If you find that you get poor performance, or the network connection is dropped altogether when you connect to certain wi-fi hot spots with your Vista or Windows 7 computer, this may be because the wireless access point or router does not support 802.11 power save protocol. There are a couple of methods you can use to work around the issue. Find out about them in KB article 928152 at
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928152
With over 30 years in computing technical roles and specialized GRC expertise, I translate complex security frameworks into actionable insights. My journey from IT VAR to financial compliance to enterprise security initiatives informs this blog, where I break down cybersecurity concepts for both professionals and everyday users seeking practical protection in our digital world.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Can't connect to the Internet anymore
QUESTION:
I have a Windows 7 computer that could connect to the Internet fine before. Now suddenly I can't get online with it. I have to use my old XP computer to get online. So it's obviously not a problem with my ISP since the XP computer still works. What can I do?
ANSWER:
Always start troubleshooting at the hardware level. Make sure your network cable is connected (and try swapping it out for a different Ethernet cable) or if you're using wi-fi, make sure wireless is turned on. Many times I've seen people forget to reenable wi-fi after disabling it on a plane and then think there was something wrong with the computer.
If all that checks out, run the built in network troubleshooter in Windows 7. This article tells you how:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Using-the-Network-troubleshooter-in-Windows-7
If that doesn't work, try booting the computer in safe mode with networking, and/or try booting without loading third party applications (clean boot mode). You can find out more about that here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929135
I have a Windows 7 computer that could connect to the Internet fine before. Now suddenly I can't get online with it. I have to use my old XP computer to get online. So it's obviously not a problem with my ISP since the XP computer still works. What can I do?
ANSWER:
Always start troubleshooting at the hardware level. Make sure your network cable is connected (and try swapping it out for a different Ethernet cable) or if you're using wi-fi, make sure wireless is turned on. Many times I've seen people forget to reenable wi-fi after disabling it on a plane and then think there was something wrong with the computer.
If all that checks out, run the built in network troubleshooter in Windows 7. This article tells you how:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Using-the-Network-troubleshooter-in-Windows-7
If that doesn't work, try booting the computer in safe mode with networking, and/or try booting without loading third party applications (clean boot mode). You can find out more about that here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929135
Why Do So Many Geeks Hate Internet Explorer?
It’s common knowledge that almost every single geek hates Internet Explorer with a passion, but have you ever wondered why? Let’s take a fair look at the history and where it all began… for posterity, if nothing else.
Contrary to what you might think, this article is not meant to be a hate-fest on Internet Explorer—in fact, we’re pretty impressed with the hardware acceleration and new features in Internet Explorer 9—but keep reading for the whole story.
In the Beginning There Was IE, and It Was Good?
We’ve all been so used to thinking of Internet Explorer as that slow, buggy browser that is behind the times, but it wasn’t always that way—in fact, way back when, Internet Explorer pioneered many innovations that made the web what it is today.
Here’s a quick tour through the easily forgotten history of the infamous browser:
1996: Internet Explorer 3
This version of the browser, introduced in 1997, was the first browser to implement CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Yes, you’re reading that correctly—in fact, it introduced many new features like Java applets and sadly, ActiveX controls.
1997: Internet Explorer 4
IE4 introduced a blazing fast (at the time) rendering engine as an embeddable component that could be used in other applications—this was a lot more important than people realize. This version also introduced Dynamic HTML, which allows web pages to dynamically change the page using JavaScript, and added Active Desktop integration.
Even more weird? Seems like nobody remembers this anymore, but IE4 was actually cross-platform—you could install it on Mac OS, Solaris, and HP-UX—and by the time IE5 was released, IE4 had reached a 60% market share.
1999: Internet Explorer 5.x
Microsoft invented Ajax. Wait… what? That’s right, it was this version of IE that introduced the XMLHttpRequest feature in JavaScript, which forms the underlying technology behind every web application you’re using today—you know, like Gmail. Of course, the term “Ajax” wasn’t actually coined until years later by somebody other than Microsoft, but this release supported everything required to make it work.
So Yes, Microsoft Innovated
From IE3 until IE6, Microsoft used all their resources to simply out-innovate the competition, releasing new features and better browsers faster than Netscape. In fact, Netscape 3 Gold was a buggy piece of junk that crashed all the time, and Netscape 4 was extremely slow and could barely render tables—much less CSS, which would often cause the browser to crash.
To put it in context: web developers used to complain about Netscape the same way they complain about IE6 now.
What Made It Go So Very Wrong?
The trouble all started when Microsoft integrated IE into Windows as a required component, and made it difficult to uninstall and use an alternate browser. Then there was the whole business with them exploiting their monopoly to try and push Netscape out of the market, and a lot of people started to view Microsoft as the evil empire.
Microsoft Stopped Trying
By the time Microsoft released Internet Explorer 6 in 2001, complete with lots of new features for web developers, since there was no competition and they had a 95% market share, Microsoft just stopped trying—seriously, they did nothing for 5 years even after Firefox was released and geeks started migrating left and right.
Microsoft-Specific Features
The whole problem with Microsoft’s innovation is that much of it was done in ways that didn’t follow the web standards—this wasn’t as big of a problem when Internet Explorer was the only game in town, but once Firefox and Webkit came around and started following the standards correctly, suddenly it became a huge problem for web developers.
Security Holes and Crashing
Since Microsoft decided they didn’t need to try anymore, and they didn’t keep up with the competition from Firefox and other browsers, bugs and security holes just cropped up left and right—really terrible ones, too. For instance, this code is all that is required to crash IE6:
IE7 and IE8 Were Too Little, Too Late
It took 5 years after IE6 for Microsoft to finally get around to releasing IE7, which added tabs and made the browser slightly more tolerable, but for web designers it was still a nightmare to deal with, and only complicated the issue since now you had to make pages render correctly in two lousy browsers instead of just one.
