Smart Holiday Shopping Online: Top Tips for a Joyful Experience

 

The festive season is upon us, and as our shopping lists grow, many of us are turning to online platforms for the perfect gifts. With convenience, however, comes the need for caution. Here are some quick tips to ensure a secure and pleasant online shopping experience this holiday season:

1.     Trustworthy Websites: Stick to reputable online retailers. Look for "https://" in the URL and a padlock symbol to ensure the site is secure.

2.     Avoid Public Wi-Fi: Public networks can be less secure. For transactions, use a secure, private internet connection.

3.     Use Credit, Not Debit: Credit cards generally offer better fraud protection. If possible, use a virtual card number for added security.

4.     Beware of Deals Too Good to Be True: Extremely discounted items could be scams or counterfeit. If a deal seems too tempting, research the website and product reviews.

5.     Set Strong Passwords: Especially for online retail accounts, use unique and complex passwords. Consider a password manager to track them.

6.     Keep Software Updated: Ensure your computer, smartphone, and security software are updated. This helps protect against potential threats.

7.     Review Purchase Details: Before confirming, double-check shipping details, return policies, and delivery dates.

Remember, while hunting for the perfect gift, your online safety is paramount. A dash of caution ensures your festive shopping spree remains merry and bright!

Protection Two-Step

Hi Everyone. I am asked all the time about anti-virus, both personally and professionally. The answer always starts the same; it makes no difference how much you buy or how much you have. Nothing is 100%. With that being said, I want to talk to you about your home protection.

My suggestion is a two-part scenario that focuses on prevention more so than remediation. Think about that. Certainly, it would be more beneficial to your time and energy if you put a plan in motion that works on being proactive, so you do not spend much time reacting to every threat, am I right? Let’s have a look at this scenario.

Part One – There are dozens of anti-virus products out there and they are essentially as effective as the flu shot; not very. So how do you choose which one to get? Should you pay for protection or get the free protection? Free protection is great if you are the type of person who will scrutinize everything that happens to your system because of the horrors of the Internet. However, if you ask what Joel does, I pay for the premium version of MalwareBytes Anti-Malware. Here is why. MalwareBytes has a much different stand on viruses; instead of remediation after infection, they focus on being proactive and making sure the infection cannot harm your system and they do so by stopping the two-way communication between the virus and the virus command center.

Part Two – Take an extra step to protect your home network and do it for free! Stop on over to OpenDNS.com and sign up for an account and start protecting. Here at Reybold, we use Cisco Umbrella which is the Enterprise version of OpenDNS. With this free personal service, you will either change some settings in your computers or in your home router with their incredibly easy-to-follow instructions and once done, you are under the umbrella of protection by the service. Not only does OpenDNS provide a much faster browsing service for your Internet, it also has the build-in protection that Cisco offers by blocking bad elements from passing through the DNS to your router and/or systems.

So, this is my personal plan that somewhat follows the path we use here at work. We deploy a strong Anti-Virus package on the computers and then we add the outer layer of protection from Cisco to keep bad guys out to begin with. Just remember, this is like anything else and not 100% effective. All of these things cannot prevent the number one problem when it comes to infections; the human element. You still have to be vigilant with where you are browsing and what happens in your email.

http://www.malwarebytes.com/premium
http://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security

Why Backup?

I want to talk to you about backups and their importance in today’s digital world. There are plenty of choices of software and hardware that will do the job as well as cloud services. Let’s dive in.

I still get asked the question “why backup”? Why would you not backup is what I ask. There are no guarantees that your computer will last forever and now with all the malicious bugs roaming the Internet the chances have only increased that you will have a problem. The question is no longer “if” you get infected; it is now a question of “when”.

External hard drives are good for backups. However, the potential for failure is greater than, say, cloud backups because this is a piece of hardware, after all and therefore capable of the same mishaps of mis-managed computer equipment. You must run diagnostics and maintenance on the backup drive to ensure that the hardware is in top shape and preserving your data. Also, if you choose this method, I recommend that you connect the device, run your backup and then disconnect it from the computer. If you have an unknown virus on the computer, you do not want it to affix itself to your backup drive infecting it.

Cloud backups are quickly becoming the popular trend in data backup and for obvious reasons. When you do online backups through a service, you set some parameters like time and what you want backed up and forget about it. Your data is backed up onto servers that are maintained, kept safe from viruses and ready when you are for recovery if necessary. You are putting your data into someone else’s trust and many of these companies do a very good job at cloud backup. This has become my method of backup with a twist. I manually control my backups to the cloud then delete everything from my computer. If my computer is compromised, hackers will be disappointed in their findings.

