Despite the great things computers and the Internet in particular provide society with, there are still great potential risks to being online. Obvious cases are of course getting computer viruses and malware, which harm your computer system and data up to severe levels of corruption. Worse cases though, are ones in which identity theft occurs: the stealing and unauthorized using of another’s Social Security, credit card, etc… This can have a critical affect for one’s financial state, since not only are their information being used for purchases on the behalf of another, but also can hurt one’s credit rating and make the victim a risk for potential loans, investments, and the like. On a less severe level, people’s information can be used as a means to heckle or loiter someone: Finding out a person’s residence or phone number can lead to sales calls or even pranks, perhaps worse still is possible threats or stalking behavior.
Due to all the potential dangers that may quite possibly arise from simply using the Internet, it’s key for people to take extra and specific precaution so as to avoid any pitfalls as best as possible. I for one don’t share any personal information online. Facebook, for example, allows a user to post their address, phone number, etc… I have posted my name, date of birth, e-mail address, and that is all! People who post information further than this risk others using their personal information in some fashion against them. Pertaining to the risks of viruses, hacking, and other types of data corruptive breakdowns, it is imperative for users to have an up-to-date and fully operating anti-virus program, such as PC-illin or Norton. It’s not enough to install it, but to also check the conditions of the firewall and other levels of the anti-virus protection, and additionally to delete the history and cookies after one is finished being online.
Asides from these measures, the next best thing a user can do is to avoid suspicious sites altogether. It’s common knowledge that porn sites are LOADED with malware and viruses, not aimed at corrupting the system, but rather enabling a hacker to receive whatever information the victim, types into their computer: Including credit card numbers, Social Security, passwords, and anything else imaginable. Building upon the notion of staying away from unknown or suspicious web sites, it’s also highly important to be wary of unknown/suspicious e-mails. If it’s from a completely unknown user, you must take extreme caution when links or attachments are sent along, and even if an e-mail is from a very well-known friend, if it has weird writing or anything that seems ‘off’, then perhaps it’s quite possible that their account was very well hacked into and being used to spread around viruses, via the victim’s Contact List—something that actually happened recently to a friend of mine, after I received a very peculiar e-mail from him one day with strange attachments. When it comes to online security, there’s no such thing as being ‘too safe’, because as many people can attest to, it’s much better to be ‘safe than sorry’, especially with all the different threats out there.
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