It took another 2.5 years for Microsoft to finally release Internet Explorer 8, which greatly improved CSS support for web developers, and added new features like Private browsing, tab isolation to prevent one bad page from taking down the whole browser, and phishing protection. By this point, most geeks had already moved on to Firefox, and then some of us to Google Chrome.
Here’s the Real Reason Geeks Hate IE
Just because we’re geeks doesn’t mean we hate everything that’s inferior and outdated—in fact, we often love retro computing—that’s why we love Atari, NES, Commodore 64, etc. We take pride in our geek knowledge. So why’s Internet Explorer a different story?
Here’s a couple of reasons that fueled our hatred of the buggy browser, and finally put us all over the edge:
Supporting IE is Like a Fork in the Eye for Web Devs
Here’s a sample of a day in the life of a web designer: You spend hours making sure that your page looks great, and you test it out in Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and even Opera. It looks great, awesome!
Now you open up IE and the page looks like somebody put it into a blender and hit the Whip button. Then you spend double the amount of time trying to fix it to look tolerable in IE6 and IE7, cursing loudly the entire time.
Geeks Forced to Use Internet Explorer
And here’s where we come to the real issue—the whole reason that geeks can’t stand Internet Explorer:
Geeks everywhere were forced to use Internet Explorer at work even when there are better browsers, forced to support it for corporate applications, forced to make sure web sites still work in IE, and we couldn’t convince everybody to switch to a better browser.
Geeks don’t hate something that’s inferior—but they do hate it when it’s forced on them.
The Good News: The Future Might Be Brighter
Thankfully it seems like Microsoft has finally learned from their many, many mistakes in the browser world. They are below 50% in the market share wars, and they’ve finally learned to focus on using web standards.
Internet Explorer 9 is about to be released, it’s got a shiny new interface that looks a lot like Google Chrome, blazing fast hardware acceleration, and supports HTML5 surprisingly well—in fact, it’s so much better that 34% of our readers said they will switch to IE9.
Microsoft is billing Internet Explorer 9 as the browser that’s going to change the world, and they aren’t wrong—they just aren’t mentioning that they were the only ones holding the web back with their anemic browsers. And now that mess is finally over.
Contrary to what you might think, this article is not meant to be a hate-fest on Internet Explorer—in fact, we’re pretty impressed with the hardware acceleration and new features in Internet Explorer 9—but keep reading for the whole story.
In the Beginning There Was IE, and It Was Good?
We’ve all been so used to thinking of Internet Explorer as that slow, buggy browser that is behind the times, but it wasn’t always that way—in fact, way back when, Internet Explorer pioneered many innovations that made the web what it is today.
Here’s a quick tour through the easily forgotten history of the infamous browser:
1996: Internet Explorer 3
This version of the browser, introduced in 1997, was the first browser to implement CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Yes, you’re reading that correctly—in fact, it introduced many new features like Java applets and sadly, ActiveX controls.
1997: Internet Explorer 4
IE4 introduced a blazing fast (at the time) rendering engine as an embeddable component that could be used in other applications—this was a lot more important than people realize. This version also introduced Dynamic HTML, which allows web pages to dynamically change the page using JavaScript, and added Active Desktop integration.
Even more weird? Seems like nobody remembers this anymore, but IE4 was actually cross-platform—you could install it on Mac OS, Solaris, and HP-UX—and by the time IE5 was released, IE4 had reached a 60% market share.
1999: Internet Explorer 5.x
Microsoft invented Ajax. Wait… what? That’s right, it was this version of IE that introduced the XMLHttpRequest feature in JavaScript, which forms the underlying technology behind every web application you’re using today—you know, like Gmail. Of course, the term “Ajax” wasn’t actually coined until years later by somebody other than Microsoft, but this release supported everything required to make it work.
So Yes, Microsoft Innovated
From IE3 until IE6, Microsoft used all their resources to simply out-innovate the competition, releasing new features and better browsers faster than Netscape. In fact, Netscape 3 Gold was a buggy piece of junk that crashed all the time, and Netscape 4 was extremely slow and could barely render tables—much less CSS, which would often cause the browser to crash.
To put it in context: web developers used to complain about Netscape the same way they complain about IE6 now.
What Made It Go So Very Wrong?
The trouble all started when Microsoft integrated IE into Windows as a required component, and made it difficult to uninstall and use an alternate browser. Then there was the whole business with them exploiting their monopoly to try and push Netscape out of the market, and a lot of people started to view Microsoft as the evil empire.
Microsoft Stopped Trying
By the time Microsoft released Internet Explorer 6 in 2001, complete with lots of new features for web developers, since there was no competition and they had a 95% market share, Microsoft just stopped trying—seriously, they did nothing for 5 years even after Firefox was released and geeks started migrating left and right.
Microsoft-Specific Features
The whole problem with Microsoft’s innovation is that much of it was done in ways that didn’t follow the web standards—this wasn’t as big of a problem when Internet Explorer was the only game in town, but once Firefox and Webkit came around and started following the standards correctly, suddenly it became a huge problem for web developers.
Security Holes and Crashing
Since Microsoft decided they didn’t need to try anymore, and they didn’t keep up with the competition from Firefox and other browsers, bugs and security holes just cropped up left and right—really terrible ones, too. For instance, this code is all that is required to crash IE6:
IE7 and IE8 Were Too Little, Too Late
It took 5 years after IE6 for Microsoft to finally get around to releasing IE7, which added tabs and made the browser slightly more tolerable, but for web designers it was still a nightmare to deal with, and only complicated the issue since now you had to make pages render correctly in two lousy browsers instead of just one.
