Securing MS Windows
Understanding how to be safe and secure on the net is critical for your safety. We now use the computer for purchasing products, Internet banking and all sorts of financial transactions. Making the computer as secure as possible is critical. I am not a computer security expert in anyway, just a user that has learnt the lessens the hard way and willing to pass on my knowledge. Take the advice for what it is worth.
The first step in seeing how secure you are on the net is to go to grc.com and use Shields Up to see how much security is provided by your firewall or lack of one. If you find that you are not in stealth mode we will advice you how to get your computer in stealth mode.
Windows file sharing is turned on by default in Windows XP home addition and you can find information here at Microsoft Support on how to turn off file sharing. I highly recommend that it is turned off or at least configured correctly for home network if you have one
If you are not in stealth mode after testing your computer at grc.com Shields Up and you have a firewall I recommend that you change the settings in the firewall to enable stealth mode. If you have no firewall then I recommend that you download Zonealarm pro. Zonealarm also offers a free firewall to home users. Once you have installed Zonealarm you can go back to grc.com and test your computer and will find that it is in stealth mode. You can also perform more security checks at PC Flank
I have read about security issues with Internet Explorer so I started to take a look at different browsers. After much downloading and using different browsers I happen to come upon a browser called Firefox. It is not a big download and it is easy to use. Firefox is built by a community of volunteers passionate about maintaining innovation and choice on the web. This browser is a great alternative to IE. All your bookmarks can be imported also. Firefox is a browser designed from scratch to be secure, fast and customisable. It is the safest browser available, as it does not contain any of the vulnerabilities that IE has, such as ActiveX components so often used to install spyware on IE-user machines. the things that you’ll notice first about Firefox are features like tabbed browsing which reduces your desktop clutter by keeping all of your open webpages within one Firefox window Give it a try, download now! Click on the banner to go to the site.
Your browser without you knowing it is giving information through the referral header setting. What this means is that the sites that you visit can see that the sites you already have been too. With some firewalls you can turn this option off. With Firefox you can configure the browser. These are the steps that you take to do that.
- Type about:config in the FireFox Location Bar.
- Type refer in the about:config filter bar.
- Double-click network.http.sendRefererHeader and enter 0 at the prompt.
- If you experience problems, try changing network.http.sendRefererHeader to 1, or if you still have problems, set it back to the default of 2
I have mine set to zero and have not had any problems.
Cookies, what are they? A Cookie is very small text file placed on your hard drive by a Web Page server. It is essentially your identification card, and cannot be executed as code or deliver viruses. It is uniquely yours and can only be read by the server that gave it to you. The purpose of the cookie is to tell the server that you returned to that Web page. A cookie can help you if you personalize pages, or register for products or services, a cookie helps web sites remember who you are.
The downside of cookie could be that some sites could set a cookie to track you for advertising purposes. I personally have mine turned off and only allow sites that I do business with to set a cookie. Here is how you can control the cookie in Internet Explorer six.
You can order your browser to accept all cookies or to alert you every time a cookie is offered. Then you can decide whether to accept one or not.
If you're using Internet Explorer 6.0:
- 1. Choose Tools, then
- 2. Internet Options.
- 3. Click the Privacy tab,
- 4. Default setting is medium. Move the slider to determine which setting you prefer.
- 5. You can also click on Advanced for specialized cookie treatment.
I personally use the Firefox browser and this is how you turn off cookies in Firefox
If you're using Firefox:
- 1. Choose Tools, Options on a Linux version of Firefox it is Edit Preferences.
- 2. Click on Privacy
- 3. Click on Cookies
- 4.Click or unclick the cookie allow box
Personally I only allow cookies to be set by sites of my choice, You can do that by clicking exceptions next to where you clicked or unclicked the allow cookie box. When you click on exceptions a window opens and you can then type in the address of the site that you want and click the allow button.
Disclaimer
This information on this page is advice only. Use at your own risk.
