Internet and Email Safety

Keeping your informaton safe from pirates and keeping yourself safe from the spam, spyware, and virus programs that circulate through e-mail is an important part of your on-line experience.

Even if your ISP provides protection, it is important to have your own protection as well. A firewall will alert you to viruses attached to email, and will also let you know when other computers are trying to contact yours.

You can purchase your own Internet Security Software from companies like Norton or McAffee and we recommend that you do, and keep your virus definitions  up to date. You should set your security software to scan your email as it downloads, and your firewall software should be first on your startup list, so it will be up and running if your computer connects automatically to the Internet. If your security system does not come with a firewall, you can download a free personal firewall here.

SPAM is the Internet name for all those irritating pop-up advertisements, time-consuming and sometimes funny messages, chain-letters, and false virus warnings, that appear un-asked-for in your e-mailbox. Many on-line companies sell or share consumer information on line. We do not, but here are a few ways to cut down on spam.  Don't sign up for freebies, drawings, or anything else that requires you to  give your e-mail address, home address, and/or other personal information, like your birthday. If it says "click here" to be taken off our list. Don't! If you receive a blank e-mail that asks to be notified when it is read, say "NO". Beware of free greeting cards and other freebies, yes you get to send nice cards, but you will also inevitably get  spam and so will the person to whom you send the card, since the company will also have their e-mail address as well.

FALSE MESSAGES, purporting to come from companies you use, like Paypal or eBay, abound. This includes messages that say you have won a prize, and some messages that are 
made to look exactly like they are coming from someone you actually trust and do business with and contain a safety warning.
 
Usually the heading will be something like "IMPORTANT MESSAGE" and the message itself will contain both the warning and a link  like this:

As part of our security measures, we regularly screen activity in the PayPal system. We recently contacted you after noticing an issue on your account. We requested information from you for the following reason: Our system requires further account verification. Case ID Number: PP-097-788-133 This is a third and final reminder to log in to PayPal as soon as possible

You must click the link below:

DO NOT click, folks! If you suspect your PAY PAL (or any other bank) account has been tampered with ALWAYS Go To your PayPal or your Bank Account Site by TYPING in the address and password by hand.  

Be careful of your security information. NEVER give your password to anyone. Remember, if you choose the "remember my password" option, the information will be saved in your "cookies" file and could be accessed by spyware., should it get into your system Choosing a password with both upper and lower case characters and a mixture of numbers and letters is also a good safety precaution.

Keep printed (and well hidden) information of all the sites, groups, and services you join, or to which you subscribe so that you will be able to double-check the information. Do NOT hide it within reach of your computer, or even in the same room. Keep it in a locked file drawer.

If you click on the link in an e-mail like the one above, they may be able to find out your PayPal info and steal whatever money you have in your PayPal account. Instead, open the header at the top of the message to show the routing.  When you do, it will  have a list of things and a great deal of code. You will likely see: Subject; From; Reply to; Date; To: (If it says To "Undisclosed Recipients" you know this same message was sent to a lot of 
folks at once and is indeed, spam.);  and "Received From" and "Originating IP." The "Received From" may be an address that looks like it is genuine, but the "Originating IP"  will be a set of numbers. If you want to find out who they really are, you can check with WHOIS and find out where the message originated.  This will be the name of the company from whom the spammer rents Internet space. This company is not responsible for what their customers do, but may kick the customer off if you report  the illegal activity. If you want to report abuse, you can usually e-mail the header info the originating ISP's main address using the following format abuse@(name of ISP).com

False Messages  and viruses (see below) usually have a "Reply To" address that comes from "harvested e-mail" addresses. They are genuine addresses of perfectly innocent people who had nothing to do with the spam, false message, or  virus, but whose address is used falsely to send the information . We have actually gotten advertising spam from one of our own e-mail addresses.

Spyware: Whether or not it is accompanied by those annoying pop-up ads, spyware is the Internet name for programs that track what you buy and/or sites that you visit, and e-mail that information back to others without your knowledge, so companies who sell stuff can send you more spam.  Spybot  and Adaware are two free programs that will help keep your computer free of spyware. The spy programs can take up a lot of memory and may cause your computer to slow down.

Viruses and Worms: Computer virus programs are designed to throw a wrench into the works of your program files. Worms collect information from your addressbook, send messages to everyone in it, and collect info from them, etc. Worms, because of their exponential growth can cause whole sections of the Internet to fail. Virus programs can scramble your computer's brains and may cost you a lot of your stored information. They are usually written out of spite by disgruntled former employees of software manufacturers, or by people with too much time on their hands and a weakness for mischief. Your virus software should be up to date at all times and you should do a complete scan once a week. If you have Norton Utilities or Systemworks, you may be able to partition your hard drive. Then you can keep the programs on the part of the drive that accesses the Internet, and store information on another part of the drive. Should a virus infect your hard drive , it MIGHT not access the information files.

An external hard drive for backing  up your system is also a good idea. Information stored on an external drive is much less likely to become infected than that on your basic hard drive.

Some virus warnings are actually worms, so it's important to check--especially when you receive a warning that says something like "send this to everyone on your list." If you do, it's almost certain all those addresses will be harvested by someone for future spam. To find out if a virus is the real thing check at Symantec's virus hoax page.

Virus programs must be sent as e-mail attachments. They do not come in the body of the e-mail. They usually have an .exe extension, and you should be very careful about opening attachments . Keep your firewall and virus protection software set to automatically scan your e-mail. If you receive an attachment file--an e-book for instance -- your anti-virus software will allow you to scan the file, before you open it. So when you download information, or software, from the Internet, scan the file before opening it, or program before installing it in your computer. One should always  make safe downloading a practice, even if you know the source of the files very well.