It took another 2.5 years for Microsoft to finally release Internet Explorer 8, which greatly improved CSS support for web developers, and added new features like Private browsing, tab isolation to prevent one bad page from taking down the whole browser, and phishing protection. By this point, most geeks had already moved on to Firefox, and then some of us to Google Chrome.
Here’s the Real Reason Geeks Hate IE
Just because we’re geeks doesn’t mean we hate everything that’s inferior and outdated—in fact, we often love retro computing—that’s why we love Atari, NES, Commodore 64, etc. We take pride in our geek knowledge. So why’s Internet Explorer a different story?
Here’s a couple of reasons that fueled our hatred of the buggy browser, and finally put us all over the edge:
Supporting IE is Like a Fork in the Eye for Web Devs
Here’s a sample of a day in the life of a web designer: You spend hours making sure that your page looks great, and you test it out in Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and even Opera. It looks great, awesome!
Now you open up IE and the page looks like somebody put it into a blender and hit the Whip button. Then you spend double the amount of time trying to fix it to look tolerable in IE6 and IE7, cursing loudly the entire time.
Geeks Forced to Use Internet Explorer
And here’s where we come to the real issue—the whole reason that geeks can’t stand Internet Explorer:
Geeks everywhere were forced to use Internet Explorer at work even when there are better browsers, forced to support it for corporate applications, forced to make sure web sites still work in IE, and we couldn’t convince everybody to switch to a better browser.
Geeks don’t hate something that’s inferior—but they do hate it when it’s forced on them.
The Good News: The Future Might Be Brighter
Thankfully it seems like Microsoft has finally learned from their many, many mistakes in the browser world. They are below 50% in the market share wars, and they’ve finally learned to focus on using web standards.
Internet Explorer 9 is about to be released, it’s got a shiny new interface that looks a lot like Google Chrome, blazing fast hardware acceleration, and supports HTML5 surprisingly well—in fact, it’s so much better that 34% of our readers said they will switch to IE9.
Microsoft is billing Internet Explorer 9 as the browser that’s going to change the world, and they aren’t wrong—they just aren’t mentioning that they were the only ones holding the web back with their anemic browsers. And now that mess is finally over.
Make Microsoft Word Always Use Plain Text for Pasted Text
Are you tired of pasting text into Word, only to find that the pasted text included colors, formatting, links, and more from its original source? Here’s how you can keep pasted text from messing up your documents. By default, Word will keep the formatting of text and other content you past into a document, including links, colors, size, font, and more. This can be annoying at best and at worst, can mess up the other formatting in your document.
If you copied a large amount of text or images from a site, or if your internet connection happens to be slow, Word may even freeze temporarily while it’s retrieving and pasting the content. That’s no fun.
Word does have one saving feature: you can click the little popup under pasted text and select Plain Text to get just the text and none of the formatting. However, that’s 2 extra clicks. If you just want to paste the text, and nothing else, you’ll want to change the default setting. Thankfully, it’s easy. If you just pasted text, just click the popup and select Set Default Paste.
Alternately, open the Options pane in Word manually from the File backstage menu or the Office orb in Word 2007.
Select the Advanced tab, then scroll down to the Cut, copy, and paste settings section.
Here you can change a wide variety of pasting options. To switch to pasting text only by default, select Keep Text Only in the drop-down menus. You can change the settings for all options, or just change the ones you wish. We often want to keep the formatting if we’re pasting within the same document, so we left the first option at default, then switched all the others to Keep Text Only.
Once you’ve changed the settings, try pasting some text to make sure it works right. Now it should just paste the text, even if your paste included an image, link, or other text formatting. This is great for the default setting, and makes everything much quicker.
Or, if you decide you want to include the formatting, links, or other content from the paste, just click the popup and select Keep Source Formatting. This way, you’ll only have to click extra if you need the extra content.
Now you can save time and get just the text you want from websites, other programs, and more without waiting for a large paste and taking the time to tweak it.
If you copied a large amount of text or images from a site, or if your internet connection happens to be slow, Word may even freeze temporarily while it’s retrieving and pasting the content. That’s no fun.
Word does have one saving feature: you can click the little popup under pasted text and select Plain Text to get just the text and none of the formatting. However, that’s 2 extra clicks. If you just want to paste the text, and nothing else, you’ll want to change the default setting. Thankfully, it’s easy. If you just pasted text, just click the popup and select Set Default Paste.
Alternately, open the Options pane in Word manually from the File backstage menu or the Office orb in Word 2007.
Select the Advanced tab, then scroll down to the Cut, copy, and paste settings section.
Here you can change a wide variety of pasting options. To switch to pasting text only by default, select Keep Text Only in the drop-down menus. You can change the settings for all options, or just change the ones you wish. We often want to keep the formatting if we’re pasting within the same document, so we left the first option at default, then switched all the others to Keep Text Only.
Once you’ve changed the settings, try pasting some text to make sure it works right. Now it should just paste the text, even if your paste included an image, link, or other text formatting. This is great for the default setting, and makes everything much quicker.
Or, if you decide you want to include the formatting, links, or other content from the paste, just click the popup and select Keep Source Formatting. This way, you’ll only have to click extra if you need the extra content.
Now you can save time and get just the text you want from websites, other programs, and more without waiting for a large paste and taking the time to tweak it.
Friday, October 15, 2010
What to Do If Hackers Steal Your Online Accounts
By RIVA RICHMOND
Has your Web-mail or social-network account been hijacked? Join the (miserable) club.