The best defense against Ransomware is a good backup. It pains me the amount of people I know who still do not have a backup plan. Your most important documents and precious memories are extremely important to you. Make a conscious effort to choose a method of backup and stick with it. You’ll be better off if disaster strikes!

Ransomware Is Getting Worse

As I write this I am thinking, I am so sure that you probably encounter an article like this at almost every turn on the Internet. So you ask yourself why you would stop to read my article on Ransomware? Because, my articles are way cooler!

First thing that we need to do is to identify what Ransomware is. Ransomware is an exploit in which the hacker encrypts the unsuspecting user's data demanding ransom for the decryption key payable in un-traceable funds. This is a true mess any way that you look at it and Ransomware has become a multi-billion dollar venture globally.

Between January 2016 and November 2016, the distribution of ransomware increased by 267% (Source: 2017 State of Malware, MalwareBytes) and shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, it is predicted that ransomware will move beyond encrypting your files and begin to lock the boot partition of your hard drive, meaning that you will not so much as be able to load your operating system.

So what do we do about this? Ladies and gentlemen, there is not much we can do about the problem. I'd like to say that if people stop paying the ransom monies, the business would go under. However, like Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in California, there are going to be organizations who find themselves in the position where they must pay. There will be senior citizens who are preyed upon by this attacks who feel there is no alternative than to pay up. This is not true. Let's continue our journey.

How Did I Get It? - A very good question with a very bad answer. There are several ways that you can get it and it does not mean that you did it to yourself. The most common way to get ransomware is by opening an email attachment from an unsuspected sender. Many of these emails come in the form of IRS notifications, shipment receipts, important documents, etc. You can also receive the bug from an infected website and even now, it can be on a legitimate website embedded in an advertisement. Or, in today's advanced world of "always connected" high speed Internet, you could have received it through a drive-by payload.

Prevention is The Best Medicine - Education is key here and lucky for you stopping by to read this, I am like a techie educator. Let's look at some things that you should do to try and prevent an infection on your device.

• Keep your computer clean as far as making sure that your software and any Internet-connected devices are up to date. Be sure and run critical updates from all vendors on a regular basis or better yet, automatically.
• 
  Use strong passwords. Include letters, numbers, symbols, upper case and lower case characters and at least 8 in length. Try phrases, they work better.
• 
  If you have the opportunity to do so, use two-factor authentication with every service that you can. If your accounts are hacked, this will speed up the time it takes to gain control of your accounts again.
• 
  Never open email attachments from persons that you do not know. As a rule of thumb, the IRS will not contact you by telephone or email to discuss anything with you; they will snail mail you. No one will email or text you and ask you for personal information or passwords; if this happens do NOT respond. Shippers (UPS, USPS, FedEx, etc) will not send you shipping information or receipts in your email. It is the responsibility of the company with whom you placed your order to send that information to you. If ever in doubt, trash the email without opening it.

OK, But I Got Infected - If I leave you with one piece of urgent information to take away from this article, it is BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP! If you become infected with Ransomware or any other extremely damaging malware, the best defense is to have a backup of your files because the only recourse that should be considered is to know that you have a recent backup so you can take a deep breath, relax and format your device and start over. You should never consider payment to these criminals. If you have a good backup then yourself or your technology professional will have you fixed in no time.

There are many things that you can do, both free and monetary, to protect yourself from Ransomware. However, the truth is that there is no way of avoiding it. Hackers will work feverishly every day to find new and innovative ways to steal your money and that means that Ransomware will only get worse. Do yourself a favor for piece of mind and backup and do it regularly so that you are current. Do what I do. I keep my documents, pictures and other important stuff on cloud services and never on my computer. In the end, if infected, I've only lost the time to restore. I hope this gives you a little valuable information that keeps you a little bit safer on the Internet.

"We don't need no stinking recovery discs"...Wait, I do?

When I first began my career in the technology field, computer manufacturers would always send you set of recovery discs in the event that something drastic happened to your system and you needed to set things back to factory condition or far worse, change your hard drive. As years went by, they began placing this "system restore" on a separate partition of the hard drive and with a few commands, you could reset your computer back to factory condition. This was pretty convenient and they would still include the recovery discs so you had them. A little while later, the discs were no longer included but, if disaster struck, you could buy a set for $25 or $35.

There is your quick history lesson.

Recently, I had several clients who had hard drives that failed. This left them in that critical stage of "what do I do now". The good news is that all of the clients issues were worked out in a speedy and satisfactory manner but I want to discuss the importance of the recovery discs. Almost every computer will ship with an annoying blurb that returns now and again reminding you to create your recovery media. This is something that everyone should do. It is very convenient to have that recovery partition on your hard drive, but what will you do if your hard drive fails? You need the recovery discs. After the hard drive fails is not a good time to find this out. I recently learned that some manufacturers only maintain recovery libraries for their computers for a limited amount of time. That means after a few years, you may not be able to obtain the recovery media from your manufacturer.

