4 steps to making your computer immortal online.
4 Steps to making your computer immortal online!
Hi and welcome to this free report that tells you how you can download whatever you want online without getting the slightest danger of getting infected by a virus.This report simply offers 4 steps that tell you what to do that gives you rock hard protection against viruses.These four steps are:
1-Installing an Up-to-date Anti Virus Software
2-Installing a firewall.
3-Using File Extensions to your benefit.
4-Learning which websites and people to trust.
Getting Started:
Step 1:Using an Anti-Virus Software:
Using an Anti Virus Software is the first thing you should do.An Anti Virus program is a computer program that works in the background and keeps an eye on all that's going on inside your computer.Whenever it finds a program that's performing a malicious activity or one that intends to perform one,or notices any activity that could harm your computer or anything virus-like,it stops that activity at once and tells you about that virus and gives you certain useful options,like repairing the virus,deleting or quarantining the virus,or to ignore the virus(of course not recommended at all).It can also scan any file or folder that you suspect is a carrier of viruses.For example,you downloaded a file that claims to be a game.But you don't want to take a risk and want to confirm that this file isn't a virus.So,you simply scan that file for viruses using your anti virus software.You can do so by simply right clicking on that file and clicking on "Scan your viruses" or "Scan using _______" where _____ holds the name of your anti virus software.If this option is not available,you can scan that file using "Scan a file" option available inside your AVS(anti virus software).You can scan multiple files,or scan a whole folder in the same way.You can also scan your whole computer using "Scan my computer" option.This would take some time,probably one-two hours or more/less depending upon your computer's speed.This option would scan simply EVERY file and folder in your computer to see if it has a virus.If any virus is found,then you get the same bunch of useful options to repair the file,delete it,etc.You should scan your computer at least once a week to ensure maximum protection.
Keeping your Anti-Virus software up to date:
Normally,your AVS would come with protection against some thousand viruses.However,every month tens of new viruses are written and therefore,your AVS might not be able to detect the viruses that are written after your installing that AVS on your computer.For example,let us assume that you installed an AVS named X on your computer on 1st January,2003.On 15th January,a new virus named,say, ABC was written and started spreading around the internet.You download the ABC thinking its a game.However to ensure that its not a virus,you scan it using X.Now,since ABC was created after the installation of X on your computer,X wouldn't be able to detect that ABC is a virus because this virus wouldn't be in the virus database of X.So,you would run ABC on your computer thinking its harmless,which,infact,its not!
The solution:
The solution to this problem is quite simple.Update your anti virus software constantly.Whenever a new virus is detected,people provide updates for anti virus softwares so that they can protect the pcs they run on against the virus.Once you install an AVS,usually,whenever it detects an internet connection,it contacts its producer's website to see if any updates are available.If it finds any updates,it asks you if you would like to receive the updates so that you can be protected against new viruses.In this way,whenever new viruses are detected,you simply update your AVS so it can protect you against them.It is highly recommended that you constantly keep your AVS updated,otherwise,it will protect you only against old viruses and you would be completely unprotected against new viruses.
Which Anti Virus Software to use?
There are many AVS's available.However its recommended that you use only one of the popular ones.Below is a list of the popular Avs's.Just visit the website address given at the end to find out more about them:
Norton Anti Virus:
http://www.symantec.com/
Pc Cillin:
http://www.trendmicro.com
Mc Afee:
http://www.mcafee.com
Sophos Anti Virus:
http://www.sophos.com/
You might have to click on the "Products and services" link on some of these websites to get to the actual anti virus thing.You can also search Google.com for Anti Virus Software to find out more.