Stolen accounts—caused by aggressive phishing attacks and distribution of malicious programs to collect passwords—have become a plague upon the Web. Spammers want them so their messages can get past spam filters. And crooks, who often lock out the true owners by changing their passwords, use them to find and get inside financial accounts or to impersonate the owners and weasel money out of their friends.
“This is big business. There’s billions of dollars at stake,” says Dan Lewis, senior project manger for Windows Live Hotmail at Microsoft. “There are some really smart criminal organizations doing this.”
It’s not hard to recover an account that a reprobate is co-habiting with you: Simply change your password to lock them out (and scan your PC for malware that might steal your new password). But it’s trickier if someone has taken over your account entirely or the site has temporarily shut you out because they believe your account is compromised. Many people describe long and painful processes to get their accounts back. There’s no phone number to call or human to speak to. You click and hope for the best.
The most common roadblock to a quick recovery is proving you are the real account owner, the sites say. Service providers consider the worst outcome to be handing an account to the wrong person. So if you can’t prove it’s yours – maddening as that may be – you will have no choice but to start all over with a new account. Here’s what to do if one of your online accounts is compromised.
Hotmail
Last week, Microsoft quietly undertook an effort to clean out hijackers from Hotmail en masse. It displayed a warning message to people whose accounts it suspected were compromised and required them to reset their passwords, using a method that would be difficult for a scammer’s automated systems to operate. Mr. Lewis said less than 1 percent of accounts were part of the surprise purge—which is nevertheless a big number of accounts, considering Hotmail maintains an estimated 360 million of them.
Account owners had to prove their identities by obtaining a code via an alternate e-mail address, by answering a secret question or supplying other personal information. If an account owner was not able to regain gain access using an automated process, they could get help from Hotmail’s online support staff to validate themselves and reset their passwords. Users who can prove they’re the legitimate owner will get access within 24 hours, according to Hotmail.
In a second phase, Hotmail on Monday rolled out features to make account recovery easier in the future. It’s asking users to supply cellphone numbers where Hotmail can text them with an extra security code and to identify the devices they use to access Hotmail—their “trusted PCs”—to help the service know it’s them logging into the account.
Gmail
If you’re locked out of your Gmail account, click on “Can’t access your account?” at the bottom of the main Gmail sign-in page and on the help page and click the circle beside “My account has been compromised.” Google will ask for secondary e-mail addresses and mobile phone numbers you have supplied previously to validate you are you. If you haven’t provided this information, you’ll be asked to fill out a form with a set of questions designed to verify you are the real Google account owner.
Gmail may show a warning if it suspects your account is being used by someone else and will help you reset your password. And it is increasingly prompting users to provide or update alternate contact information that can speed recovery should you get hacked.
Yahoo Mail
Yahoo Mail users whose accounts have been taken over should visit Yahoo’s help page and click “Security” in the box listing popular Yahoo services. From there, click the “Contact Us” tab at the top and send Yahoo a message using the form at the bottom of the page. An online customer-care agent will help you from there.
Facebook
If your Facebook account has been hijacked or suspended, visit this help page and submit a report. If the e-mail address tied to your account is in your hands, it will be fairly easy to change your Facebook password and regain your account, Facebook says.
But if your e-mail account has been hacked or your nemesis has changed the e-mail address tied to your Facebook account, you will have to verify your identity by answering certain questions before you can set up a new password and get your account back. (Then avail yourself of new Facebook security features that can help prevent account takeover.)
Twitter
Twitter users who notice tweets and direct messages from their account that they didn’t send or are following new people they didn’t select should go here and follow the directions to change their password and disconnect from Twitter apps they don’t recognize or trust, which could be the culprits.
If you can’t log in at all, you will need to ask Twitter to send a new password to the e-mail address associated with your account.
Andrew Stephens, of Cirencester in Britain, who is @drhappymac on Twitter, had his account hijacked last week, which was then used to send spammy tweets. Twitter quickly suspended his account, and four days later he got it back. “All in all, I was surprised at just how effective Twitter’s response was. They had my account locked down within minutes and back in my control pretty much as soon as you might reasonably expect,” he says.
If your e-mail address was hacked too, you will need to recover that first and then request a new Twitter password. If you can’t get your e-mail account back or continue to have problems, send Twitter an SOS using this form.
Losing access to accounts like these can be awful. Earlier this month, Jonathan Roniger, a musician in Nashville, was frozen out of Facebook and two e-mail accounts by hackers, who contacted his friends and asked for $1,800, claiming to be destitute in London after getting mugged while on a last-minute vacation. At least one well-meaning friend wired money not once, but twice.
Mr. Roniger wrested control of his Gmail account two days after it was hijacked, only to get locked out again by the hackers. After getting back in, he shut down the account altogether and opened a new one. He still hasn’t regained his Facebook account, which is suspended while he pulls together documents and photos to prove his identity. Mr. Roniger says a well-connected friend got Facebook to lock down the account and “stop the madness,” when he couldn’t figure out how to get it shut down himself. (He could have gone here.)
http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/29/what-to-do-if-hackers-steal-your-online-accounts/?src=me&ref=technology&nl=technology&emc=techupdateema4
Has your Web-mail or social-network account been hijacked? Join the (miserable) club.
Stolen accounts—caused by aggressive phishing attacks and distribution of malicious programs to collect passwords—have become a plague upon the Web. Spammers want them so their messages can get past spam filters. And crooks, who often lock out the true owners by changing their passwords, use them to find and get inside financial accounts or to impersonate the owners and weasel money out of their friends.
