Headlines to note | A good giveaway
Quickly, a few items I think worthy of your attention:
* NetSeer suffers hack, triggers Google anti-malware warnings
“One advertising network’s corporate Web site suffered a hack and a malware injection attack this morning, which led to Google warning users worldwide to avoid ‘infected’ sites.” Read more..
* Welcome to bullyware: Malware gets more aggressive in money hunt
* Forget the Super Bowl. Critical Java patch released; update now
*Anonymous posts over 4000 U.S. bank executive credentials
And an alert reader shared a good software giveaway (download) you might want to jump on.
“The Glarysoft Giveaway today is… Zemana Antilogger 1.9.3.251. $34.00 usually…BTW, I signed up for their daily email.
Zemana AntiLogger is a powerful, efficient, and lightweight app that blocks hackers. It detects any attempts to modify your computer’s settings, record your activities, hook to your PC’s sensitive processes, or inject malicious code in your system. The AntiLogger is designed to work with your anti-virus. While an anti-virus application will protect you against a wide range of known forms of malware, the AntiLogger is able to stop advanced, new, and niche threats developed with a specific objective: to steal your private information or access your secure internet connections.”
* The Big Picture: A good read for looking at the future of tech (and, understanding what’s happening now) Surface Pro, Windows 8 and the rebirth of Microsoft
“A new landscape of tablets, cloud and BYOD pressures means that Microsoft has to get both the software and the hardware right.
Last year’s launch of Windows 8 and the soon-to-be-released Surface Pro tablet are setting the company on a very different course to the one it has pursued in recent years, and will define its strategy for the next decade.” Read more..
Busy day ahead.. have to run.
Update: * An Easy-To-Use Program To Fix, Speed Up, Maintain And Protect Your PC
“One of the biggest complaints I often hear from people who use a computer at home is that over time their computer gets slower and slower. This often occurs as result of installing numerous software programs and failing to perform routine system maintenance. When I hear this complaint, I will often help them clean up […]” Read more..
Copyright 2007-2013 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved.
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• About Tech Paul
I am a Retired computer & network technician. I used to think the machines were pretty cool. Now I don’t.
They’re anything but.
I regularly posted how-to’s and tricks & tips and general computing advice here starting in 2007. (Use the Search tool to find answers. But be aware, many are rather dated.) Sometimes I answered (your) specific questions in an article if I believed the answer was generally helpful to “everyone”. All the writing you see was my own, typos and all. There always is/was an implied “IMHO” in what you see here.
Note: You are responsible for using this blog and its content. I am in no way liable for any losses caused by user error, viruses and/or other malware, hardware or software failure, or any other conceivable reason.
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TechPaul,
Thanks for the link back… P.S. I could hear you yelling last night all the way from San Francisco! I had to work, caught bits and pieces; but what a game.
Rick
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Rick,
Yeah… makes me glad I’m not a betting man. Sorry you had to miss the show, but – yes – gotta keep the priorities straight.
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The link above to the latest Java warning strongly cautions us to update to the latest patch, version 7u13, and also highly recommends shutting javascript off entirely. Mine is off, but to get the update from Oracle, javascript must be enabled.
I use Secunia for all but Microsoft updates, and it will allow you to download the latest Java patch without enabling javascript. Even though I don’t use Java any longer, I still want it to be up-to-date. Just a small tip.
At this point I don’t know exactly how I’ll deal with my financial institutions online web sites. They all require Java to use them. I guess for now I’ll phone them from a land line to request statements and other important information to be sent in the mail.
The rate at which undesirable individuals are attacking us is growing exponentially. I intend to request (demand) that our banks stop using javascript coding, at least for login and account viewing purposes. I’m very sure that nothing will come from my “requests”, but I’m still going to try.
The US Postal Service may very well begin getting a lot more mail from me, since most of my “online bill pay” accounts also require Java. When the Department of Homeland Security recommends turning off Java, I’d say that as much as some folks love their online social networking games and such, they might want to consider just how dangerous it is.
IMHO.
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KsTinMan,
Generally speaking.. since it would require a significant number of people saying what you intend to say before the voice for change will be heard – and most people don’t know hardware from software (much less what Java, or JavaScript, is) – I suspect that only those in the know (so to speak) will go “off the grid” and stay secure, and things will continue on as is. Losing tens of millions doesn’t seem to be enough to make the Industry change, so… Maybe a theft of tens of billions will? (Don’t hold your breath: we hemorrhage $105 billion a year in cybercrime and have for the past three years..)
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I thank my lucky stars that my wife is intelligent enough (no offense intended) to heed the warnings. She quit using Facebook altogether. However, if and/or when Oracle gets their stuff together and finally releases a “bulletproof” version (HA!), she’ll be back on in a flash.
Of course she knows that I will be the guy who has to repair any problems caused by malicious JavaScript code on her computer. First and foremost, I’ll have to work to fix any identity theft issues that may arise. She really doesn’t want to go there… Something to be thankful for!!!
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KsTinMan,
I do not want to detract from what you are saying here… but I am suspecting that (perhaps) you are confusing, or “melding”, the two “Javas”. (Maybe I’m mis-reading between the lines, and if so, I apologize..) But the two are separate animals.
* Java
* JavaScript
I do not Facebook, so I do not know if there are things there that require Java. And I do not know how much interaction via JavaScript occurs on an average visit. So I cannot say if Facebook is/was particularly vulnerable to serving malware/exploit attacks.
But I can say, no machine is, or can be made, “bulletproof”. It is no longer a question of if you’ll get infected, but when. So all we can do is take what measures we can to make it harder to be victimized — which from prior exchanges with you, I know you’ve implemented.
* Sandbox your browser
* Keep your software “patched” and up-to-date
* If possible, use security “plug-ins”: ad-blockers, script stoppers (i.e. NoScript, NotScript), privacy
* Exercise paranoid common sense in your surfing and downloading
* And last but not least, absolutely use a firewall and heuristic anti-malware.
And then make regular, full “image” backups. So you can more readily recover from the day a “zero day” is bumped into…
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Hmmm… apparently she’s more intelligent than I. When she heard of the Java warning, she went into the Windows Control Panel and turned off Java in the Security tab of the Java Control Panel, as did I. But, I also have the NoScript add-on running which won’t allow entry into Facebook (unless you expressly permit it). She indeed can still use Facebook. I never have used social networking and never will. Sorry for any scare I may have caused with bad information.
I’m the guilty party on this one. As a retired software engineer it’s hard to admit, but I was also in the 95+% who thought that JavaScript was a function of Java. After all of the web pages I’ve written that had snippets of JavaScript inserted for bells and whistles, one would think that I’d have known that. ID:10T….
Thanks for pointing out the smell I failed to recognize!
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KsTinMan,
I truly don’t think your assumption qualifies as a ID-Ten-T Error! Natural-enuff mistake. And in a way, it’s splitting hairs.
Your concerns about maintaining your privacy and security on the Web are more than well-founded.
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