Protect Yourself from Online attacks

According to computer experts, we have to know whether our system has been attacked by virus. Some signs to watch for are

• (a) a dramatic slowing of our system, either overall or intermittently;
• (b) numerous crashes;
• (c) a lot of bounced email;
• (d) pop-up windows appearing when online or when browser is not running; and
• (e) new shorcuts appearing on desktops or liks or toolbars appearing in the browser.

How can we fight them back? We have to set ourselves with a good collection of anti-mailware tools and use some commonsense precautions. Our security toolkit should include the following:

Anti-virus program - free antivirus programs such as: AVG Anti-Virus Free (free.grisoft.com/doc/1), Avast (www.avast.com/eng/avast_4_home.html), Comodo (antivirus.comodo.com) and ClamWin (www.clamwin.com).

Antipspyware programs such as: Windows defender (www.microsoft.com/defender), AVG Anti-spyware (tinyurl.com/c3b8l), and Spybot Search & Destroy (www.safer-networking.org), which are all free.

A firewall to monitor information flowing to and from our monitor: Comodo free firewall (www.personalfirewall.comodo.com)

A spam blocker: Spamex (www.spamex.com), which let us create an unlimited nuber of disposable email addresses.

There are lots of useful websites featured in most computer magazines.