“This is big business. There’s billions of dollars at stake,” says Dan Lewis, senior project manger for Windows Live Hotmail at Microsoft. “There are some really smart criminal organizations doing this.”
It’s not hard to recover an account that a reprobate is co-habiting with you: Simply change your password to lock them out (and scan your PC for malware that might steal your new password). But it’s trickier if someone has taken over your account entirely or the site has temporarily shut you out because they believe your account is compromised. Many people describe long and painful processes to get their accounts back. There’s no phone number to call or human to speak to. You click and hope for the best.
The most common roadblock to a quick recovery is proving you are the real account owner, the sites say. Service providers consider the worst outcome to be handing an account to the wrong person. So if you can’t prove it’s yours – maddening as that may be – you will have no choice but to start all over with a new account. Here’s what to do if one of your online accounts is compromised.
Hotmail
Last week, Microsoft quietly undertook an effort to clean out hijackers from Hotmail en masse. It displayed a warning message to people whose accounts it suspected were compromised and required them to reset their passwords, using a method that would be difficult for a scammer’s automated systems to operate. Mr. Lewis said less than 1 percent of accounts were part of the surprise purge—which is nevertheless a big number of accounts, considering Hotmail maintains an estimated 360 million of them.
Account owners had to prove their identities by obtaining a code via an alternate e-mail address, by answering a secret question or supplying other personal information. If an account owner was not able to regain gain access using an automated process, they could get help from Hotmail’s online support staff to validate themselves and reset their passwords. Users who can prove they’re the legitimate owner will get access within 24 hours, according to Hotmail.
In a second phase, Hotmail on Monday rolled out features to make account recovery easier in the future. It’s asking users to supply cellphone numbers where Hotmail can text them with an extra security code and to identify the devices they use to access Hotmail—their “trusted PCs”—to help the service know it’s them logging into the account.
Gmail
If you’re locked out of your Gmail account, click on “Can’t access your account?” at the bottom of the main Gmail sign-in page and on the help page and click the circle beside “My account has been compromised.” Google will ask for secondary e-mail addresses and mobile phone numbers you have supplied previously to validate you are you. If you haven’t provided this information, you’ll be asked to fill out a form with a set of questions designed to verify you are the real Google account owner.
Gmail may show a warning if it suspects your account is being used by someone else and will help you reset your password. And it is increasingly prompting users to provide or update alternate contact information that can speed recovery should you get hacked.
Yahoo Mail
Yahoo Mail users whose accounts have been taken over should visit Yahoo’s help page and click “Security” in the box listing popular Yahoo services. From there, click the “Contact Us” tab at the top and send Yahoo a message using the form at the bottom of the page. An online customer-care agent will help you from there.
If your Facebook account has been hijacked or suspended, visit this help page and submit a report. If the e-mail address tied to your account is in your hands, it will be fairly easy to change your Facebook password and regain your account, Facebook says.
But if your e-mail account has been hacked or your nemesis has changed the e-mail address tied to your Facebook account, you will have to verify your identity by answering certain questions before you can set up a new password and get your account back. (Then avail yourself of new Facebook security features that can help prevent account takeover.)
Twitter users who notice tweets and direct messages from their account that they didn’t send or are following new people they didn’t select should go here and follow the directions to change their password and disconnect from Twitter apps they don’t recognize or trust, which could be the culprits.
If you can’t log in at all, you will need to ask Twitter to send a new password to the e-mail address associated with your account.
Andrew Stephens, of Cirencester in Britain, who is @drhappymac on Twitter, had his account hijacked last week, which was then used to send spammy tweets. Twitter quickly suspended his account, and four days later he got it back. “All in all, I was surprised at just how effective Twitter’s response was. They had my account locked down within minutes and back in my control pretty much as soon as you might reasonably expect,” he says.
If your e-mail address was hacked too, you will need to recover that first and then request a new Twitter password. If you can’t get your e-mail account back or continue to have problems, send Twitter an SOS using this form.
Losing access to accounts like these can be awful. Earlier this month, Jonathan Roniger, a musician in Nashville, was frozen out of Facebook and two e-mail accounts by hackers, who contacted his friends and asked for $1,800, claiming to be destitute in London after getting mugged while on a last-minute vacation. At least one well-meaning friend wired money not once, but twice.
Mr. Roniger wrested control of his Gmail account two days after it was hijacked, only to get locked out again by the hackers. After getting back in, he shut down the account altogether and opened a new one. He still hasn’t regained his Facebook account, which is suspended while he pulls together documents and photos to prove his identity. Mr. Roniger says a well-connected friend got Facebook to lock down the account and “stop the madness,” when he couldn’t figure out how to get it shut down himself. (He could have gone here.)
http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/29/what-to-do-if-hackers-steal-your-online-accounts/?src=me&ref=technology&nl=technology&emc=techupdateema4
This Week's Top 10 Spyware Threats
One of them, My Freeze / YourScreen, is a website which contains many screen savers , this site also bundled with many adwares such as Whenu.com, Save now etc.
Just to clarify, an Adware Bundler is a downloadable program that is typically "freeware" because it is bundled with advertising software -- adware. The adware may function independently of the bundler program, but in some cases the bundler program will not function if the adware is removed, or will not install unless the adware is installed. Most Adware Bundlers install several adware applications from multiple adware vendors, each of which is governed by a separate End User License Agreement (EULA) and Privacy Policy. Some Adware Bundlers may not fully and properly disclose the presence of bundled advertising software during installation.
