBank Browser, a special version of FireFox that runs in conjunction with the free Tor anonymizer service. and that can also run directly from a USB flash drive. Just plug in your USB stick to any PC with a USB port and FireFox V2 is automatically launched, set up for secure and private surfing.

TorPark creates a secure encrypted connection between the PC you are using and the first Tor server. This allows you to safely transmit information without fear of local interception. This makes it ideal for surfing on open Wi-Fi networks.

Download at: Download.com

One caveat you should take note of however; since all transmissions are encrypted and transmitted across many nodes, anonymous surfing can be slower.

I must admit that I get very tired of opening my email accounts only to see spam email after spam email, designed to sell me something I don’t want and that I have absolutely no interest in. While these emails are not harmless given that sending spam violates the Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) of almost all Internet Service Providers, it’s the phishing emails that cause me the most frustration.

It seems that more and more often, these days, I get phishing emails in my inboxes all designed to trick me into revealing financial information that can be used to steal my money. This morning was no exception when I received a Bank of America Alert requesting that I update my account information.

If you’re unfamiliar with phishing, it is defined as the act of tricking unsuspecting Internet users into revealing sensitive or private information. It relies for its success on the principle that asking a large number of people for this information, will always deceive at least some of those people. So phishing is considered an opportunistic attack, rather than the targeting of a specific person.

In a phishing attack, the attacker creates a set of circumstances where the potential victims are convinced that they are dealing with an authorized party; in this case, the Bank of America. What makes this particular type of scam so potent is, the average person on receiving an email from an authoritative source, generally lowers their defenses.

According to this email my online banking privileges with Bank of America have been blocked due to security concerns. This looks like an official email to me and the enclosed link makes it simple to get this problem solved with just a mouse click. What could be easier than that?

Clicking on the link would have redirected me to a spoof page, comparable to the original site, and I would then have begun the process whereby the scammers would have stripped me of all the confidential information I was willing to provide.

My financial and personal details, had I entered them, would then have been harvested by the cyber-crooks behind this fraudulent scheme who would then have used this information to commit identity and financial theft.

The reality is of course; your bank or any other legitimate financial organization will on no account, ask you to divulge account information or passwords via email. Credit card numbers, ATM PIN numbers and additional financial information would never be required to enable you to find out the current status of your account.

These types of attacks against financial institutions, and consumers, are occurring with such frequency that the IC³ (Internet Crime Complaint Center), has called the situation “alarming”, so you need to be extremely vigilant.

Be kind to your friends, relatives, and associates and let them know that these types of scams are now epidemic on the Internet. In that way, it raises the level of protection for all of us.

Minimum safety precautions you should take.

• Consider every email, telephone call, or text message requesting confirmation of your personal and financial information as a scam.
• When contacting your bank; use a telephone number from your statement, a telephone book, or another independent source.
• Don’t open emails that come from untrusted sources.
• Don’t run files that you receive via email without making sure of their origin.
• Don’t click links in emails. If they come from a known source, type them on the browser’s address bar. If they come from an untrusted source, simply ignore them, as they could take you to a web designed to download malware onto your computer.
• Never click on embedded cell phone links.
• Keep your computer protected. Install a security solution and keep it up-to-date.

So your significant other is always sending you neat little packages in your email right? Things like MP3 files, screensavers, cartoons, YouTube videos and the like. You get them so often that you just automatically click on the email attachment without even thinking.

A new computer worm disguised as a screen saver with the title to_my_love.scr (not to be confused with My Love 3D Screensaver), recently discovered by security experts running wild on the Internet, relies heavily on the fact that most of us don’t stop to think about email attachments, instead we just “click”.

Our instinctive human response is to just “click”. But, that instinctive response poses one of the biggest risks to our online safety and security. Our curiosity coupled with our conditioned responses can often override our common sense; so it’s not unusual for people to open an email attachment despite knowing that the attachment could be a virus, a worm, or another form of malware.

If you had clicked “yes” when your computer asked whether you wanted to install the to_my_love.scr your computer would have become infected with a worm/keylogger. This keylogger is capable of stealing IM passwords, email passwords, and confidential/financial information. Using IM, email, and other contact information from the now infected computer, the worm goes on to infect other machines. That’s right, the computers of your friends, your family, and perhaps even your co-workers.

