Updated 11/22: Added information on the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer.
I make no secret about my love for Linux, and I make no bones about it either. I understand many of you still run Windows and you have good reasons (and sometimes really bad ones) for doing so. But if you must run Windows and connect it to the Internet, please take some steps to secure it, not only for your own sake, but for the rest of us.
Aside from the obvious threats from email viruses, pop-up windows with porn, spyware, there are also crackers out there who try to install malicious software on your computer. This software can turn your computer into a “zombie” which is used to launch attacks on yet more computers, causing untraceable denial of service attacks against web sites — perhaps even sites you visit frequently.
Updated 11/22: First of all, run Windows Update. Please remember that even if you turn on Automatic Updates, you aren’t necessarily going to get everything you need. So visit Windows Update from time to time. In addition, not even Automatic Updates and Windows Update present you with all the available security updates for your computer. Be sure to install the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer to gain access to all the available updates. Run it in addition to Windows Update, not instead of it.
Second, dump Internet Explorer. It is a blight on the computing landscape and the entry point for half of your computer security problems. Check out Firefox today, and see how much better, safer, faster the Web is without Internet Explorer. While you’re at it, dump Outlook Express too.
Third, install anti-virus and anti-spyware software. You can find some packages for free with a simple Google search, but to get the best software, by and large you’re going to have to pay for it. Norton Internet Security has historically been an excellent product, and while I haven’t seen this newest version, I have no reason to think that it’s any different.
If you aren’t quite up to paying money, Ad-Aware is an excellent anti-spyware package for Windows. Aside from Norton or other paid packages, this is the free package I always recommend and install on any Windows computer I find myself near.
I’m afraid I don’t know of any good, free anti-virus packages for Windows. All the good ones require payment or subscription. Norton is still probably your best bet here, even if you have to pay for it.
Finally, don’t forget your personal firewall. While Windows XP Service Pack 2 includes a personal firewall, it’s a bare-bones firewall, and not particularly good, and it’s also configured to block some applications you probably want to run. Leave it to Microsoft to screw up a perfectly good concept. You still need third-party software here. The above mentioned Norton will also take care of this for you.
Also try comparison shopping for other personal firewall software. Zone Alarm has a free non-commercial version available. I’ve used it and recommend it to any Windows user.
And finally, no article I write about computer security would be complete without links to Linux resources. If you want to try out Linux without even installing it, go get Knoppix and burn it to CD. Then boot off the CD, and voila, you’re running Linux! It doesn’t install anything to your hard drive, so just take the CD out and reboot, and you’re back to Windows.
When you’re ready to take the plunge, go read Moving to Linux. This is a book for non-technical people considering switching from Windows to Linux. It will get you up and running fast and answer your first batch of “newbie” questions.
Then go get your Linux distribution: The big three are Fedora, Mandriva and SuSE. They all are mostly similar but have a few differences, so check them out carefully before you choose one. (Don’t let this startle you; after all, Ford, Chevolet and Chrysler have their differences, too.)
There’s much more I could write about this, but I can see your head is spinning already. If you have comments or questions, use the box below, or the one in the upper right corner to find the answer yourself. Cheers!
Except where otherwise noted, content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license.
Video published by this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Sampling+ license.
Bad Behavior has blocked 3239 access attempts in the last 7 days.
Facebook
Digg
del.icio.us
reddit.com
Newsvine
Dan Birchall
Nov 20, 2004
I’ve found that the best and safest way to run Windows is under emulation. In fact, Microsoft has said as much themselves – their page for Virtual PC notes (or used to, at least) that Windows under Virtual PC isn’t quite as vulnerable as “the real thing.” (This is probably due to it not being given as much control over network interfaces; the host operating system is likely to answer if anyone comes knocking.)
Running under emulation also typically means that the Windows “drive” is really just a drive image file under the host OS – which can easily be duplicated, backed up, or whatever. Imagine your Windows box getting totally hosed, and being able to fix it in a matter of seconds simply by copying over a “clean” copy you saved. I’ve been there, done that. And Windows crashing under emulation doesn’t usually have any effect at all on the host OS.
I’ve run Windows NT 4 Workstation under VMWare on Linux, and Windows 95, 98, NT 4 Workstation and XP Professional under Virtual PC on Mac OS X. There are very few things I have to do that require Windows – most can be done as easily, if not more easily, on Linux or a Mac – so it’s convenient to not have Windows running all the time.
Nielmot
Nov 21, 2004
AVG has a free version of their anti virus program.
I have used AVG for about 6 months now and I have been happy with it. It is slowly but steadily gaining in popularity. (probably would grow faster if they marketed it more)
http://www.avg.com/us-en/homepage
Howard Robinson
Nov 27, 2004
Two good Anti-spyware programs are spybot and adaware.
Jul 26, 2005
IO ERROR
Jan 01, 2006
Is your computer endangering homeland security? - Homeland Security or Homeland Stupidity
Johnson
Jun 18, 2006
Avast is also a good free AV. Nice thing about Avast is that they update almost every day, but they use a patch program so the updates are small. And I think clamav and f-prot, although usually mentioned for Linux, have free windows versions.
adaware is good to run as a backup, but I have found spybot to be better. In the past at least, adaware has purposely ignored some types of spyware, saying they don’t “hurt your machine” (they sure hurt mine). This stuff is usually the spies that major manufacturers install with bundled software, so adaware is probably trying to avoid lawsuits. As a test, I ran both adaware and spybot side by side for a year. spybot found 5 or 6 things I had installed from bundled software. adaware didn’t find any. Maybe adaware has changed its mind on this stuff since I was using it.
If you’re up to learning networking, give snort a try. It’s built for Linux, but also has a windows version. snort is a NIDS which can sniff out a lot of bad stuff. Much of what it checks for is already in some firewalls, however. In general, a great way to get free security software for Windows is to look for ports of Linux stuff.
spywareblaster is also good, and use a hosts file which blocks bad addys.
Anonymous
Jan 28, 2007
norton is an excellent product? where do you get your information? norton is semi-useless bloatware!
AVG as mentioned earlier is a more effective (and free) alternative.
jim
Oct 24, 2007
Confirming – Norton A-V is actually VERY risky to rely on; I had constant viral & malware headaches using it, which stopped once I moved to Panda … I now use Spybot Search & Destroy in conjunction with Avast. They work well together. I still have a screen-capture of Norton: “# of files scanned – 0, # of problems found – 1.” Truly a cybernetic miracle! Apparently it can find problems by osmosis.
My computer sometimes acts “sluggish” – probably due to simply over-stuffing its memory – but I’ve yet to encounter a single serious problem with virii or malware, for more than 2 years.
Nov 25, 2009
If spyware is outlawed, only outlaws will have spyware - Homeland Stupidity