Breathe New Life In Your Computer

Follow these instructions regularly and you'll breathe new life into your PC.

So, you've increased your system's memory threefold, bumped up performance by installing a bigger, faster hard drive, and performed a CPU transplant to pump up your PC's processing cycles. Now what? This is the fifth of six methods that will result in much better computer performance. Well, hardware upgrades can certainly reinvigorate a feeble computer, but did you know what Windows comes equipped with many software-oriented tools to boost your PC's performance?

Windows Vista introduces a new Control Panel Applet that not only looks pretty but also houses some very useful programs that one can use to tweak and optimize their system. To access the Control Panel Applet, navigate to the start menu, Control Panel, System and Maintenance, Performance Information and Tools; the tools you'll need are located on the left side. The Advanced tools link also contains some very useful options that you'll want to experiment with.

It's certainly a shame that most of these performance-boosting tools remain buried deep within Windows, leaving most average PC users clueless as to their existence. Vista's predecessors offered many of these same tools, but, again, were hard to find. Vista makes these tools more accessible, but are still not as obvious as one would hope they would be. Let's take a look at some of these optimizing utilities that can shift your OS into a higher gear, shall we?
Clandestine Optimization Tools

There are a number of settings that you can adjust and configure that can improve your Windows Vista/XP/2000 PC's performance. You can access these settings by right clicking on the Start menu button and selecting "properties"; next, select on the enabled "Customize" button. Under the Advanced tab, make sure that you've enabled the "Display on the All Programs menu" under the System Administrative Tools options.

RAM: Random Access Memory

Your PC uses its RAM as a sort of holding tank for data that it's currently processing or needs to access quickly. If you're experiencing sluggish performance, this could be due to a problem with your computer's memory. This isn't really an issue if you're running Vista, as Vista will usually automatically detect any memory problems, and if it finds any, it will automatically run the Memory Diagnostic tool. For peace of mind, you can run this utility any time you want, as it's located in the Administrative Tools menu.

When you fire up the Memory Diagnostic tool, your PC will reboot itself into an all text screen, a far cry from the fancy windowed GUIs we've all become accustomed to. For an expanded list of options, press the F1 key. When faced with the textual interface, you'll need to select from the Basic, Standard, and Extended tests. Opting for the Basic test, along with the default settings for the Cache and Pass Count, is usually good enough to detect most problems. Hit the F10 key to begin the test.

The duration of the memory test should be around a few minutes. When the test concludes, Vista will reboot itself. If no problems or errors were detected, Vista will display this fact in the system tray. If problems with your RAM were found, replacing your defunct memory modules will usually solve the problem.

Pruning the Service List

Have you ever noticed that when you boot up your PC for the first time Windows boots up at a snappy pace? But after enough time and a few dozen application installs, the time it takes Windows to boot up into a fully usable state seems to take ages. Why is this? Well, the problem is probably the startup services that Windows loads whenever you reboot your PC. The more services Windows needs to load, the longer it'll take Windows to get into a usable state. A lot of these services aren't really essential and can be disabled at your whim. The less services you have running around in memory, the faster your computer will be.

There's one caveat to heed, though: be sure to set a System Restore point and to back up your registry before altering or disabling any of your service settings. You don't want to inadvertently disable an essential system service, realizing that you've effectively rendered your computer useless. You should not disable a service you don't fully understand, and it's a good idea to only disable one service at a time, determining whether your system will remain stable after said service is turned off.

Once again, navigate to the Administrative Tools menu and select the Services item. You should see a dialog box that displays all the services--either running or disabled--on your system. A short description should be visible to the right of each service. Remember do not randomly disable any service you don't understand the purpose of!

Startup SpeedupsWhen using XP or 2000, go to the start menu and choose run; type in "msconfig" without the quotes and hit enter. You'll be presented with the System Configuration dialog window. In Vista, these same settings can be altered in the System Configuration menu.
Inside XP's System Configuration Utility, navigate to the Startup tab; peruse the list, disabling any program that isn't necessary. A lot of the startup items listed here aren't important and should be disabled if you don't need them, effectively expelling them your PC's precious memory. The leaner you can make this Startup list, the better and more efficient your computer will run.