While this malware is being dropped on a user’s machine a screensaver with red fractals is displayed as a diversion so that the malware can go about its nasty work.

Security experts agree that a significant number of malware infections could be avoided if users stopped opening the types of files that are clearly dangerous. To this point however, this type of dangerous behavior continues despite the warnings.

Generally, your virus filter should prevent your computer from receiving possibly destructive files. However, while downloading, you should avoid files with extensions such as .exe, .scr, .lnk, .bat, .vbs, .dll, .bin, and .cmd.

Be kind to your friends, relatives, and associates and let them know that these types of scams are now epidemic on the Internet. In that way, it raises the level of protection for all of us.

You know what to do, right?

• Don’t open emails that come from untrusted sources.
• Don’t run files that you receive via email without making sure of their origin.
• Don’t click links in emails. If they come from a known source, type them on the browser’s address bar. If they come from an untrusted source, simply ignore them, as they could take you to a web site designed to download malware onto your computer.
• Keep your computer protected. Install a security solution and keep it up-to-date.

Recently, a reader of this Blog commenting on the epidemic of rogue security software infesting the Internet had this to say “We are being protected from the terrorists in the sky. When are we going to get protected from terrorists on the internet??????  It is getting out of hand, and no one is getting arrested for ripping off the consumer.  These people are sick and need to get a real job!” Ripping you off though, is their real job, and a very lucrative one at that!

Unless you have had the bad experience of installing this type of malicious software, you may not be aware that such a class of software even exists. But it does; and regrettably, as this reader points out, it is becoming more widespread.

In the last few days, the cyber criminals behind the creation of WinDefender 2008 have morphed this parasitic rogue security software application into WistaAntivirus. So now we have one more software parasite to add to the epidemic of rogue security software infesting the Internet.

A rogue security application like WistaAntivirus is an application that uses malware, or malicious tools, such as the ZLOB or Vundo Trojan, to install itself on the victim’s computer. Like many dangerous applications of this type, WistaAntivirus is usually found on free download sites, and adult websites. Or it can be installed from rogue security software websites, using Trojans or manipulating Internet browser security holes.

After the installation of WistaAntivirus be prepared for false positives; fake or false malware detection warnings. As with all rogue security applications, WistaAntivirus was developed to mislead uninformed computer users’ into downloading and paying for the “full” version of this bogus software, based on the false malware positives generated by the application.

If the full program fee is not paid, WistaAntivirus continues to run as a background process incessantly reporting those fake or false malware detection warnings. Over time, this type of software will essentially destroy the victim’s computer operating system, making the machine unusable.

Generally, reputable anti-spyware software is capable of detecting rogue software if it attempts to install, or on a malware scan. But this is not always the case. Anti-malware programs that rely on a definition database (most anti-malware programs), can be behind the curve in recognizing the newest threats. Nevertheless, it is critically important that your Anti-malware programs definition database is always kept current.

An additional safeguard is, ensure you have installed, and are running, an anti-malware application such as ThreatFire 3, free from PC Tools. This type of program operates using heuristics, or behavioral analysis, to identify newer threats.

As well, Malwarebytes, a reliable anti-malware company has created a free application to help keep you safe and secure. RogueRemover (latest version released July 7th, 2008), will safely remove a number of rogue security applications.

SmitFraudFix available for download at Geekstogo is a free tool that is continuously updated to assist victims of rogue security applications.

A further resource worth noting is the Bleeping Computer web site where help is available for many computer related problems, including the removal of rogue software.

An absolute necessity is making sure that any security application you are considering installing is recognized as legitimate by industry experts. An excellent web site that will keep you in the loop, and advise you what products work and have a deserved reputation for quality performance is Spyware Warrior.

What you can do to reduce the chances of infecting your system with rogue security software.

Be careful in downloading freeware or shareware programs. Spyware is occasionally concealed in these programs. Download this type of program only through reputable web sites such as Download.com, or sites that you know to be safe.

Consider carefully the inherent risks attached to peer-to-peer (P2P), or file sharing applications where exposure to rogue security applications is widespread.

Install an Internet Browser add-on that provides protection against questionable or unsafe websites. My personal favorite is Web of Trust, an Internet Explorer/FireFox add-on that offers substantial protection against questionable or unsafe websites.

Do not click on unsolicited invitations to download software of any kind.