Virus and Security Notices & Alerts

Here you will find the latest threats that we encounter in our day-to-day travels as well as links to headline news about security vulnerabilities, patches and viruses.

Current Threats and Alerts

There is a new form of trickery appearing across the net to get spyware and adware installed on systems, especially those running the more secure FireFox browser (see Best Practices below). These tricks open or redirect a full-screen browser to a message that looks like a DOS or system file alert like this:

Threat

Clicking the "OK" button provides the necessary access to your hard drive for the malicious code to be installed and initiated. The side effects of these can be simple tracking to viruses and spam gateways. If you are in doubt, don't click.

Best Practices

There are three simple steps to the Taliesyn Technologies Security Best Practices Model.

1. Purchase and properly install a good quality hardware Internet Firewall.
2. Keep your computer up-to-date or ask about a support contract.
3. Purchase a quality anti-virus product like Command Antivirus and keep it current.

There is an increasing level of security compromises with current web browsers as well. Unfortunately, a large number of these impact the Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser more than others due to the tight integration it has with the Windows environment.

Some things you can do in addition to the three steps outlined above:

Use a different web browser such as Mozilla's Fire Fox browser which is a strong and modern browser that will enhance your web viewing over the now dated Internet Explorer 6 product. As Firefox does not use Active-X controls, you may find a very small portion of some e-commerce sites that may not function.

If you opt for a different browser, you will have to continue to use Internet Explorer to run your Windows Update as this is a proprietary system that will work only with a Microsoft browser.

Tighten security settings on Internet Explorer so that it prompts for confirmation prior to running Active-X controls or other scripts. This will impair the advanced function of many web sites, however you do have the option of making sites you know and trust "trusted" sites to restore functionality and remove confirmation boxes. Do this at your own risk however.

Apply critical patches to Windows as they are released from Microsoft to both the operating system and the Internet Explorer product should you continue to use it. Visit the Microsoft Windows Update web site to identify and install the latest critical patches.   Also be sure to patch and check Microsoft Office products if they are used in your environment for patches and vulnerability updates.

Adware and Spyware

Dowload and run weely the free Adaware adware and spwyware scanner which will identifiy and isolate ad, spy and malware threats that are picked up in the course of everyday Internet use and general computing. Commercial versions are also available to buy for real-time threat neutralization.

Firefox is now also slightly vulnerable to some malicious spyware tactics if you approve the running of a script. This is still a superior browser in our opinion and will protect you from "drive by" infections. All browsers are still vulnerable to tracking cookies and data miners, run your Adaware weekly.

Antivirus Protection

Taliesyn Technologies endorses and sells one of the best commercial grade antivirus products available in the market today. Based on the world reknown F-Prot and F-Secure systems, Command Antivirus by Authentium is a strong partner to have in today's increasingly dangerous computing world.

Unlike competing products that tend to take over your system and are constantly in your face, only to let you down with things really go south; Command Antivirus is unobtrusive and offers strong pattern matching to catch even new threats in the wild. The self updating feature based on annual subscription is simple and intuiative and lacks the often intimidating bar graphs, traffic lights and cat calls - Command simply sits on your computer and does its thing.

Command Antivirus for Windows is now only $39.99 per computer per year. Compare with Norton at $69.99. If you have several computers that need protecting, contact us for discounted volume licenses.

Command Antivirus Current Stats

To maximize your protection, ensure your Command Antivirus is up-to-date. Click on the "C" icon in the system tray and when the program starts, select "Help" and "About Command"

If these are not the dates you see, select UPDATE NOW button and select the engine update if present and then the definition file update. If you need assistance please email support@taliesyn.ca on how to update your product. If you are asked repeatedly for your username and password and you purchased your product from Taliesyn Technologies, your subscription may be due for renewal. Contact our office to renew at just $39.99 per year per computer.

Taliesyn Technologies