Online Computer Tips Monthly Newsletter - October 2009
Latest Virus/Security Alerts:
Clampi computer virus affecting online banking
The Clampi computer virus is threatening thousands of online banking customers as it captures login information such as your password. It is a new trojan that is attacking computers in the UK and USA. It is installed on to a PC when a user visits an infected web site and then waits until the user visits a financial web site.
The virus monitors Internet browsing and when it detects that the user is visiting one of the 4,500 financial web sites, it captures the login information and then sends it to the hackers who use the data to hack into accounts.
Only computers running various Windows operating systems are affected. The virus cannot install itself on Linux based systems.
You should always make sure that you have antivirus software installed and that is its up to date. Also be sure to do regular virus and spyware scans and be careful of what webistes you go to.
Septembers's Poll Results:
Are you a member of a social networking site such as Facebook or MySpace?
Yes
- 900%
No
Tip of the Month:
Firefox RunDownload 1.2
Firefox RunDownload 1.2 Is a addon program for the Firefox web browser that gives you the option to run the file from the download location link that you clicked rather than having to save it first. Normally Firefox only gives you the option to save the file. Then you have to go to where you downloaded it and run it that way. With this addon you can run it without having to do the extra step.
Hot Product of the Month: Logitech NuLOOQ Navigator
Details:
NuLOOQ navigator is an innovative stationary control device, about the size of a half a tennis ball but weighs in at a solid 1 lb. Built into the device are a multi-dimensional ring, called the navring for simultaneous 360 degree pan and zoom and a touch sensitive circular disk, called the tooltuner for fine precision control. Put your other hand to good use; NuLOOQ navigator gives you a powerful new way to interact with your application. Design, create, edit or just navigate — put the fun back on your desktop!
Includes the NuLOOQ navigator input device
Fluid and smooth document or image pan and zoom navigation using the built-in navring
Fine adjustment of Photoshop brush size or InDesign text attributes using the tooltuner
Support for Adobe Creative Suite 2, Photoshop Elements 4, Final Cut Pro, Word, Excel and more
Compatible with Mac OS X: V10.4.4 or greater on PowerPC and Intel Core-Duo Processors. Compatible with Windows XP SP2 or Windows Vista platforms.
Advertisement:
Important Windows and Office patches:
Patch Tuesday Forecast: 13 Microsoft Updates
Next Tuesday, October 13, Microsoft will release 13 security bulletins for Microsoft Windows, Internet Explorer, Office, SQL Server, Forefront and Silverlight, and updates to those products. 8 of the bulletins are rated Critical.
For the first time, Microsoft is including Windows 7 in the normal patch cycle. It's affected by 5 of the bulletins, but only 1 of them, affecting Internet Explorer 8, is rated Critical. Windows Server 2008 R2 is also lightly affected. It's likely that some of the fixes in this batch were incorporated some time ago into those products before they went RTM.
For most Windows users there will be many critical updates to fix.
If you dont use Automatic Updates then make sure to visit the Microsoft Update site and get your patches installed.
Take a break and play some free online Flash Games
Readers Question of the Month:
How to Restore Laptop Using the Recovery Disks
Chrissie writes in with a Windows question.
Q. I have an ASUS laptop, and I would like to restore it to its factory conditions. I have the restore disc, but when I open it on 'my computer', it just shows a bunch of files. I think you have to run it on start-up, but I don't know how to do that. I need a way that I can run it properly WITHOUT needing administrator privileges or the administrator password. Thanks, Chrissie
A. To run the recovery/restore disk you will need to put it in your CD drive and start the computer afterwards. Then you should see an option to press a certain key such as F2 etc to boot from the CD or to start the system recovery process. After that you can follow the prompts and restore your computer to the way it was when you bought it. Keep in mind that all your personal files will be deleted so back them up first. You will also have to reinstall any software that you added to the computer after you got it.
Adobe Warns of Critical Threat to Reader, Acrobat Users
Adobe Systems Inc. late Thursday issued an alert saying that hackers are exploiting a newly-discovered vulnerability in its free PDF Reader and Acrobat products to break into Microsoft Windows systems. Adobe said it plans to release a patch to fix this vulnerability next Tuesday, in keeping with its recent shift to push out security updates in tandem with Microsoft's regular monthly patch cycle.
Adobe says disabling Javascript in Reader and/or Acrobat can help mitigate the threat from the specific exploit that is circulating at the moment, but that it will not protect against all attacks taking advantage of the underlying vulnerability.
News like this is often jarring and scary, but in all likelihood the attacks that Adobe is referencing are targeted at a specific group of organizations or governments.
