A new year has just begun. And if you're like many of us, you may already be well on your way to forgetting any New Year's resolutions you made during an evening of revelry
A new year has just begun. And if you're like many of us, you may already be well on your way to forgetting any New Year's resolutions you made during an evening of revelry
"Phishing" refers to the practice of trying to procure from you account information, personal identifying information, or anything else that scammers can use to try to gain access to your money.
Phishing attacks come in all forms: e-mail messages that look like they come from legitimate financial institutions, requesting that you log on to your account; phone calls that appear to be from official agencies, again requesting sensitive personal information; websites that redirect you to other sites, where applications are surreptitiously installed on your PC in an effort to extract account information.
In 2011, do not respond to any external request that you log on to your bank account or provide account information verbally or by e-mail. If you have a question about whether a request is legitimate, call the institution in question to verify that you were contacted.
In addition, make sure you're using a full-featured anti-virus application and be sure that the virus signatures are up to date.
If you carry data around with you, as many do on USB sticks, secure that data with encryption. Otherwise, anyone can plug in your stick and read what's on that drive. Windows 7 Ultimate and Enterprise come standard with BitLocker. For everyone else, there's the free, open-source TrueCrypt.