Step 2:Firewalls
Have you ever heard of the terms "Hacking" and "hackers"?Most probably,you have.What hacking is,that,someone from another computer gains access to your computer and gets to view and access your files and stuff like that.A firewall is a kind of barrier that keeps such things away from your computer.A firewall is a software or a hardware device that filters the information coming through the internet.You can think of it,as,the information coming to your computer through the internet first passes through the firewall.If the firewall detects any suspicious data then it is not allowed through.The following figure explains how data transfers between your computer and the internet with a firewall installed:
Data from the Internet---------->Firewall------->Home Computer
The advantage of having a firewall is,that hackers do not gain access to your computer.It also protects you from many other unwanted things.Although some firewalls protect you from viruses,still,its worth the investment to install an anti virus software.I won't get into more details about firewalls because it includes some extremely technical things which I don't want to get into because you might be a novice with computers.Go through your firewall's user manual to find out more or visit:
www.howstuffworks.com/firewall.htm
Which Firewalls to Buy:
Below is a list of some of the popular firewalls:
Zone Labs:
http://www.zonelabs.com
CheckPoint:
http://www.checkpoint.com
Trustix AS:
http://www.trustix.com/
Doorstep:
http://www.opendoor.com/doorstop/
Sun Microsystems:
http://www.sun.com/security/
Once you have installed a firewall,you should test its working.You can do so by visiting www.grc.com and trying their free Sheilds Up! security test.
Step 3:Using File Extensions to your benefit:
File extensions are the tiny little suffixes at the end of every file in your computer.Let us suppose you created a file in Microsoft Word.You named that file "me" and wrote anything in it.Say,you wrote a few lines about yourself.You saved that file in the folder "C:\me".Now when you open the folder "C:\ME" you see a file named "me.doc" in it.
OK..so you named the file "Me" but what's this ".doc" thing about?Well,this .doc is what's known as the file extension.Almost every file on your computer has file extensions.Just browse through your computer and almost every file you come across has an extension e.g ".exe,.bat,.jpeg,.gif,.txt" etc after the real file name.
NOTE:If you can't see the file extensions,then follow these steps:
1-Open My computer.
2-Go to View-Options and click on the View Tab.
3-Uncheck the "hide file extensions for known file types" checkbox,and choose the "show all files" radio button.
If you cannot see the options menu under view,then may be you should try these steps:
1-Open My Computer.
2-Click on Tools-Folder Options
3-Click on View Tab.
4- Uncheck the "hide file extensions for known file types" checkbox, and choose the "show hidden files and folders" radio button.
If none of these steps work for you,then open My Computer,Press F1.This would show up the "Help" portion of your computer.Search for "viewing file extensions" or "changing folder options" and follow the steps.
Anyways,file extensions describe what a file is and how the computer will handle the file.For example,a file with the extension ".jpeg" is supposed to be a photo or picture and the computer would use your favourite graphics editing software to view that file.Similarly,a file with the extension ".exe" is supposed to be a computer program and the computer would simply follow the instructions in that file.
Now,file extensions play a very important role in detecting viruses.Below is a list of the file extensions that are most likely to be viruses:
.exe
.bat
.com
.scr
.pif
.vbs
.shs
.dll
.ocx
Any file with these extensions has 80% chances of being a virus.Therefore,whenever dealing with an untrusted person or website,never open files which have one of these extensions.You might receive emails that contain an attachment.Never download the attachment if it has one of the above mentioned extensions unless you have an up to date anti virus software and you can scan the file.
Below is the list of file extensions that have the minimum chances of being a virus:
.txt
.gif
.jpeg
.bmp
You can download files with these extensions from the internet.
A little problem:
Although you choose the option not to hide file extensions,there are still some file extensions that wouldn't be displayed.For example,a file with the extension ".txt.shs" would be displayed as a harmless text file and Windows would hide the extension ".shs". This allows a virus writer to write a virus,give it a name with the extension ".shs" and forward it to people.Suppose a virus writer names it virus "textfile.txt.shs".Now,if someone examines this file under Windows,it would be displayed as "textfile.txt" and would occur as a completely harmless text file.In fact,that's how many virus writers spread their viruses.
Solution:
The solution to this problem is by deleting a special entry from your Windows Registry.Carry out the following steps:
Note:Be extremely careful when working with Windows Registry,because a smallest mistake can produce extremely harmful results.Do only what is instructed and DO NOT play around with it.Also,be extremely careful.
Before carrying out the following process,make sure you have already set Windows to show all files.Do this by carrying out the steps mentioned in the beginning of Step-3.
Follow these steps:
Close all open program.Then:
1-Click on Start.
2-Click on Run.
