Personal Technology Information |
|
Does Microsoft Show Hackers How To Attack?
After another security hole recently surfaced in Microsoft's Windows operating system, the software giant released a patch this past Friday to plug the possibly devastating "back door" which allows hackers to potentially seize control of any pc running Windows. The latest threat, "Download.Ject," infiltrates computers after users surfing with Microsoft's "Internet Explorer" web browser visit websites infected with the virus. This newest security patch covers Windows XP, 2000, and Windows Server 2003. Several factors make this latest development more disturbing than past discoveries of security problems with Internet Explorer, currently the most dominant web browser on the market. First, it demonstrates very clearly that criminals discovered they can use the power of viruses to very profitably steal important bank, personal, and credit data from people on a large scale. Second, it took Microsoft what many would consider a very long time to come up with a patch for this problem. Before a fix appeared, Microsoft told everyone who uses Internet Explorer to stick their finger in the dyke by putting their web browser security settings on high, rendering it impossible to view or use features on many websites and web-based services. Third, expect this to happen again as new holes open in the future when Microsoft makes Windows more complicated, adds layers of code, and generally makes the operating system more complex. This may sound like business as usual, however, I think this story actually points to a much deeper problem, one for which I'm not sure a simple solution exists. Though free and reasonably reliable, many people do not automatically update their Windows operating system through the update service on Microsoft's website. (I won't even get into how many people don't operate up-to-date anti-virus protection.) Whenever Microsoft publishes a security update, especially for a highly publicized and obviously widespread security breach, thousands of people will not immediately download the update. In fact, tens-of-thousands of users will not download these security updates for days, weeks, even months (if ever). So let me ask what seems like a very elementary question: By publishing security updates that point out very obvious flaws in their system, doesn't Microsoft also point the way to exactly where the holes exist? Let me put it another way. Doesn't this rate the same as discovering that the local bank vault won't lock and then announcing the details on the front page of the paper along with the dates and times no bank guard will be on duty? After all, if tens-of-thousands of users won't immediately get the Microsoft Security Patch, don't those patches show hackers exactly which holes get plugged (and which, logically, must already be open without the patch)? It doesn't take a hacker with more than a basic set of skills to recognize where and what holes got fixed and then reverse-engineer how they can get into computers that don't get updated. Now, do I have a concrete, 100% bullet-proof answer to this problem? Unfortunately, I don't have more than a common- sense answer... At this point, your best defense rates staying current on the latest threats and how to defend against them. Keep your anti-virus software current, your firewall up, and your Windows software updated with the latest security patches. Though not a perfect solution, at least you'll have a fighting chance to prevent, or at least minimize, any possible threats. For more information from Microsoft's website, go here http://www.ebookfire.com/download-ject.html About The Author Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how to use fr^e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website or affiliate links... http://www.TurnWordsIntoTraffic.com © Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
MORE RESOURCES: What I Got Wrong in a Decade of Predicting the Future of Tech The Wall Street Journal ‘Data is the new oil’: Virginia Tech professor wants to protect the personal data of marginalized communities WRIC ABC 8News Smartphones Can Now Last 7 Years. Here's How to Keep Them Working. The New York Times iPad Pro vs. MacBook: The Great Apple Laptop Trade-Off The Wall Street Journal Opinion | Technology Hates Me The New York Times In the City, Personal Safety Starts With Your Smartphone The Wall Street Journal Jonathan Haidt's 'The Anxious Generation': Tech, Smartphones Cause Teen Anxiety - WSJ The Wall Street Journal Tech That Will Change Your Life in 2024, From AI to EV - WSJ The Wall Street Journal Want to Get More Done? That Podcast in the Background Is Holding You Back The Wall Street Journal How TikTok Is Wiring Gen Z's Money Brain The Wall Street Journal OpenAI Made AI Videos for Us. These Clips Are Good Enough to Freak Us Out. - The Wall Street Journal OpenAI Made AI Videos for Us. These Clips Are Good Enough to Freak Us Out. The Wall Street Journal Apple's New iPad Pro vs. New iPad Air vs. iPad: Why Are There So Many? The Wall Street Journal The Invisible $1.52 Trillion Problem: Clunky Old Software The Wall Street Journal After a Sugar High of Free Money, These Billion-Dollar Technologies