Aside from adding faster and more powerful hardware to your box to improve overall system performance, these are several software tacks that you can take to give your PC a little more pep.

Don't want to waste time with your PC problems? I can save you money from high cost PC repairs. Give me a call for more information on hassle-free computing and making being on the computer fun again. You'll be able to relax with true peace of mind.

Sincerely,
Rosemarie Grabowski

308 687 6085

Computer-virus infections don't cause your machine to crash anymore.

How to tell, what to do if computer is infected (AP)

Nowadays, the criminals behind the infections usually want your computer operating in top form so you don't know something's wrong. That way, they can log your keystrokes and steal any passwords or credit-card numbers you enter at Web sites, or they can link your infected computer with others to send out spam.

Here are some signs your computer is infected, tapped to serve as part of "botnet" armies run by criminals:

• You experience new, prolonged slowdowns. This can be a sign that a malicious program is running in the background.

• You continually get pop-up ads that you can't make go away. This is a sure sign you have "adware," and possibly more, on your machine.

• You're being directed to sites you didn't intend to visit, or your search results are coming back funky. This is another sign that hackers have gotten to your machine.
So what do you do?

• Having anti-virus software here is hugely helpful. For one, it can identify known malicious programs and disable them. If the virus that has infected your machine isn't detected, many anti-virus vendors offer a service in which they can remotely take over your computer and delete the malware for a fee.

• Some anti-virus vendors also offer free, online virus-scanning services.

• You may have to reinstall your operating system if your computer is still experiencing problems. It's a good idea even if you believe you've cleaned up the mess because malware can still be hidden on your machine. You will need to back up your files before you do this.
How do I know what information has been taken?

• It's very hard to tell what's been taken. Not every infection steals your data. Some just serve unwanted ads. Others poison your search result or steer you to Web sites you don't want to see. Others log your every keystroke. The anti-virus vendors have extensive databases about what the known infections do and don't do. Comparing the results from your virus scans to those entries will give you a good idea about what criminals may have snatched up.


http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090315/ap_on_hi_te/tec_inside_a_botnet_checklist

Twitter's Down Look

And It's All Your Fault


Yesterday, I suffered through three hours without access to Twitter. The micro-blogging service, which was hit by a massive denial of service (DDoS) attack, eventually came back—and then it failed again last night. Twitter's working now, but it's acting like it's on life support: slow to respond, listless, and drifting in and out of consciousness.

In other words, there is someone other than you to blame, but good luck finding that person. Wouldn't it be easier for all of us to install security software, pay for the updates, run regular scans, and stop doing risky things online? Yes, it would. And then that one evil person would be writing malware bots that go no further than his own desktop, making future DDoS attacks virtually impossible.

Every day, someone tells me about how their PC is doing something odd, like playing music when a browser isn't open, or launching a browser when they haven't chosen to go online. I've also heard tales of home pages changing to something less pleasant than Google.com. Those are frustrating problems that are usually tied directly to malware. But there's another kind of malware and, ultimately, it's far more dangerous than anything you can see. This bit of code drops onto your PC from any one of the above-named scenarios and then does nothing. Well, that's not entirely true. It does have one task to perform before it truly makes its presence known. It needs to spread. It usually uses your system and, say, your e-mail address book to reach hundreds of other computer users. So the malware (also known as a bot) spreads and, thanks to some clever programming, works to hide itself; there may even be some mutations that allow it to avoid security software sweeps. Just like a viral marketing message, the bot spreads out in ever wider circles (think: they told two friends and then they told two friends and so on and so on). In its wake are, potentially, millions of zombie PCs.