3- Type "Regedit"
..........................
4-This would open up the Windows Registry Editor.
5-Click on Edit and click on Find.
6-Uncheck the "Keys" and "Data" entries under "Look at"
7-Type "NeverShowExt"" in the Find what Box and click Find Next.(Make sure you type the words exactly as given here.You may also copy these words and paste them in the Find what box".
8-When a value is found,right click on it,and click delete.
9-Press F3 again.This would once again search the whole registry and bring up with the next value containing "NeverShowExt".
10-Repeat step 9 and 10 until all values of NeverShowExt have been deleted.
That's it.Whenever you come across a file that has the extension .exe, .bat, .com,etc always scan it for viruses before opening it.Check out the above given extensions to know which extensions are dangerous and which ones are not.
The following table gives you a list of the various file extensions you may come across when working with windows,what those extensions mean and their possibility of being a virus:
Extension name: Meaning: Can it be a virus?
.exe Executable computer program Hell Yes
.Bat Dos batch File Yes
.Com Command file Yes
.Dll Data library used by programs Yes
.Ocx Active X control Yes
.swf Shockwave file Not really
.txt Text File Not really
.VBS Visual Basic Script file Yes
.Bmp Bitmapped Image file Not really
.Gif Image File No
.Jpeg Image File No
.Html/.htm Html File Yes
.Scr Screensaver File Yes
.Pif Not sure about this one ;) Yes
.Ink Shortcut file Yes
.Log Log File Not really
.Shs Shell scrap or something Yes
.Zip Compressed Zip File Yes
*Please note that you should always be careful.Although I have tried my best to be as accurate as possible,still,we never know what might be the next thing that happens in the Virus industry.Therefore,do not blindly open a .Log file just because I told you in this table that it couldn't really be a virus.Always be careful.
Step-4: Learning which websites and people to trust:
Well,as for the people,I can't really say anything.It just depends on your sense of judging people.I mean,you can always trust on someone whom you know in real life.I mean,why would your best friend send you a virus?However,there are some new viruses that send themselves in an email that pretends to be from your loved one and asks you to download the attachment.Here I again want you to use the file extension tricks you have learnt in step 3.Step As for other people whom you meet online,well,someone might send you a file that claims to be his/her photo but is a virus in reality.Here again you will use the file extension tricks you learnt earlier to see if they are telling the truth.For example,if Tanya sends you a file named "myphoto.exe" and tells you that its her photo,then of course you could yell "Hey,its an executable program file,it can't be a photo.If it were a photo it would have used the extension .jpeg or .gif or .bmp." You should also use your sense of judging people.I mean,try to judge if a person just wants to be your friend or is he/she trying to make you download a file or attachment.Here's a tip that always worked for me.Whenever someone starts begging you to download a file or accept a file transfer or open a file again and again,I mean,if he goes anxious trying to make you do something that has to do something with a file or with your computer or anything like that,then there's a 99% chance that he's trying to trick you into downloading a virus.
Now to the websites.Well,if you visit a website that claims to provide free games or software downloads,then you should judge it by the site's appearence.A website with a professional look is less likely to be trying to spread viruses.However,a website with a black background and little description of the stuff it provides for download is more likely to be trying to spread a virus.If a website allows you to download a demo version of a game/software/anything,then try checking out if they really can accept orders.If they provide orders accepting service,then the common sense says that they are rather trying to sell a virus free product than to spread viruses.I mean,they have to pay to get that credit card processing account.And most virus writers do not dare to spend money to spread their creation.So..you can trust the websites that can accept orders the most.Also,if a website can identify who they are,I mean,give their phone No. or contact information,and you are SURE that the information they provide isn't fake.Then they are also less likely to be virus spreading guys.
With that,I come to the end of this report.I hope what you learnt proved useful to you.Feel free to forward this report to your friend or to print it out and give it as a present to your friends or to give it away in anyway you like but don't sell it for money.I wish you best of luck for your computing life.
Happy Computing.
Ali Akhtar.
P.S Don't forget to post your feedback.Also,don't forget to get my latest ebook on the Blaster Worm at:
http://www.virustimes.cjb.net/msblast/download.html