We do consider that this is low risk and should not harm your machine or compromise your privacy and security unless they have been installed without your knowledge and consent. A low risk may be a program, network tool, or system utility that you knowingly and deliberately installed and that you wish to keep. Although some low risk programs may track online habits -- as provided for in a privacy policy or End User License Agreement (EULA) -- or display advertising within the applications themselves, these programs have only vague, minimal or negligible effects on your privacy. Low risks may also be cookies, which can be used to track your online activities, though without identifying you personally. But you should be aware that by downloading a screen saver from this site will also install a toolbar, many shortcuts on to your desktop, and adwares products from Whenu.com. Not sure why you would want to do that.
The other newbie to our list from Pinball Corporation is also adware but we consider it to be a much riskier proposition and features and elevated threat. Elevated risks are typically installed without adequate notice and consent, and may make unwanted changes to your system, such as reconfiguring your browser's homepage and search settings. These risks may install advertising- related add-ons, including toolbars and search bars, or insert advertising- related components. These new add-ons and components may block or redirect your preferred network connections, and can negatively impact your computer's performance and stability. Elevated risks may also collect, transmit, and share potentially sensitive data without adequate notice and consent. In short if you come across it, do not download it and if you have by all means get rid of it!
Trojan.Win32.Generic!BT: Trojan
Trojan-Spy.Win32.Zbot.gen: Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Generic!SB.0: Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Generic.pak!cobra: Trojan
Worm.Win32.Downad.Gen (v): Worm.W32
INF.Autorun (v): Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Bamital.c (v): Trojan
Pinball Corporation. (v): Adware (General)
My Freeze/YourScreen: Adware Bundler
Zugo Ltd (v): Toolbar
Stay on top of all the real-time threats:
http://www.sunbeltsecuritynews.com/B3HA75/101013-Real-Time-Threats
Just to clarify, an Adware Bundler is a downloadable program that is typically "freeware" because it is bundled with advertising software -- adware. The adware may function independently of the bundler program, but in some cases the bundler program will not function if the adware is removed, or will not install unless the adware is installed. Most Adware Bundlers install several adware applications from multiple adware vendors, each of which is governed by a separate End User License Agreement (EULA) and Privacy Policy. Some Adware Bundlers may not fully and properly disclose the presence of bundled advertising software during installation.
We do consider that this is low risk and should not harm your machine or compromise your privacy and security unless they have been installed without your knowledge and consent. A low risk may be a program, network tool, or system utility that you knowingly and deliberately installed and that you wish to keep. Although some low risk programs may track online habits -- as provided for in a privacy policy or End User License Agreement (EULA) -- or display advertising within the applications themselves, these programs have only vague, minimal or negligible effects on your privacy. Low risks may also be cookies, which can be used to track your online activities, though without identifying you personally. But you should be aware that by downloading a screen saver from this site will also install a toolbar, many shortcuts on to your desktop, and adwares products from Whenu.com. Not sure why you would want to do that.
The other newbie to our list from Pinball Corporation is also adware but we consider it to be a much riskier proposition and features and elevated threat. Elevated risks are typically installed without adequate notice and consent, and may make unwanted changes to your system, such as reconfiguring your browser's homepage and search settings. These risks may install advertising- related add-ons, including toolbars and search bars, or insert advertising- related components. These new add-ons and components may block or redirect your preferred network connections, and can negatively impact your computer's performance and stability. Elevated risks may also collect, transmit, and share potentially sensitive data without adequate notice and consent. In short if you come across it, do not download it and if you have by all means get rid of it!
Trojan.Win32.Generic!BT: Trojan
Trojan-Spy.Win32.Zbot.gen: Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Generic!SB.0: Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Generic.pak!cobra: Trojan
Worm.Win32.Downad.Gen (v): Worm.W32
INF.Autorun (v): Trojan
Trojan.Win32.Bamital.c (v): Trojan
Pinball Corporation. (v): Adware (General)
My Freeze/YourScreen: Adware Bundler
Zugo Ltd (v): Toolbar
Stay on top of all the real-time threats:
http://www.sunbeltsecuritynews.com/B3HA75/101013-Real-Time-Threats
Thursday, October 14, 2010
How To Make Your Windows 7 System Even Faster
by Andre on October 13, 2010
One of the things you might encounter after upgrading your computer or starting a new computer for the first time is the amount of stuff that might make the operating system start a little groggy at first. This article will show you some of the common tasks you can do to speed up that old computer or squeeze as much performance as possible out of that new PC.
If you are using an old computer, there are some things you should take into account if you are upgrading to Windows 7. First off, you will need to make sure your computer meets the Windows 7 System Requirements and second, you should be aware that housecleaning may not be enough to speed up an old computer. Instead a hardware upgrade of components might just be what you need to achieve better performance.
The first three things that come to mind are Memory, Processor and Storage. These three components can add a dramatic improvement to your computers performance. One of the great things about running Windows 7 is the memory foot print is about the same as Windows Vista and its more efficient because of a lot of complex low-level changes the Windows Team made to the operating system with how it loads programs, services and devices.
Anyway, if you do upgrade to Windows 7, here are few things you can do to speed things up even more:
Disk Cleanup – This is always a favorite place to start, because it list many of the common locations where old unused files that are often not needed any more are stored. To find Disk Cleanup, click Start, type: Disk Cleanup. Alternatively, you can find it under Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools. When Disk Cleanup is started, you are prompted to select the drive on which you would like to do the cleanup. In this case, it’s the operating system drive where Windows 7 is installed, usually C:\. If you are running Windows 7 in a dual-boot configuration with another operating system, click in the list box and select the drive on which it is installed. Click OK
Disk Cleanup dialog
An initialization wizard will scan you hard disk to check for areas of the system you will be able to run the clean up on. After the scanning is complete, the Disk Cleanup dialog appears. This window provides a list of areas of the system you can clean up safely. The most common locations are Temporary files, Temporary Internet Files, Recycle Bin to name a few. Other not so common locations include the Thumbnail Cache which stores previews of your images allowing you load them faster when you open the Pictures Library or Windows Live Photo Gallery. This I do not recommend you delete for obvious purposes. Lets dig a little deeper. Disk Cleanup provides a list of areas where you can free up disk space and gain additional speed in some cases.
