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The first part of this section contains information on preventative
measures you can take so that pc repair wont be required:
- Make sure you have anti-virus software and a firewall installed
on your computer before connecting to the internet.
Most people think that they don't need a firewall
because they only use there computer for email, or eBay or even the new
favourite facebook that everyone seems spend all day on finding ways to
spam me. Having this view is right and wrong: right because eBay &
facebook generally infect computers with virus, wrong because connecting
a unfirewalled computer to the internet leaves it visible to "zombies".
A zombie is an infected computer that spends its spare time scanning for
unsecured computers on the internet, that's you. Once it finds a
computer without a firewall it will automatically infect it and then it
too becomes a zombie. Once this happens your computer is at the
mercy of the hacker that owns the virus, any information on your
computer now belongs to them (bank details, personal pictures, home
address). I don't want to worry you but it worries me just how
little informed people are before they connect to the world wide web.
Thankfully this threat can be mostly blocked with a few clicks of you
mouse: Windows XP users -
- Click [start] [run] and type control panel, click
[ok]
- Click [Network and Internet Connections], click [Network
Connections]
- Right click [Local Area Connection], click [Properties]
- Click the tab [Advanced], click [Settings]
- Ensure that the checkbox [On] is checked.
Alternatively with Windows XP and also other versions of Windows
you can either download a free firewall and antivirus from many
places on the web,
www.download.com has some. Or you can buy one, personally
I would go with a free one because they usually offer similar
functions and protection. Note. As I said earlier, it would be
better to get an already protected friends pc to connect to the
internet and download the firewall for you if you can, I have seen
unfirewalled pc's get infected with 1 minute of going online,
alternatively you can give us some money to do it for you.
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