It is a simple process and worth the time spent doing this when you first setup a new computer. It is even more valuable now if you have had a computer for some time. Create the discs. Get yourself a couple of DVD writable discs and locate the "Backup and Recovery" section on your computer and start the process. The process will walk you through every step telling you what to do and when to do it. Once you are done, you will now be equipped with the recovery tools needed in the event of an UN-recoverable hard drive disaster. While you're at it, make sure that you are regularly backing up your important data (documents, pictures, etc.).

Now, let's get started on that recovery, shall we?

NOTE - There are other good options for making an exact image of your drive that I will discuss in a future article.

Still Using Windows XP? Then Read On!

We've all heard the warnings and the techie nay-sayers scream from the data center rooftops, "Get rid of XP! Abandon XP!" From the standpoint of security, sure it is a good..no..great idea to move on to a more modern and/or more secure operating system. But there are a good handful of reasons why people cling to Windows XP and if you are one of the more than 25% of the operating system share that chose to do so then here are some tips for you.

Use Anti-Virus Protection: It goes without saying that everyone should use a good anti-virus software. There are still a good number of free suites that are still supporting Windows XP, even if Microsoft is not. Take a look at AVG, Avast!, Comodo and Panda to name a few who have not announced end of Windows XP support dates as of yet.

Use Malware Protection: A very good companion to any anti-virus protection is the use of a good malware scanner. Again, there are many free options. The thing about free versions is that it is completely manually invoked. If you can part with the few dollars for say MalwareBytes Anti-Malware, then the program can be setup to check for updates and scan the system on a schedule.

TIP: While you are downloading MalwareBytes Anti-Malware, pick up the free MalwareBytes Anti-Exploit as well. Just one more layer of protection to help when you are browsing online.

Toss Internet Explorer: Besides the fact that Internet Explorer is stuck in version 8 under Windows XP, it is slow, bogged down and everyone is trying to exploit its many vulnerabilities. Using alternatives like Chrome, Firefox or others is the best way to go because they are still supported, safe and they self update without so much as a normal restart of the browser which we do anyway when we are done browsing, right?

Do Not Use Outlook Express: Like Internet Explorer, Outlook Express has been abandoned by Microsoft and therefore does not receive any love, or updates for that matter. So if you are not ready to abandon the application-style email client for the cloud-based solutions, then check out Mozilla Thunderbird, Windows Live Mail, IncrediMail, etc. Or, if you really like the Outlook experience, fork out $5 per month and get the Office 365 subscription.

Keep Checking Updates: I know, it sounds crazy, right? Didn't Microsoft stop supporting Windows XP? Yes, they did but there may be other elements of Microsoft that have available updates. One such item is the Malicious Software Tool. Also, if there is a major update to any hardware that is still supported then you can get that downloaded too.

So let's review. There are still plenty of users who have not yet given up the Windows XP platform. If you are still using it, all you have to do is be very careful and take some sensible precautions. Be sure that you are also self-monitoring where you go and that you are not being socially-engineered. You can still enjoy one of the greatest operating systems abandoned by Microsoft...at least for a couple more years.

Computer Support on a Stick? Hold That Thought!

You’ve seen the ads on television; Everything from a USB flash drive to solve all of your computing woes to inexpensive remote service techs. These sound like great tools when you are watching a thirty second or sixty second ad because they squeeze a lot of fantastic words into the delivery and the end result is that this flash drive or service will solve your problems instantly and forever! Remember that anything that sounds too good to be true probably is not.

So let’s break this down by the two different classes. The first class is the all-in-one USB stick. You purchase this product and insert it into a USB port and it is suppose to solve all the issues on your computer. There will be interaction by you, the consumer. This is a suite of tools that will need to be run individually to do certain functions of cleaning and disinfecting. But when you’re finished how do you truly know that the infections are gone? How do you know that your computer is actually clean? What if your infection was a root kit? Wait..what is a root kit? That is a lot of unanswered questions, right. Guess what, all you really paid for there was a glorified cookies and browser cache cleaner. It did nothing to eradicate the viruses, Trojans, spyware or anything else.

The second class is the over-the-telephone experts. Call them now and get your computer running faster in 30 minutes only $19.99! Well, the $19.99 is apparently a fee you give them to allow an unknown person remote access to your computer. Once in they tell you that you have $300-$1000 worth of necessary work to be done to your computer. Believe it or not many people will fall for this and the headaches that ensue afterwards are anything from even slower computers to more viruses to have pictures and documents stolen from your computer. What is that worth to you? Scary isn’t it? The end result is that you have to hire a professional anyway to undo the damage that was done when you could have hired a qualified technician in the first place to take care of your needs. Several know cases to me on this are that after not allowing the additional work to be performed, strange things happen after the “tech” logs off the computer.

