Okay folks, your computer is doing weird things. Running slow, randomly rebooting, taking you to websites you don't want to see, calling you names and giving you the digital finger. Before you grab the phone and call a geek, here are some things you can do to try and correct matters...
First off, an explanation of what may be happening.
Your computer may be part of a bot net
If your computer is "zombied" this means that somewhere on your computer a program or set of programs is letting someone else access it and use it for nefarious deeds such as spamming or bringing down a website. Most of this is automated, the person responsible is not in your computer looking at your stuff, they are using automated scripts and programs to access many computer simultaneously. This is known as a "bot net" and you really don't want to be part of this, it slows your box down, really annoys people who are getting the spam being generated, and is just generally uncool...
Your computer is running too much spyware or malware
This really slows computers down as the regular programs have a hard time running when something is using up all available memory
Where does this stuff come from and how did it get on my computer?
There you are happily surfing the web searching for variations on turnip wine recipes or some such thing, when you land on a certain website. The site seems totally innocent, even the website designer may be unaware of the evil lurking in the webpage code. But your computer downloads this bad code, and when executed, tries to download all its friends. the next thing you know the computer is running slower than the hour before schools out, and your start page has gone from google to some strange page about midget yahk herder sex. This is called a drive by, and is just one of the ways that you can get compromised.
Oh sweet tunderin' Jesus! what do I do now?
All is not lost! Follow these suggestions and there is a good chance that you can solve these difficulties.
(disclaimer...The following are just suggestions, and by using them you do so at your own risk. If you are uncomfortable doing the following, indeed call in a pro)
Number 1 (and most important) Check to make sure that your anti virus is running and up to date. I cannot over state the importance of this. Many computers that I have to deal with have either outdated, disabled or non-existent Anti Virus. I even had one lady who uninstalled her anti virus because she didn't like the color of the antivirus window. sheesh!
All computers ship with antivirus programs, but most of these only work for a couple of months before the ask you to pay a subscription or they stop updating.
Some viruses, worms and spyware will intentionally break your av.
What to do if your av is broken...
There are quite a few Free for personal use Anti Virus programs out there. The one I have been using is Avast.
It is a self updating av, scans everything going in and coming out of your computer and it talks. The first time I used it I left my computer on overnight, and around three am I heard this manly voice say "Anit Virus successfully updated"...scared the bujesus outa me!
It is good for a couple of months as a demo, but registration is free, and all they want to know for registration is your email, so they can send you a registration number,and what country you are from.
Just download it and install. It will ask if you want to do a "boot time" scan. Say yes and let it reboot your computer. It will scan before letting anything load into windows memory, and will pick up most of the crud.
If you have problems downloading it because your computer is running too slow, shutdown your computer and restart. As it starts to boot up press "F8" a few times and it will bring up a boot menu. Use the arrow key to go to "safe mode with networking" and hit enter. This will start windows without any drivers or programs being loaded. the screen will look weird, but you should be able to access the internet.
Next you are going to want to download another free program Spybot Search and Destroy.
Download and run this, make sure you update it first. This will remove spyware from your system.
This is normally enough to get things back on track, but being the overly paranoid and under paid person that I am, I also use these programs just to make sure:
Ad-Aware
Super Anti-Spyware
All of these are free for personal use.
Other suggestions to keep you safe...
Use the Firefox browser. I personally think it is a better browser than internet explorer and has lots of plugins to keep you safe. One of the add ons is called "NoScript" and when enabled, stops websites from executing anything unless you say so.
Another handy plugin for most browsers is the Netcraft Anti-Phishing Toolbar. This will alert you if a website is fake, like a banking site or auction site. I'm always getting emails telling me that I need to reset my banking info, or there is something wrong with my ebay or paypal account. These are just attempts by scum sucking hairless monkeys to steal my stuff. Neither Banks or ebay or paypal would ever ask you to reenter your financial info by email. When in doubt, phone the person that the suspect email is from.
Well, thats all for now. I'll put up some more security stuff as soon as I get time.
Cheerio all!
