10 acts of stupidity that can really mess up your computer.–PC Pitstop.
10 Stupid Ways to Mess Up Your PC
By Bob Rankin
How to Mess Up Your Computer
Aside from actually drop-kicking it or smashing it with a sledge hammer, it’s fairly difficult to actually break a computer. That said, there are a number of ways to render your computer just slightly more useful than a doorstop. Certain careless acts can cause crashes, freezes, painfully slow performance, loss of data or invasion of your privacy. Here’s my list of stupid things you can do to really mess up your computer… –
Okay, I’m using a little reverse psychology on you… If want to keep your computer running smoothly and avoid becoming a target for cyber criminals, here are ten things you should NOT do.
1: Not Using Anti-Malware Protection – This is perhaps the most common way to make a system inoperable, and the easiest problem to avoid. Not using an anti-malware program (or using one that’s out of date) is akin to leaving the front door of your house wide open with all of your valuables on prominent display. Having an unprotected system is an invitation to allow all kinds of nasty things like spyware, trojan horses, viruses and root kits to access your system. Virus and spyware creators do this in the hope of gaining control of computers for nefarious purposes, or getting access to sensitive information that may be stored on a hard drive. And of course, viruses and spyware can significantly slow down a machine.
Be safe, use a good anti-virus program to keep out the bad stuff. See my recommendations in Free Anti-Virus Programs and Five Free Malware Removal Tools.
2: Failing to Apply Security Patches – New computer security threats crop up almost daily, as hackers, crackers and other cyber villians attempt to find and exploit holes in the operating system and application software we use every day. Unpatched vulnerabilities can lead to virus infestations, enslavement in a botnet, or even identity theft. And no software is immune, whether you run Windows, Mac or Linux. You need to configure your system to automatically download and install security patches for your operating system, office software, web browser, Java, email program, PDF reader, media player and other software you use. How do you do that?
Take advantage of the tools built into your operating system — Windows Update, Mac OS X Software Update, or Ubuntu Update Manager — and make sure they’re set to run on auto-pilot every day. Other software that you’ve installed may offer the same type of automatic updating capability. Don’t ignore the warning messages from the updaters, and apply fixes as soon as they are available. See Computer Security: The Missing Link to learn more about securing the software on your computer.
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Excerpt shared with permission from Bob Rankin.
