Reverse Paranoia

Secunia PSI – PC Security for Home Users

I was reading a few days ago about a potentially serious security risk in Microsoft’s popular web browser “Explorer” that could let hackers take control of a computer that had visited a web page infected with some fairly nasty code. The thing that shocked me most about this issue was that nothing needed to be clicked on or downloaded to contract it just visiting the page was enough.

In all reality the chance of the average user becoming infected is extremely remote but the official line by security experts is that until Microsoft have issued a patch that users should either up their security settings from within Internet Explorer or switch to an alternative browser such as Firefox or Opera.

As regular readers of my articles may know I recommend using a browser such as Firefox or but if you really must use Internet Explorer please do keep Windows up to date at all times. Whilst no fix is available for this particular bug, if you keep your Browser and Operating System updated this will limit your chances of experiencing the issue first hand.

Many people seem to overlook the importance of ensuring their other applications on your computer are kept up to date as it isn’t just browsers that can be affected by such security issues. However making a list of all software you have installed and then checking the manufacturer’s website systematically for updates would be a rather arduous, time consuming process. Thankfully an easily recommendable piece of software named Secunia PSI has recently come out of Beta testing; it is designed to make regularly checking for updates unnecessary by checking the majority of the applications currently installed on your computer for known security vulnerabilities.

There are two versions of this application available, one that runs online and one that you download and install; both are available from http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/. Personally I would recommend downloading the application rather than the online test as the 500kb file will scan a greater number of programs than the online version.

Once Secunia’s own scans have completed, you will be presented with a list of outdated software, a vulnerability rating along and a link to get the most up-to-date version of the application available. You can view many details related to every potential threat and the results can be quite scary; although my personal computer managed a security score of 92% there were a couple of serious vulnerabilities. One fairly unknown bug in my PDF reader (Foxit PDF) had the potential to give a hacker full access to my computer.

I think there is a stage where paranoia can kick in and users can be over cautious but a certain level of precaution should always be taken. Even if you are not worried about the potential security implications of running out of date software, Secunia offers a quick and easy way to ensure that you are running the most up to date and hopefully feature rich versions of all your favourite programs.

About the Author

Chris Holgate writes a weekly article of all things tech related. He is a director and copyrighter of the online computer consumables business Refresh Cartridges who sell cheap ink cartridges,
toner cartridges
, computer hardware and other computer consumables online. An archive of his work can be found at
www.computerarticles.co.uk
.

Alex Jones Tv 1/2:Psychology Today Say’s”Alex Jones & 9/11 Truthers Suffer from Mental Instability?”

Paranoia: Webster’s Timeline History, 1744 – 2007 $28.95 Webster’s bibliographic and event-based timelines are comprehensive in scope, covering virtually all topics, geographic locations and people. They do so from a linguistic point of view, and in the case of this book, the focus is on “Paranoia,” including when used in literature (e.g. all authors that might have Paranoia in their name). As such, this book represents the largest compilation of timeli…