Downloaded Program Files
Downloaded Program Files are ActiveX controls and Java applets downloaded automatically from the Internet when you view certain pages. They are temporarily stored in the Downloaded Program Files folder on your hard disk. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Temporary Internet Files
The Temporary Internet Files folder contains webpages stored on your hard disk for quick viewing. Your personalized settings for webpages will be left intact. Personally, I suggest you keep this if you are on a slow connection and need the basic elements of web pages you often visit to load faster. Keep It
Offline Webpages
Offline pages are webpages that are stored on your computer so you can view them without being connected to the Internet. If you delete these pages now, you can still view your favorites offline later by synchronizing them. Your personalized settings for webpages will be left intact. I also recommend you leave this alone since you might be on a slow connection and need quick access to a webpage with some specific content. Keep It
Recycle Bin
The Recycle Bin contains files you have deleted from your computer. These files are not permanently removed until you empty the Recycle Bin. Sometimes you might inadvertently delete a file that you didn’t intend to delete permanently, so before you empty the contents of the Recycle Bin, do a thorough check before. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Temporary files
Programs sometimes store temporary information in the TEMP folder. Before a program closes., it usually deletes this information. You can safely delete files that have not been modified in over a week. You can view the contents of the temp directory and see if there is anything in there you might need. Open the Run Command (Windows key + R), type in %temp% > hit OK. Sometimes program installers for common applets are stored there that you can use to reinstall such as Adobe Flash for instance if you don’t want to redownload it every time. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Thumbnails
Windows keeps a copy of all your picture, video, and document thumbnails so they can be displayed quickly when you open a folder. If you delete these thumbnails, they will be automatically recreated as needed. I don’t see any problems deleting it if its gonna be recreated, but deleting it sometimes can correct problems with previews of photos and videos. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Debug Dump Files
When your computer experiences a system hang because of a poorly written application or device driver, Windows intelligently creates a log of what happened. This log can be used along with other logs such as System error memory dump files to help diagnose the problem when sent to Microsoft or the developer for review. Keep It
System error memory dump files
Similar to the Debug Dump files, memory error dumps happen when poorly written drivers or applications crash. It is very handy for utilities built into Windows such as Troubleshooters which help in diagnosing problems that occur in Windows. Keep It
In addition to these common locations, Windows will also store information related to Error reporting and solution checking, leave these for diagnosis that can help resolve issues with applications or devices. Also, if you do an upgrade from Windows Vista or clean install, Windows 7 might store information related to servicing which are logs used to assist the installation of the operating system. Once you have checked these locations for clean up, click the OK button and these locations will be cleaned out.
A folder you might be familiar with is the Windows.old, in a future article I will be taking a closer look at this directory. It’s basically a backup of your old installation of Windows, which you can use to reinstall Windows if you decide to return to your previous installation. Also, it’s used as a last resort in case you didn’t backup your files and need to recover personal files and settings. The Windows.old folder can use up a considerable amount of your hard disk space and reduce the systems performance. It’s normally stored at the root of your hard disk where Windows 7 is installed. Before you delete it, make sure you check through the directories and ensure that everything migrated successfully to Windows 7
System Restore – The Windows Team has added some nice enhancements to Windows 7′s System Restore feature, allowing you to keep a larger collection of System Restore Points in addition to storing them in your System Images of Windows 7. A friend had recently upgraded to Windows 7 and he asked me why he was low on hard disk space. He had a 320 GB drive and only had about 70 GBs of free disk space left after doing a disk cleanup. It was then I discovered that System Protection had been configured to use about 200 GBs of disk space to keep System Restore Points.
Configuring System Protection settings
To configure System Protection, click Start, type: System Protection, hit Enter. Under Protection Settings, click the Configure button. A dialog will appear with various settings for configuring Restoration and Disk space usage. Under the Disk space usage tab, you will see the current amount of space in use by System Restore while the Max usage displays the amount allocated. Use the Max usage knob to configure how much disk space you want to allocate to System Protection. In the above screenshot, you will see that I am using 21.05 GBs for Restore Points, while I have allocated 22.36 GBs of disk space for System Protection. You also have the option of deleting all Restore Points which stores System settings and previous versions of files. I suggest you leave this, since you will be able to individually restore changes to files you are working on. For instance, if you edited an image and would like to restore it to a previous version or original version of the file, you could do it so long as you don’t delete these restore points.
One of the things you might encounter after upgrading your computer or starting a new computer for the first time is the amount of stuff that might make the operating system start a little groggy at first. This article will show you some of the common tasks you can do to speed up that old computer or squeeze as much performance as possible out of that new PC.
If you are using an old computer, there are some things you should take into account if you are upgrading to Windows 7. First off, you will need to make sure your computer meets the Windows 7 System Requirements and second, you should be aware that housecleaning may not be enough to speed up an old computer. Instead a hardware upgrade of components might just be what you need to achieve better performance.
The first three things that come to mind are Memory, Processor and Storage. These three components can add a dramatic improvement to your computers performance. One of the great things about running Windows 7 is the memory foot print is about the same as Windows Vista and its more efficient because of a lot of complex low-level changes the Windows Team made to the operating system with how it loads programs, services and devices.