Need a Nap The Wall Street Journal Huawei's latest smartphone mostly made in China The Register We Aren't Posting on Social Media as Much Anymore. Will We Ever? The Wall Street Journal The Tech to Help You Beat Your Tech Addictions The Wall Street Journal Tech Hubs Are Losing the Talent War to Everywhere Else The Wall Street Journal iPhone Fixes to Make if You're the Family IT Department This Year The Wall Street Journal What Kind of Driver Will Your Kid Be? This Test Can Tell. The Wall Street Journal AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile US fined $200M for selling off people's location info - The Register I Bought the World's Hottest High-Tech E-Bike. Then Its Maker Went Bankrupt. The Wall Street Journal Apple's New Face Computer Is for Work The Wall Street Journal Hands Off! With $3500 Headsets in the Wild, New Social Norms Apply The Wall Street Journal Schools Want to Ban Phones. Parents Say No. The Wall Street Journal Niklaus Wirth, Who Inspired a Generation of Computer Programmers, Dies at 89 The Wall Street Journal Vision Pro Review: Apple's First Headset Lacks Polish and Purpose The New York Times He Stole Hundreds of iPhones and Looted People's Life Savings. He Told Us How. The Wall Street Journal The Accounting Technology Lab Podcast: Personal Tech at CES 2024 CPAPracticeAdvisor.com Boys Are Struggling. It Can Take Coaches, Tutors and Thousands a Month to Fix That. The Wall Street Journal 12 Apps We Can't Stop Using, for Better or Worse The Wall Street Journal 100 Cool Tech Gadgets in 2024, According to a Tech Expert BestProducts.com Best Tech Gifts of 2023 to Buy This Holiday Season, an Updated List - WSJ The Wall Street Journal Yun-Hee Kim promoted to Tech Editor, Corporate and Personal Technology The Washington Post The Four Steps to Better Password Security The Wall Street Journal Testing Apple’s Vision Pro The New York Times Turn On Your iPhone's Stolen Device Protection Now to Secure Your Money and Photos in iOS 17.3 Update - WSJ The Wall Street Journal Meta’s Ray-Ban Smart Glasses Use AI to See, Hear and Speak. What Are They Like? The New York Times Snapchat's Friend-Ranking Feature Adds to Teen Anxiety The Wall Street Journal A Pain-Free Way to Secure All Your Online Accounts The Wall Street Journal Is the $139 Amazon Prime Subscription Still Worth It? The Wall Street Journal The Apple Video Feature Awkwardly Crashing Your Meetings - WSJ The Wall Street Journal What if You Never Had to Charge Your Gadgets Again? The Wall Street Journal The most personal technology | Jul 22nd 2023 The Economist Quick Tips to Save Time on the Telephone The New York Times Apple’s iOS 17.3 Stolen Device Protection Update Aims to Stop iPhone Thieves The Wall Street Journal Don't rent out that container ship yet: CIOs and biz buyers view AI PCs with some caution The Register Do You Have Painful 'Tech Neck?' This Expert-Approved Gadget Might Help The Wall Street Journal The Most Important Tech Company You've Never Heard of Is a Major Reason Computers Keep Getting Faster The Wall Street Journal Faster, Beefier, Cheaper: The Next-Generation Electric Skateboards Have Arrived The Wall Street Journal Meta Welcomes Headset War With Apple - WSJ The Wall Street Journal Meta and Google Are Betting on AI Voice Assistants. Will They Take Off? The New York Times Distracted, Forgetful and Hooked on Smartphones: Why More Women Are Being Diagnosed With ADHD The Wall Street Journal Ten years ago Microsoft bought Nokia's phone unit – then killed it as a tax write-off The Register Yes, It's Rude to Use Your Laptop During Meetings—and More Tech Etiquette Rules You Might Be Breaking The Wall Street Journal You're Brewing It Wrong: The Coffee-Making Myths That Might Be Holding You Back The Wall Street Journal How to Cut Down Your Screen Time but Still Get Stuff Done The New York Times Why Tech Companies Are Not Your Friends: Lessons From Roku The New York Times EU duties might not hold off flood of China EVs The Register BASICally still alive: Classic language celebrates 60 years with new code and old quirks The Register New Tech That Asks 'Are You Sure About Sending a Nude Photo?' The Wall Street Journal How to Make Your Phone Last Forever: 6 Simple Tips The Wall Street Journal |
RELATED ARTICLES
More Cool Web Tricks If you ask most people what frustrates them most about the Internet, many of them will tell you "It's the little things!"It seems like all the great tricks and tips that make people exclaim "STOP! How did you do that?" never make it into any manual (at least where I can find them).My father (and co-author of "Turn Words Into Traffic") calls it the "reverse oral tradition" of computing, where children teach parents the survival skills of PC life. Home Electronics: The Facts About Plasma TV Not so many years ago, homes across the country watched their favorite TV shows on a bulky floor model that took awhile to warm up before you could see the picture, didn't offer anything in the way of remote control manipulation and offered a washed out image on the TV's cathode ray tubehosted screen.. A Lesson in HTML As the owner of a Country Mall and Top Site List, I have been asked several times about what to put in the sign up form when it asks for the