Browser Cache

To be able to speed up your browsing experience a browser saves information of your regularly visited sites. The information could be text, images or codes of the webpage and is used the next time you visit the page.  How is this then a security threat? Well for starters you can learn a lot about a person from the webpage visited. Let’s say you just came from your doctor who diagnosed you with a serious ailment that you would like to keep secret. You go home and try to do research on this ailment and then forgot to clear up your browser cache. Chances are someone would know what particular ailment you have just by checking on the browser history.

To make sure that you do not leave traces of any website you visited always make it a point to clear the cache and cookies of your browser after you have used it. Internet Explorer 8 has a feature called InPrivate which eliminates your online history when you close your IE8.

Public Computers

There are lots of cybercafés now offering cheap PC rentals. Because lots of people use these computers, chances are they are infected with trojans whose main function is to steal your passwords. Almost all of these public PCs are not closely monitored by their owners making them susceptible to infection. Once you try to access your email on any of these infected PCs your password would then be known and the ones responsible for the infection can then sell your email information to spammers.

If you need to use a public computer try to bring a portable flash drive with a portable scanner like ClamWin installed and scan the computer you will be using for malicious programs. If the public PC you are using allows you to boot to USB then try to have bootable operating system in your USB flash drive like Knoppix or Ubuntu so that you can use your own operating system.

Social Networking

A lot of people are signing up to social networking sites nowadays. Services like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter let’s you get connected with your friends. Sharing of information such as photos and videos has never been easier. Some people are also taking advantage of these social networking sites by spreading their malicious software. Have you ever received a message in your Facebook inbox which provides a link to a particular website promising you a funny video or picture only to find out later that you are redirected to an infected website? A lot of people have already fallen victim to this creative way of spreading malicious software.
To protect yourself avoid clicking on these links even if they come from your trusted friends.  Make it a habit to constantly change your password as well so as to prevent your account from being used by someone else.

Fake Internet Security Suite Offers

Have you ever gotten one of those pop-up windows from your browser telling you that your computer is infected? Or maybe it’s telling you to scan your computer? It then provides a solution by selling you an anti malware software probably named AntiVirus X, AntiVirus 2009, DriveCleaner for $50. These supposedly security software is in fact the malwares itself.