In truth, some accounts are actually hacked by viruses, but that’s a subject I’ve already handled.

So what are we to do? The good news is there’s an easy process to protect your accounts:

1. Never use the same password for more than one site
2. Use passwords that contain upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols
3. Use the above in a random fashion
4. Never type your password on a computer that has any possibility of infection

There, now that you know what you need to do, practice safe computing and have a nice day.

What? That’s too hard? You can’t remember T$d63Fes% as a password? Thankfully, there’s an easier solution – use a password manager.

Password managers have been around for as long as there have been passwords. My first was a little black book that got washed one too many times. My second was a Palm Pilot, that I lost, and that probably got washed too. Fortunately, today’s solutions don’t risk the possibility of loss or accidentally getting washed. There are many to choose from, but the one I want to detail today is from Lastpass.com.

Lastpass is a browser plug-in for Firefox and Microsoft browsers. By default, it replaces the insecure (yes, they are) password managers built-in to those browsers. Your passwords are actually saved on the Lastpass servers, freeing you from the possibility of losing all your passwords because of a computer failure. I know what you’re thinking – “But that gives somebody else my information!” Actually, no. Before any of your passwords are sent to Lastpass, they are encrypted with your master password. Lastpass uses 256-bit AES encryption which is as good (or better in most cases) as the federal government uses. Maybe that’s a bad example. How about “Its what geeks use.” There, that’s better.

There’s a whole lot of techno-babble I could detail and explain, but suffice it to say that Lastpass gives you secure access to really secure passwords. I’m not going to explain how to install it either, find out at their website.

The real beauty of Lastpass is the password generator, which will give you all of the requirements above. When you use the password generator, you can pretty much guarantee you have a secure password. The design of passwords is customizable for websites that support one style of password but not another (upper/lowercase OK, symbols not OK).

Since Lastpass stores EjaJ9LQ$z%Y^ for you, you don’t have to remember it. Simply visit the site you want and Lastpass will automatically fill in your username and password for you (HINT: If it doesn’t automatically fill in your password, press ALT-PGUP which is the key combination to cycle through all passwords for that site).

You’ll still need to go back through sites and generate new passwords to be secure, but Lastpass should automatically detect the password change and prompt you to save it.

“But, what about when I’m not on my PC?”

The lastpass.com website allows you to login and access your passwords from any PC, also granting you the ability to sign-in to a website directly from lastpass.com without ever typing anything.

Lastly, if you don’t trust the PC you’re using – maybe a internet cafe or hotel computer – you can use one-time passwords. These passwords are exactly what they sound like – they allow you to login one time with that password. So, even if somehow, someone captures your password, its useless once you’ve used it. Of course, you do have to set these up in advance.

There really is no excuse for bad passwords anymore. With the Lastpass plug-in and the lastpass.com website, you have secure password management, offsite storage and one-time use protection when you’re not at your PC.

Just remember to use a secure password for your Lastpass password. By the way, Bible verses make excellent passwords (Ephesians6:7, 1Corithians13:4-8).

Every once in awhile, I will come across someone who insists on not running anti-virus software because “it slows down my PC.”

Although I will agree that anti-virus software does slow down a PC significantly, in my opinion, the benefits to an Internet-connected Windows PC outweigh the performance loss.

To be completely fair though, I do not advocate the use of “everything” security packages. The vast majority of these seem intent on locking down your PC so tight, no one – including you – can use it. These security packages tend to include a lot of software I find redundant and unnecessary, such as:

• Firewall – Both Windows XP and Vista come with perfectly adequate firewalls for the normal home user. In fact, most home users don’t even need a firewall on their PCs, because most are protected by a gateway device using NAT. As for business users, your network administrator should have a hardware-based solution, if not, call me.
• SPAM protection – In order to filter the SPAM form your mail, these packages must download it first. If you have to download it anyway, what’s the point? The idea is to prevent it from ever hitting the inbox. Most Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and hosting providers have server-based tools to allow you to prevent the junk from getting to your box, as well as providing you a way to check the junk folder for anything useful that might have slipped in there. If your hosting provider isn’t filtering or your ISP doesn’t offer filtering, it’s time to find a new one.
• Spyware/Adware protection – these types of programs are usually downloaded on impulse. That new screensaver or weather program looks so neat you just have to install it. A day later, you’re wondering why you have pop-ups for Viagra all of the sudden. Dealing with these problems is an as-occurs situation and precious system resources shouldn’t be expended looking for Potentially Unwanted Programs (PUPs) all the time. Spybot – Search & Destroy is an excellent, free program just for this purpose.
• Identity protection/Antiphishing/Backup/Web Protection – I lump all this together, because I don’t believe any of these products should be coming from your anti-virus vendor. I like the idea of my anti-virus programmer concentrating on how to keep viruses out of my machine, not on how to protect me from my own stupidity. “Do one thing, and do it well,” is part of the Unix philosophy, but it applies to any program. There are plenty of free products out to handle these issues and if you really wan to pay for them that bad, I’m sure someone will sell you a program to do one of the above.

Back to the task at hand. For home users, there are several high-quality, free, anti-virus solutions. Did I mention, they’re free? Yes, AVG is just one (and my preferred) of the many anti-virus companies that has figured out that home users are the number one source of virus infections, and that if they eliminate the home user threat, the likely-hood of a paying business customer becoming infected goes down dramatically. Now you’re not going to get advanced features like scan scheduling and multiple updates, but do you really care? No, you just know you need to be protected. So do it.

If you’re a business user, please do not install any of the free anti-virus products on your business PCs. None of them I’ve looked at make allowances for business use and for good reason. If they give away their best product, how are they going to be in business to provide you with updates? Business class programs come with advanced features you’ll probably want anyway, such as: centralized administration, email notification, custom scan settings, etc. The features are vital for keeping your business PCs in top shape.

One final note, if you’ve ever spent a single day down because of a virus, you probably lost more money that day than you would have spent on anti-virus software for your entire office. If you need a quote, please call. I’ll be happy to get you a quote to fit your needs, free of charge, complete with contact information, so you can buy direct from the vendor.