There are so many ways that we connect to the computer these days that it is a little bit scary. Even if you look at the average laptop, you will see a ton of connections that will allow you to hook the computer up to another device. You will see ports that will allow you to connect to the internet by use of a RJ-45 cable. You will also have a DVD drive on the side that will allow you to play and record movies but also insert data disk into the machine. You will also see HDMI ports that allow you to connect the computer to your HDTV screen as well. There is also another port that is better known. It is called the USB port. It is a port that allows you to connect a whole multitude of devices to your computer. This is both a good thing and a bad thing. In this article, we will talk about how this can be both.
Why is the USB connection both a good thing and a bad thing?
The reason why it is a good thing is because it allows you to connect a device that has a USB end to your computer instantly. You do not have to worry about if your computer is going to have the right physical plug or not. You will be able to quickly place the device in the socket and wait for it to install. This makes life using the computer a lot easier than it used to be. On older computers, to get this same kind of functionality, you had to rely on technology such as parallel ports and things of that manner. Now, thankfully that is no longer the case.
The technology also has its downside as well. While the ability to be able to connect any device quickly to your computer is something that we all should be happy about, it also leaves you vulnerable as well. This is especially true for the device called a USB thumb drive. These devices are like mini hard drives. They allow you to store all kinds of different data to your computer and as soon as you put it in the USB plug, this data is exposed to your computer. If you do not scan that USB device before you use any of the files on there, you can be opening yourself up to an attack.
How do you protect yourself from the USB device?
It is just about common sense. Make sure that you scan an unknown USB thumb drive just like you would any other file on your computer. And that goes for external hard drives as well. Any device that allows you to store data while hooking up to your computer via USB needs to be scanned before using. This is the only way that you can be sure that your computer will remain infection free.
The USB thumb drive and hard drive are great devices and for the most part are safe. Just make sure that if you are putting a strange device on your computer from someone else, that you scan it first.
It has been out to the public for almost a year and the reviews are in. Windows 7 is one of the most popular operating systems that Microsoft has ever released. And not only is it popular, it is the most secured operating system that they released as well. In the past, when you used Windows products there was always a hesitation when you went online that you were going to become infected by something out there. While it is still possible, you are nowhere near as vulnerable as you used to be. But there are still some concerns when it comes to Windows 7 security. It is actually a problem with all operating systems and not just Windows 7. You have to wonder to yourself if low level system attacks are still a problem that you have to worry about. While there are all sorts of attacks out there, low level system attacks are some of the most dangerous.
What is a low level system attack?
There are several layers to a computer system. During your use of the computer throughout the day, you probably only see two layers that you worry about. You see the software side, which includes the operating system and all of the programs that are running on it. You also see the hardware side, which if you ever open up your computer is the motherboard, hard drive, and all of the other things that are under the cover. But these are not the only layers of the computer. They are just what you would call the base layer. They both have several layers inside of them as well. The layer that we are going to focus on now is the system level of the operating system. This is a layer that is able to control the inner parts of your operating system. This why attacks on this layer can be so damaging. When you take control of a person’s operating system, you can do a lot of damage. Better yet, if the black hat hacker is smart, they can get a lot of information as well. System level attacks are a real problem.
Does Windows 7 solve this problem?
Windows 7 does not eradicate the problem but they make it a lot harder for attacks like this to happen. Microsoft has implemented several security features that will allow you to defeat such intrusions in your system. Form the antivirus programs that they allow you to download and install for free, to the permission based installer on the system; these are all things that have helped the fight. Now, whenever a file that can be damaging, is changed by a program, Windows 7 will ask you permission first before the change is allowed. This is a great way to stop most of the system level attacks that happen. They usually go after low level operating system files and if you are notified beforehand then you can stop it.
Windows does help a lot when it comes to this problem. If you want to make sure that you are safe, keep the permissions turned on in Windows 7 and install an updated antivirus program.
There are certain threats that will take out your computer. Your computer may be able to turn on and do some of the things that it was able to do before the threat hit but for the most part it is dead. You are not able to hit certain buttons, pops ups are flying everywhere, you cannot log onto the internet, and basically everything that can go wrong is going wrong. If this ever happens to you, you need to make sure that you have a way to fix it right away. There are a couple of things that you can do. You can keep a back up of the computer so that you can reinstall it to a point where everything was working fine. Or you can do that with something less than a back up. There is a feature in all Windows computers that is called System Restore. We will take the time later on in the article to explain what System Restore is and how you can use it to come back from a serious computer problem.
What is System Restore?
System Restore is sort of like the back up that we talked about earlier in the article but instead of it being on a new device like an external hard drive, it is a snap shot stored in the computer. It mainly saves the settings of how everything was at a previous date on the computer. A pure back up would save all of the data and the settings of the system from that time. With a system restore point, saving the settings is more than enough. With any luck you will be able to go back to a time before everything turned crazy.
Even though you have a system restore point ready to be used, it is still a good idea to try to get out the infection before you try a system restore. The infection that is in the system will not be erased by just you having a system restore point active. As we said before, it changes the setting of the system and not the data. All that will happen is that the malware will infect the machine again. That is not always the case and sometimes a system restore point is all you need. But in the case of a bad piece of malware you will need to do more to make sure you do not have to deal with the same infection again.
When malware attacks you system, you need a good way to be able to fight it. The tools that you have such as antivirus software and antispyware software will be able to help but sometimes you need to do a little more. Sometimes the infection gets so deep that you have very few options. In cases like this you need to set up the system restore on your computer and go back to the past when the system was still working.