Feel safe because you’re using the Windows firewall? Don’t - it’s not very good. Firewall? What’s a firewall? Using the anti-virus program that came with your computer? Are you sure it’s up to date, and have you got anti-spyware software?

This posting tells you how to keep your data as secure as possible when connected to the Internet. And how you can do it for free! Oh! - and it’s easy.

The Government web site National Statistics Online states that “In 2007, nearly 15 million households in Great Britain (61 per cent) had Internet access” and of those 84% were connected by broadband. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) expects on-line sales for 2007 to reach nearly £16 billion.

Now, with those kinds of figures in this country alone you can betcha there are some pretty clever baddies out there trying to get hold of your money, personal details - and even surreptitiously use your computer. Gone are the days when the biggest threats were from ‘nerdy’ kids who were just trying to show off how clever they were, we are now looking at serious criminals. I’m not a ’security expert’, which is a whole job in itself, but let me outline some of the threats and the measures you should be taking to combat on-line threats.

Read on.

Types of threat

• Viruses - (for the sake of simplicity I shall include worms and trojans under this heading). Small programs put onto your computer without your knowledge. The effect of these range from mildly annoying through to making your computer totally unusable or collecting personal information (such as bank details) and passing them back to the creator of the virus. They can also spread themselves automatically to other computers by such means as going through your address book and sending everyone listed a copy of themselves.
• Spyware - can track your surfing habits, abuse your Internet connection by sending this data to a third party, profile your shopping preferences, hijack your browser start page or pages or alter important system files. By just visiting a web-site (and no, I don’t mean just ‘adult’ sites!) you can be open to yourself to this risk. Anti-virus software does not cover you against this type of threat.
• Port Scanning - ports are a bit like doorways into your computer and, like a house, doorways are necessary but we don’t always leave them unlocked. Malicious crackers can gain access to your computer through ‘open doors’ and use it to their own ends or take information from it. This scanning can be done automatically - so don’t think you’re hidden in the crowd, you will be astounded by how frequently your computer is scanned!
• Becoming a Zombie. Well, at least your computer can become one. Computers infected like this are used to do the dirty work for spammers and other villains - and you won’t even know that it’s happening. Millions of computers around the world are hijacked like this. No, I’m not being alramist, it really does happen on a very large scale. If you want to know more take a look at this article from the BBC or this article from pcworld (the magazine, not the shop).
• Phishing - basically trying to con you into giving away details. Sometimes quite comical and sometimes very convincing.

Read on to see what can be done.

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