URL or the HTML of a banner or other image. I have people that email me feeling totally lost and have no idea what they mean! Actually, it is very easy once you know WHAT they are talking about and HOW to do what they want you to do. Three Things You Can Do to Keep Your Computer Running at Maximum Performance Although there are many things that can affect the performance of your computer, there are a few simply things you can do each month to help keep your computer running at maximum performance. This article will focus on two problems that impact the performance of your computer and will then explain what you can do about it. CCNA 640-801 Certification Primer The Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) Certification is meant for career enhancement as well as gaining knowledge of the LAN/WAN technologies currently available for implementation. Hence, CCNA Certification can be obtained by IT professionals who have been a part of the industry for a considerable time and are interested in furthering their career in terms of role enhancement and salary. How to Switch to Firefox and Why You should First things first, what is Firefox? Well, it's a browser. Ok but what's that? A browser is a computer program used to view web pages, to browse through the world wide web. Have You Invited A Spy Into Your Computer? Yes, it's true. You may have inadvertently invited a spy into your computer. Why Using an Ad Blocker Can be a Bad Idea Ad Blocking is getting to be a common sport on the internet. Now there are some legitimate uses for an ad blocker. Keeping the Windows Registry Operational The registry is where the computer stores information about the configuration of the system and the programs installed so that the operating system can use them.Regularly maintaining the registry is a basic requirement. A Beginners Guide to Avoiding Viruses "Aaaaaahhhhhh! I've been invaded by a virus!" Getting a virus means getting sick and no one in their right mind wants to be ill. Well, now that computers have become our close friends, it's a shock to learn that foreign bodies too can invade them with malicious intent. Improve PC Performance - 6 Tips You Must Know Are you frustrated with your PC?Is it feeling sluggish or crawling at a snail's pace?Are programs running slower than they used to?Are you just plain fed up with frequent slowdowns, freezes or crashes?Then it's time to stop what you're doing and optimize your system to improve PC performance!Follow these 6 simple sure-fire tips to help improve PC performance and you'll be surprised by the results! Each comes with an indication of how often you should do it.Improve PC Performance Tip #1:CLEAN UP YOUR WINDOWS REGISTRY (Frequency = Daily)This is an essential, but often overlooked, task to improve PC performance. Selecting the Perfect Big Screen TV Selecting a TV isn't as easy as it used to be in years goneby. Rather than going to the local department store and choosing a console that would take up a large portion of the living room, we now have other options. 4 Computer Money-saving Tips Tip #1 -- Rebates:A rebate is not always a bargain. Computers with rebates are often close to being discontinued. New Computer? Steps to Protect Your Computer Before Connecting to the Internet Getting a new computer should be an exciting and gratifying experience. After all, you'll be able to do things faster, safer and without having to worry that your old hard drive is so full that one more file will "break the camel's back. Digital Cameras: How Many Pixels Do I Need? With the bewildering number of digital cameras on the market, it's increasing difficult to know where to start for your first purchase. One of the major determining factors of the price of a digital camera is the number of pixels. Lightning Season: How to Avoid Data Loss We have just entered the time of year that most electrical storms occur.Sudden loss of power, power surges, and electrical spikes are all very common causes of computer damage. Buying a Home Theater Receiver Buying a receiver is one of the most important decisions you're going to have to make when building your home theater. The receiver has a number of functions including; connecting and switching audio sources; connecting and switching video sources; decoding surround sound formats; amplifying an audio signal and sending it to your speakers; tuning in to radio stations; and acting as the interface between you and your home theater. Tips for Buying a PC Buying Your PCBuying a PC that's right for you and your family is not all that simple task. More so if you're going to buy an unbranded or an assembled one. How To Recognize The Telltale Signs Of Spyware Spyware is the software that collects information aboutyour online activities and preferences. The information isthen sent to another computer with the intention of sellingit to online advertisers. Ergonomics and Healthy Computing - Positioning Your Body For Maximum Comfort At Your Computer Do you remember the old saw about how computers would change our lives for the better? We'd have more time to ourselves and lead healthier, happier lives. The truth is computers do make processing information lightening fast. |
home | site map |
© 2006 |