So as you can plainly see there are problems with both of these classes of computer hope. The facts are that only a qualified technician can actually diagnose your computer and tell if you have a serious problem and how serious. No two viruses are the same; some keep regenerating after software or a tool gets rid of them. A USB stick will not tell you if you have legitimate problems lurking in your system. It takes the care and expertise of a professional who knows what to look for and the end result is that you are treated kindly and taking care of in a manner that is much more guaranteed than a flash drive you purchased off the television. Look into the guarantees that come with these other products and services. Trust your computer to an expert and develop a relationship with that individual or business. You will be much happier in the end.

Free Tech Support

Let me tell you about my favorite word. This word jumps out at you. It calls your name. The word is FREE.

Now let me tell you how you can get FREE tech support for your PC products. Starting Tuesday July 12th and every second Tuesday of each month you can listen to The Behind The Mike Show where I will be taking calls and answering your computer questions. You can call the toll free number (866) 417-4359 and check in with your questions regarding viruses, spyware, software and hardware. It's Tech Tuesday and the show runs from 9:00 - 10:00 PM Eastern.

So come on and listen right on your computer at any of the following links:

WBTM Radio
Reality 1 Radio
SRN One
TyneFM
Star Radio NY

Hope to hear ya there!

No Maintenance? Bad Idea..

One of the absolute worse things that you could do for your computer is to not maintain it. Sure, we are all busy browsing, downloading, watching, listening, tweeting and more. If we do not keep these computers in top shape, they are liable to "unlike" you.

Maintenance on a computer means that the system is kept both physically cleaned and virtually cleaned. The system should be checked for maintenance issues with the operating system (Windows) and make sure the hard drive is healthy and the system is free from viruses, Trojans, malware and all of the things that we are afraid of catching. Also the system needs to be loved inside by way of a good cleaning.

Periodically is the answer. The computer can be maintained monthly, 3 months, 6 months or a year. The longer that you wait, the more at risk you become. If you are working on a laptop, then you can imagine how much faster such a small place becomes engulfed in heat and dust. I recommend that you do it or have it done. Of course, I can guide you on the cycle and even set you up with a maintenance plan. You can leave it to us to maintain it while you go and tweet about it to your heart's content.

If you wait too long...well...you shouldn't wait. Your computer has needs too; service them.

Call me for a special maintenance service for just $59! (302) 261-5397

Computer Maintenance: Part Three

Welcome to the final installment of the Computer Maintenance series. Part three will discuss a small battery of defenses that can be installed to help round out the protection to your computer. These are merely suggestions. Many IT professionals have patterns and techniques that work. This article lays out a plan that has proven successful in 99.4% of computers serviced by the author’s consultation firm, Delaware Valley Tech Rescue.

The computer has been physically cleaned and firewall and anti-virus are installed and running. Now it’s time to place the finishing touches on the computer utilizing the following FREE utilities.

SpywareBlaster – SpywareBlaster is an invaluable tool and is available through Java Cool Software (http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/). After installing the program, be sure and run the updater so that the definitions can be updated. Then be sure to enable protection for all items. SpywareBlaster does not need to be opened to run and it will work completely unnoticed by the user. It protects the computer from a database of malicious websites that contain content that could be harmful to the computer.

Spybot Search & Destroy – Created by Safer-Networking (http://www.safer-networking.org/), Spybot S&D also maintains a database of big bad websites. Besides updating the database regularly, you also must run the immunization module to place the new databases into effect. This program also comes with a scanner so if you feel that you might be infected then you can scan the computer. The added bonus is that this program builds a HOSTS file automatically to be sure that the websites in the database cannot push their wares through to your environment.

MalwareBytes Anti-Malware – MalwareBytes is a great addition to your protection scheme and like Spybot S&D, it needs to be updated regularly and then scanned if you feel there is a problem. It can be downloaded by the vendor (http://www.malwarebytes.org/). MalwareBytes has actually been known for finding issues that other scanners do not pick up and therefore has become an industry favorite. Keep in mind that MalwareBytes and Spybot S&D should be updated and scanned about once per week just to be sure that there are no issues brewing. There are many malicious packages out there that will not load immediately and can lay dormant.

There are no guarantees that any program will win over all the malicious objects floating around the Internet and sometimes, it takes different combinations of resources to rid the computer of the infestation. If used properly, these three programs can aid the anti-virus and firewall in keeping the operating environment safe and efficient. If a more severe problem is discovered then consult with a professional computer technician as most cases, severe as they can be, are able to be cleaned without drastic measures.