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| (cc) Don Hankins |
Many people simply don’t understand how vulnerable their computers and their information are. As a data security veteran, I often advise both my business and home clients to cover themselves first thing. When getting a new computer, second only to installing the operating system itself, you should install an adequate protective package - even before installing your Microsoft system updates.
But doesn’t my computer come with virus protection?
Microsoft does have built-in firewall and virus scanning capabilities. Many technologists agree that, because these tools are not Microsoft’s main focus, you are much better off with protection software from a company that has this as its primary focus. As an independent consultant that receives no incentives from any of these companies, I believe this to be true.
Some new PCs may come with other protection installed (of varying quality), which may be a trial version good for between 30 days to 6 months or so. Many infections happen because people let these expire.
What you need to know about data protection
The first thing is to understand what kinds of protection there are. There are basically three types of protection you should have on your computer:
Virus protection
Malware protection
Firewall
Virus protection defends against programs that infect your system and can replicate itself, spreading to other parts of your system, network, or other computers. Malware protection (including spyware and adware) protects from unauthorized software that either causes damage, shares your private information, or inundates you with advertising.
A firewall is another form of protection frequently overlooked, but firewalls offer protection that is far more sophisticated than typical virus protection. Virus protection guards against small packets of information in the form of known viruses. A firewall looks for things in your data stream that don’t make sense, like large amounts of unrequested information coming in, or when something remote tries to log in to something local multiple times per second as a robot might do. There are many other examples. There are two kinds of firewalls – a software based firewall, and a stand-alone hardware firewall. For my residential clients I usually recommend the software based firewall of the type that can be found in Norton or McAfee.
Regardless of which software you purchase, keep in mind, it is possible for a virus to get past any of them. There is a time delay between when a “black hat” (bad guy/girl) creates a new type of virus and when the solution is created and propagated out to your PC. But if you get a well-known brand of security software and keep it up to date, you will go a long way toward protecting yourself (for those other cases, see my post on backups).
So what do I recommend?
If you’re paying (which I recommend) then I’d say Norton or McAfee are the best options. There are a number of other well-known brands. AVG is free and I see it installed everywhere but keep in mind that the free version does not include firewall protection. Pricing is generally reasonable; in the range of $35-$70 per year. Norton and MacAfee both have a complete package that includes virus, malware, and firewall.
Another element of security that may be advisable for some homes and businesses is hard drive encryption software, especially if you are handling highly sensitive information. But encryption is really in another category of concerns. I bring it up here mainly to point out that you should never consider encryption to be a substitute for virus protection, malware protection, or a firewall.
For Businesses
With my business clients, I usually recommend a hardware firewall that protects their entire network. This is a system dedicated to that single purpose. The fact that your working computers are relieved of the extra data load is the least of this system’s advantages. Breaking a hardware firewall is much more difficult and rare than with software firewalls. Operating systems on your computer have many points of entry for malicious programs to access, but a firewall has far fewer points of entry, all of them monitored. There is a lot more to the advantages of these systems but, suffice it to say, most businesses should use them. While they can be pricey for individuals, they are a good investment for business use. On the cheaper end, these devices run about $600 to $700, but can run up to $25,000 or more for large networks of users, say 500 people or so. For staffs of 10-20 users it may be possible to get a unit for around $1,000 to $3,000. These are vague ballpark figures – do not attempt this without consultation from an experienced professional.
Hopefully this article has been helpful in giving you an idea of what kind of protection you may need. We will continue to offer technical and business advice in the future so subscribe if you’d like to get notice of future articles – and please feel free to comment!
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