It is important to keep your computer data secure and safe. Without protective measures viruses may use up your computers disk space and render your computer applications unusable, destroy data, or disclose proprietary data by replicating it to contacts or delivering it to competitors. Having up-to-date Virus Protection Software is one of your most important responsibilities to assure safe, trouble-free computing. In an FBI survey 94% of the respondents reported computer virus incursions and 40% detected other types of system penetrations from outside their networks. Not much has changed, except that our awareness of the problem has improved. What does this mean? Unfortunately, it means that computer viruses and hacking are still around. If you have virus protection software installed, it is recommended that you update that software with its latest version and its latest virus definitions regularly. If you suspect your computer system is infected with a virus run a full system scan. If you don’t have backup strategies, then you need to establish them, and Vesque Partners can help. .If your system has a virus and you can't get rid of it, Vesque Partnerscan eradicate it from your system and restore any files needed to get your system up and running based on the backup strategies employed by your organization.
There are many PC surveillance tools that allow an unseen user to monitor all kinds of activity on your computer, ranging from keystroke capture (key-logging), snapshots of personal data such as banking or investment account numbers and passwords, email content, chat conversations, proprietary data, and just about anything else. These tools are often designed for use by parents, businesses and similar environments, but can be easily abused if they are installed on your computer without your knowledge and approval. Spyware tools are perfectly legal in many places, but just as a tape recorder or cell phone camera, they can seriously violate your trust, as well as your privacy.
Spyware, in its kindest definition, can be used for tracking information the computer user enters while researching (surfing) on the Internet, (e.g., you search for furniture and the retailer or manufacturer wants to identify what the users are drawn to on their website. The sole purpose of tracking this information in this example is to find out how to better market to that particular person so that those clicks translate into a sale with that furniture store. Some spyware is “Adware”, jargon for advertising support software. These are the software applications that track and gather information and reports about the user, by using or selling the information for marketing analysis or intelligence gathering. There are several large media companies that offer to place banner ads on their websites and software in exchange for a portion of the revenue generated from this “targeted marketing.” Another way “spyware” can invade your computer is by installing “free” software, sometimes called “shareware.” Shareware comes with a price, but it may not be money. You may have an advertising banner that displays while the software is running, which allows the software developer to collect a fee. You don't have to pay for the software but the programmer is still getting paid. If you find the banners annoying, there is usually an option to remove them by paying a licensing fee.
While this may be a great marketing concept, the downside for users is that in addition to the known site, advertising companies install additional tracking software on your system which is continuously updating its own databases and reporting statistical data to a central database server. While according to the stated privacy policies there will be no sensitive or identifying data collected from your system and you shall remain anonymous, the fact remains, that you have an ongoing connection to a site that you may not be aware of that is accessing personal information about you and transmitting it to a remote location.
No, but the majority are. There are also products that display advertising but do not install any tracking mechanism on your system. They use other means, such as files called “cookies”, that are stored on your computer. You may not have expected or approved this software to connect to your PC. You simply wanted to research an item or service, using the internet...with the expectation of privacy.
Even though the name may sound like it should be, spyware is not an illegal software. It’s not even considered a virus. In most cases, the user must authorize its use in order to get some benefit, (e.g., a contest entry, coupons in email, or discounts on merchandise if you use their website for your purchase.) This fact often eludes the user.
While some “more legitimate” adware companies will disclose the purpose of the data that is collected and permit the user to apparently "opt in" or "opt out" of the adware, there is virtually no way to actually confirm, identify or control the data being transmitted. The fact is, the technology is capable of sending much more than just banner statistics - and this is why many people feel uncomfortable with the concept. Even so, millions of people are using advertising supported "spyware" products and are disinterested in the privacy hype, in fact some "spyware" programs are among the most popular downloads on the Internet.
Ask yourself the following questions, if you have answered NO to ANY of the questions below, your computer may be at RISK! Contact a virus solution specialist atVesque Partners Inc. to secure your system.
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Do you have a virus scanning program on your PC?
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Do you have the latest version of your anti-virus software on your PC?
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Do you or someone in your organization regularly update the virus definition patterns, record the last date a scan was done, and maintain a list of viruses detected on any computers in your organization?
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Can you or somebody in your organization do a system wide scan of all machines simultaneously in the event that there is a virus outbreak?