And so what? This has nothing to do with Twitter going down, or my shaking in a corner as I go Twitter cold turkey. Except that it does. The only way Twitter could have been attacked like this—and so successfully—is if millions of infected zombie PCs suddenly attacked the service. Usually, a company doesn't even realize it's under attack until it's too late and the service is offline. Based on the initial messages we saw from Twitter, it didn't know what was happening until Twitter crashed. Again, that's because a DDoS doesn't attack the server as much as the service. It simply floods the system with requests until it chokes. Someone did program the bot to do this and while this person didn't have to do anything yesterday—except pray that there were enough infected PCs out there (thanks to all of you) to make it happen—he certainly knew when it would happen.

Earlier in the week, other major sites, including LiveJournal and The Consumerist, were nearly laid low by a DDoS. Facebook got wobbly, too, yesterday, but somehow held up. The reason Twitter has been up and down is that the bots are continuing to work and may be programmed to switch up the ports they're attacking. So just when Twitter gets ahead of one, it's already mobilizing the attack on another.

All the while, you sit at home with your zombie PC wondering why you can't get to Twitter. I wonder why, too.

Smut Page Ransomware Trojan

What you need to know:

Russian hackers have come up with a new version of ransomeware scams.
It works by displaying an invasive advertisement for online smut sites in users
browsers that victims are extorted to pay to remove.

The Ransompage Trojan will display a persistent ad on every page that a
surfer on an infected Windows machine visits. The ad for a pornographic website
covers parts of the orginal webpage, making it even more annoying.

The ad consists of Russian-language text that instructs victims to send a
premium rate text message to remove the ad-and gain access to an online
smut site in the process.

The idea behind the Ransompage Trojan is to annoy and /or embarrass
the user so much that they give into the pressure to send the text message.

What you need to do:

• If you have the advertisement on your page, Do not call or text the number.
  


• Always keep your invisus software updated and run scans regularly. Your software will detect tools the hacker may use to control your computer.
  


• Don't click on links or visit websites that are sent to you in emails. They may be taking you to a hacked website.
  


• Make sure you are running the latest version of firefox.
  

Other information:

The Ransompage Trojan works with multiple browsers, including
Internet Explorer, some versions of Firefox and Opera. However
the malware is not compatible with the latest version of Firefox,
giving an easy excape route.

The Trojan is either dropped onto already compromised systems
by other strains of malware., or downloaded from malicious web
sites.

Rosemarie Grabowski
PC Security & Identity
Theft Protection
308 687 6085

http://www.amisafeidentitytheft.blogspot.com/

http://www.personalidentitytheft.blogspot.com/

Malware Resists Eradication

Infected PCs are being linked to networks by Criminals--using different pieces of destructive malware that thwart security applications

Millions of PCs strong That's A Botnetweb

Find more evidence of botnetwebs that came from Finjan, a network security equipment company in California. Finjan reported finding a C&C server capable of sending spam, malware, or remote-control commands to a whopping 1.9 million bots.

The C&C server had six administrator accounts, plus a cache of dirty programs. Ophir Shalitin, Finjan marketing director, says Finjan doesn't know which of the programs might have infected which of the PCs--or more important, which malware made the initial infection. The firm traced the (now defunct) C&C server's IP address to Ukraine, and found evidence that the botnet resources were rented out for $100 per 1000 bots per day.

According to Alex Lanstein, a FireEye senior security researcher, a distributed collection of botnets gives bad guys many advantages. If law enforcement or a security firm were to shut down the C&C server for any single botnet, the crook could still make a profit from the surviving botnets.

Creating such botnets typically starts with "dropper" malware, Lanstein says, that uses "plain-Jane, vanilla techniques" and no strange coding or actions that may raise a red flag for antivirus apps. Once a dropper enters a PC (often via a drive-by download or an e-mail attachment), it may pull in a Trojan horse, such as the Hexzone malware being sent by the server Finjan found. That Hexzone variant was initially detected by only 4 out of 39 antivirus engines at Virus total.

How do you make a terrible thing even worse? If you're a crook who operates a botnet--an often-expansive network of malware-infected PCs--you link botnets together to form a gargantuan "botnetweb." And you do it in a way that's hard for an antivirus suite to fight.

