A Major Digital Headache

There are so many things you have to watch out for when you're online, and one of the worst of those is the good old computer virus. Now that broadband Internet is almost everywhere it's making things a lot easier for viruses to get to your computer quickly. This is why it's very important to have a very good firewall on your computer, as well as a good antivirus program. It's just as important to keep them updated on a regular basis - having out-of-date security software is pointless.

Most computer protection software will update on its own, however your firewall may stop your antivirus software from updating. You should make sure that you have your firewall is set to allow these updates to come through. If you have something like Zone Alarm, it will ask you if you would like to allow the software to access the Internet. You'll see the same type of activity when a computer virus is trying to get onto your system. Your firewall and your computer virus software should both stop this type of activity, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't keep an eye on things.

Sometimes a computer virus can get onto your computer and can do damage very quickly, while other times the process is slow and you mightn't know what is going on for quite a while. Sometimes a computer virus will be planted that does nothing but install other viruses secretly. This can be very confusing, and can lead to a lot of problems if your software is not up-to-date. At times you may get a virus that your antivirus software doesn't recongize and cant' stop. If you think this is the case, update your antivirus software immediately and run another full system scan.

With broadband Internet access you can surf the Internet much faster, but you can also pick up a computer virus much faster. Sadly, one nasty computer virus is all it takes to completely destroy every single file on your computer. There are people out there with nothing better to do than coming up with new and smarter computer viruses to give home computer users more headaches. Why do they do this? To prove that they can - the average computer virus "author" is an 18 - 30 year old male, single and usually lives alone/at home with parents. These guys literally have nothing better to do with their days. It's kinda sad really.

So folks keep your anti-virus software updated and make sure you have a solid firewall installed too. Do everything you can to make life difficult for the cyber criminals out there.