Credit Crunch Busting Tips

Posted By admin on February 3, 2009

We all know the Internet is a great place to find information you need, but alas, it also has viruses and spyware.   In this short guide, I’ll tell you where to get a free antivirus program that updates daily to keep you protected and a free anti-spyware program to remove the other threats. Both of these products are  from reputable companies.

Before we look at who and where, the question is why do some people give free antivirus software when others charge?  Well, simple really, the biggest income comes from selling software to businesses rather than consumers, so releasing free home user editions is a good marketing trick.

This guide assumes you use Windows XP or Windows Vista, any edition of either should work just fine.

Antivirus

My personal favourite in this arena is AVG Anti Virus Free Edition, this version is sneakily hidden away from the main version of their site at avg.com to tempt the general public into buying the paid for versions (which do have more features, but we don’t need them!) so head over to http://www.download.com/AVG-Anti-Virus-Free-Edition/3000-2239_4-10320142.html?part=dl-AVGAntiVir&subj=dl&tag=button and hit Download.  Once the file has been saved (the location will vary depending on your settings/browser) navigate to the file and run it, follow the onscreen prompts by clicking Next a few times, and at the end it should update itself to the latest version.  Every day when your PC is on, AVG will now update itself, perform a full system scan at 12:00 (unless you changed the time) and monitor every running program to keep your PC clean, all for no money!  Ok, read on!

Anti Spyware

As the antivirus we downloaded was a free edition, they did cut a few bits out, one of the most important being anti-spyware protection, but rather than shell out a painful £30, lets get a different bit of software to look after that, again, a free edition.  Head over to http://www.download.com/Ad-Aware-Anniversary-Edition/3000-8022_4-10045910.html?part=dl-ad-aware&subj=dl&tag=top5&cdlPid=10998841 to download Ad-Aware Free edition.  Again, once downloaded, run the file and do the usual Next, Next, Next malarky until it has finished installing.  Ad-aware should then try to update itself followed by a system scan.

The free edition of ad-aware doesn’t include a background scanner (also termed Real Time Protection) so we’re relying to AVG to catch most of the nasties here, but to be extra vigilant, run a full system scan using Ad-Aware every few days (at the least once a week) to ensure nothing has slipped past the net.  Between these two programs you should be able to keep your PC running smoothly.  Another often overlooked measure is to ensure your windows is up-to-date with the latest patches from Microsoft, so don’t forget to click the Windows Update entry in your Start Menu to make sure you’ve got everything.

On a final note, some of you who arrive here will do so because you already have a virus/spyware problem, whilst this information isn’t true for every threat out there, I’d always recommend contacting your bank and credit card companies to ask for new details if you’ve shopped online.  In the modern world its often not the hackers and virus writers who use your card details, they tend to get piled in with thousands of others and sold to various criminal gangs around the world and as a result, it can take several months for your card to be ripped off, so don’t assume because nothing has happened in the first week you’re in the clear.  I realise it may sound a bit paranoid, but just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean nobody is out to get you

I hope something above was useful, if so please don’t forget to share this with others, the more PCs we can protect,  the less spam we all get in our inboxes.  Also please do contribute if you have other online safety tips, either using the comments below or the contact us form if you’d rather not sign up.

Categories: Computing
Tags: anti, antivirus, free protection, spyware, virus help