Web Browsers and E-mail
Since the birth of the World Wide Web, WWW, computer users have been able
to choose what operating system, OS, and software they use to view web pages
and
read their e-mail. Granted in the beginning there were few choices, but now
that the WWW has become a media rich, meeting ground where you can buy anything
you can think of and download just about any of it, we the computer users
are faced with our privacy and computers being compromised due to viruses,
adware,
spyware, and other insidious software sent out to hunt out information or
just cause havoc, and much of the time, it succeeds due to security holes
in the
software we use to check our e-mail and buy a harmless item from a website.
It is for this lack of security I get most of my computer work. Someone has
visited a website and ended up getting numerous viruses, adware and spyware,
and is now suffering with a computer that just doesn’t want to work. My first
recommendation to prevent a good portion of trouble, is don’t download
anything you don’t trust; if you don’t know what to trust and what not to,
don’t download anything at all. My second recommendation is to, download,
(ha, ha, ha), two pieces of software, one will work, but the two together
are best, Ad-Aware and Spybot – Search & Destroy.
Let me tell you right now you can trust this software; it is the same software
I use to remove the majority of malicious code from my clients computers,
it is also installed on my computers. Much like anti-virus software this
software
will look for malicious software on your computer, like adware and spyware,
and will remove it safely.
My next recommendation leads us to web browsers and e-mail clients. The best
way to prevent the vast majority of the viruses and malicious code out there
is to ditch Internet Explorer, IE, Outlook and Outlook Express. Now, I know
they come free with any PC computer, but they are full of security holes
allowing software to download and run on your computer without you even knowing
until
it is too late. If you are one of the many who insists on staying with IE
then I highly recommend downloading Spybot and making sure to enable the
IE integration
when installing the program, it won’t stop everything but it helps.
The best solution is using a different browser and e-mail client, like Firefox
and Thunderbird. Firefox is a very fast and secure web browser and Thunderbird
is a secure e-mail client. Both do not allow software to automatically install
and run on your computer. The only way you can get viruses in e-mail attachments
in Thunderbird is if you deliberately open the attachment, just viewing the
e-mail does not put you at risk like the Outlook products. You can read more
about the features of Firefox and
Thunderbird at
the Mozilla Project website. A few of my favorite features are, Firefox will
let you open new pages in tabs so you can have multiple web pages in one window.
Firefox is also incredibly fast. If you are thinking about upgrading your connection
to the Internet because the web pages are loading too slowly, download and
tryout Firefox first, you won’t be able to stream live video but regular web
pages sure load a lot quicker. Thunderbird easily allows you to manage multiple
e-mail accounts, and is very fast as well; and yes both are free to download.
If you want to go straight to trying them out I put the links to download them
directly below. Have fun with your new web browser and e-mail client and put
your mind at ease that you are surfing the web securely and in style.
Firefox Downloads:
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Security Ratings
Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.x
Microsoft Internet
Explorer 6.x
Mozilla Firefox 2.0.x
Mozilla Firefox
1.x
Recommendations
Mozilla Firefox
• Download
Mozilla Thunderbird
Ad-Aware
• Download
Spybot
• Download
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