Botnetwebs don't just enable crooks to send spam or malware to millions of PCs at once. They also represent a highly resilient infection that uses multiple files. An attempt at disinfection might eliminate some files, but those left behind will often redownload the scrubbed ones.

The culprits "are not a bunch of nerds sitting in some dark room developing these botnets for fun," writes Atif Mushtaq of FireEye, the Milpitas, California, security company that coined the term botnetweb. "These are organized people running this in the form of a sophisticated business."

Rosemarie Grabowski
Identity Protection and PC Securtiy
308 687 6085
http://www.amisafeidentityftheft.blogspot.com

http://www.topsecretfreereport.com/makeadifference-z

Malware Expected to Set Records This Year

Security firm McAfee has identified more than 1.2 million different types of malware in the first half of 2009.

FPRIVATE "TYPE=PICT;ALT=malware"

Taylor McAfee said that this is over double the 500,000 unqiue pieces of malware it identified in the same period in 2008. In total, the security firm identified 1.5 milliion types of malware in 2008, and it expects the 2009 figure to top this.

"In the first half of 2009, we have seen about three times the unique malware discovered in the same period in 2008," said Dave Marcus, director of security research and communications at McAfee.

"This tremendous growth is a signal of daunting times for users, as malware infiltrates more and more of the platforms we trust."

McAfee also revealed that around 40 percent of all password-stealing Trojans can be found on websites connected to gaming and virtual worlds, while 80 percent of all banking e-mail recieved by Web users are phishing scams.

McAfee also said on average victim's of phishing scams lose £520 per scam.

Rosemarie Grabowski
PC Security & Identity
Theft Protection
308 687 6085

http://amisafeidentityftheft.blogspot.com

http://mypcsafefreefromspyware.blogspot.com/

August 2009 Welcome to the

Cybercrime is on the increase - growing faster than ever before. There's no question . . . News articles are everywhere reporting the rising numbers.

Cyber criminals

The question is: Is anyone paying attention? And, here's the follow-up question: Does anyone know how to protect his or her personal and business computers rom this escalating cybercrime pandemic?

Cybercriminals are after three things: your personal information, your money and/or control of your computer. Cybercrime is no longer just amateur behavior. It is now organized crime operated by professional criminals who conduct criminal activity as a business and function in similar to corporations. These criminals are designing and building new malware at a record pace.

Recently it was reported that cybercriminals have developed companies that ssure their malware will work against traditional over-the-counter and free-ware protection", essentially making those products useless.

This month, our "Cybercrime Newsletter" focuses on the cybercrime problems we face. he Internet is a scary place these days; however, we believe that with the roper protection you can continue to not only survive, but be productive.

Something you can do to keep your computer running . . . . .

Your Questions Answered

Sometimes my computer gets a little slow but there aren't any malware issues, how can I make if fast again.

Defragging your hard disk:

Disk fragmentation slows the overall performance of your system. When files are fragmented, the computer must search the hard disk when the file is opened to piece it back together. Disk Defragmenter is a Windows utility that consolidates fragmented files and folders on your computer's hard disk. When your files are stored neatly without fragmentation, reading and writing to the disk speeds up.

Disk Defragmenter:

1. Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Disk Defragmenter . Click Analyze to start the Disk Defragmenter.

2. In the Disk Defragmenter dialog box, click the drives that you want to defragment, and then click the Analyze button. After the disk is analyzed, a dialog box appears, letting you know whether you should defragment the analyzed drives.

3. To defragment the selected drive or drives, click the Defragment button. Note: In Windows Vista, there is no graphical user interface to demonstrate the progress--but your hard drive is still being defragmented.

After the defragmentation is complete, Disk Defragmenter displays the results.

To receive my Insider's Computer Security Report:

"Why Does Security Software Have An 82% Failure Rate?"

email me at www.rmgrabowski@mainstaycomm.net

Rosemarie Grabowski
PC Security & Identity
Theft Protection
308 687 6085
http://amisafeidentityftheft.blogspot.com


243 2nd Avenue, St. Libory, Ne 68872
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