Anyway, if you do upgrade to Windows 7, here are few things you can do to speed things up even more:
Disk Cleanup – This is always a favorite place to start, because it list many of the common locations where old unused files that are often not needed any more are stored. To find Disk Cleanup, click Start, type: Disk Cleanup. Alternatively, you can find it under Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools. When Disk Cleanup is started, you are prompted to select the drive on which you would like to do the cleanup. In this case, it’s the operating system drive where Windows 7 is installed, usually C:\. If you are running Windows 7 in a dual-boot configuration with another operating system, click in the list box and select the drive on which it is installed. Click OK
Disk Cleanup dialog
An initialization wizard will scan you hard disk to check for areas of the system you will be able to run the clean up on. After the scanning is complete, the Disk Cleanup dialog appears. This window provides a list of areas of the system you can clean up safely. The most common locations are Temporary files, Temporary Internet Files, Recycle Bin to name a few. Other not so common locations include the Thumbnail Cache which stores previews of your images allowing you load them faster when you open the Pictures Library or Windows Live Photo Gallery. This I do not recommend you delete for obvious purposes. Lets dig a little deeper. Disk Cleanup provides a list of areas where you can free up disk space and gain additional speed in some cases.
Downloaded Program Files
Downloaded Program Files are ActiveX controls and Java applets downloaded automatically from the Internet when you view certain pages. They are temporarily stored in the Downloaded Program Files folder on your hard disk. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Temporary Internet Files
The Temporary Internet Files folder contains webpages stored on your hard disk for quick viewing. Your personalized settings for webpages will be left intact. Personally, I suggest you keep this if you are on a slow connection and need the basic elements of web pages you often visit to load faster. Keep It
Offline Webpages
Offline pages are webpages that are stored on your computer so you can view them without being connected to the Internet. If you delete these pages now, you can still view your favorites offline later by synchronizing them. Your personalized settings for webpages will be left intact. I also recommend you leave this alone since you might be on a slow connection and need quick access to a webpage with some specific content. Keep It
Recycle Bin
The Recycle Bin contains files you have deleted from your computer. These files are not permanently removed until you empty the Recycle Bin. Sometimes you might inadvertently delete a file that you didn’t intend to delete permanently, so before you empty the contents of the Recycle Bin, do a thorough check before. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Temporary files
Programs sometimes store temporary information in the TEMP folder. Before a program closes., it usually deletes this information. You can safely delete files that have not been modified in over a week. You can view the contents of the temp directory and see if there is anything in there you might need. Open the Run Command (Windows key + R), type in %temp% > hit OK. Sometimes program installers for common applets are stored there that you can use to reinstall such as Adobe Flash for instance if you don’t want to redownload it every time. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Thumbnails
Windows keeps a copy of all your picture, video, and document thumbnails so they can be displayed quickly when you open a folder. If you delete these thumbnails, they will be automatically recreated as needed. I don’t see any problems deleting it if its gonna be recreated, but deleting it sometimes can correct problems with previews of photos and videos. SAFE TO DELETE - YES
Debug Dump Files
When your computer experiences a system hang because of a poorly written application or device driver, Windows intelligently creates a log of what happened. This log can be used along with other logs such as System error memory dump files to help diagnose the problem when sent to Microsoft or the developer for review. Keep It
System error memory dump files
Similar to the Debug Dump files, memory error dumps happen when poorly written drivers or applications crash. It is very handy for utilities built into Windows such as Troubleshooters which help in diagnosing problems that occur in Windows. Keep It
In addition to these common locations, Windows will also store information related to Error reporting and solution checking, leave these for diagnosis that can help resolve issues with applications or devices. Also, if you do an upgrade from Windows Vista or clean install, Windows 7 might store information related to servicing which are logs used to assist the installation of the operating system. Once you have checked these locations for clean up, click the OK button and these locations will be cleaned out.
A folder you might be familiar with is the Windows.old, in a future article I will be taking a closer look at this directory. It’s basically a backup of your old installation of Windows, which you can use to reinstall Windows if you decide to return to your previous installation. Also, it’s used as a last resort in case you didn’t backup your files and need to recover personal files and settings. The Windows.old folder can use up a considerable amount of your hard disk space and reduce the systems performance. It’s normally stored at the root of your hard disk where Windows 7 is installed. Before you delete it, make sure you check through the directories and ensure that everything migrated successfully to Windows 7
System Restore – The Windows Team has added some nice enhancements to Windows 7′s System Restore feature, allowing you to keep a larger collection of System Restore Points in addition to storing them in your System Images of Windows 7. A friend had recently upgraded to Windows 7 and he asked me why he was low on hard disk space. He had a 320 GB drive and only had about 70 GBs of free disk space left after doing a disk cleanup. It was then I discovered that System Protection had been configured to use about 200 GBs of disk space to keep System Restore Points.
Configuring System Protection settings
To configure System Protection, click Start, type: System Protection, hit Enter. Under Protection Settings, click the Configure button. A dialog will appear with various settings for configuring Restoration and Disk space usage. Under the Disk space usage tab, you will see the current amount of space in use by System Restore while the Max usage displays the amount allocated. Use the Max usage knob to configure how much disk space you want to allocate to System Protection. In the above screenshot, you will see that I am using 21.05 GBs for Restore Points, while I have allocated 22.36 GBs of disk space for System Protection. You also have the option of deleting all Restore Points which stores System settings and previous versions of files. I suggest you leave this, since you will be able to individually restore changes to files you are working on. For instance, if you edited an image and would like to restore it to a previous version or original version of the file, you could do it so long as you don’t delete these restore points.
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