Tips to keep your system "safe"

We all are apprehensive of the security of our desktop or laptop at home. A single thought that someone might be tapping out network when we are keying in the Net-banking password or logging in to our email can run a chill down our spine. How do we prevent it all? This is a question that always revolves in the back of our mind.

The fact is it depends. Well I won’t say following these tips will make your system fool-proof, instead you would have taken a reasonable care to keep yourself safe in most situations.

With the increasing amount of attacks for Trojans, Worms, Viruses & Malwares etc it has become even more important to be very conscious of whether we are secure. A few tips that I would recommend are:

1) Keep your OS updated, any loopholes that an attacker knows can be easily exploited to gain access & thus compromise the security of your system. Even though doing such a thing regularly is painful with Windows due to the frequency of such updates & the restarts they require, they are necessary from a security perspective.

2) Always, and I mean always keep a good Internet Security solution with an “active” key on your system. I have personally tried a lot of such software, I would suggest that most of the freeware aren’t good enough.

3) Nowadays it is becoming sort of necessary to have your HDD encrypted. Reason being that even if someone does break into your system he won’t be able to read anything unless you decrypt the data using your key. You may use this freeware for encryption: TrueCrypt.

4) Always, backup your data and registry. In case something worse happens you can easily revert to the backup. The backup period can depend on your usability & needs.

5) Never click any links in your email or on the website unless you are very sure about it. In case of any doubt cross-check with the sender if he/she sent you such a mail in the first place.

In case you need any help you are always free to ask here. Stay safe.

img: foolproofsoftware.com