What are Malware and Viruses? »

These two types of software are very similar to each other although they are not the same thing. Many times mistaken as a virus, malware can wreak havoc on any PC that it has infected. It may also drive the user to the brink of insanity. Malware or “Malicious Software” is any piece of software written directly with the intent of doing harm to the file system of your PC. Malware may be downloaded to your PC unintentionally through either a peer-to-peer file sharing program or through an opened email attachment. Malware may actually contain other malicious software such as viruses, worms, spyware, and adware. The malware software may actually corrupt the file system of your PC causing it to come to a slow crawl or even a screeching halt!
On the other hand, viruses, which are also attained through downloaded software and opened email attachments, infect the different pieces of software on your computer and may cause you to lose important data. The thing about viruses is that they may also spread to other PCs in your network using a “worm”. This can happen without any interaction from the user, and can cause major problems and even hours of downtime for a business with more than a handful of computers. Many of these viruses have also been used to “take over PCs” and use them to send out mass spam emails as well as to inundate your PC with spyware to grab your personal information.

The risk of having either of these infect your PC(s) can be greatly reduced by having properly updated Anti-Virus software installed on your PC as well as software updates, and Windows Updates.

How to change your email Send/Receive settings »

Many times you may wonder why you have to click on the Send/Receive button to get your email. Shouldn’t it be automatic? Yes, it should be, but by default it is not. Here is how to have Microsoft Office Outlook automatically check for your email every 5 minutes.

1. Open Microsoft Office Outlook

2. Click Tools –> Send/Receive –> Send/Receive Settings –> Define Send/Receive Groups

3. You will see a box that looks like this:

Click the checkbox next to “Schedule an Automatic Send/Receive every “5″ minutes.”

4. Click Close

All done!

Getting “E-Mauled” by E-Mail »

Back when e-mail was in its infancy, users used to have to pay around $20 a month for an account. I remember when having an email account was viewed as a status symbol, even if none of your friends had one and therefore did not communicate with you that way.

Fast forward 15 years and almost EVERYONE has an email account. The only holdouts are usually the elderly, infants or separatists living in one-room cabins in Wyoming. Most people even have multiple email accounts since they are available for free these days. But, of course the Spammers know that fact also and one of the biggest complaints, if not THE biggest, these days is the amount of SPAM that the average user receives daily (the FTC even has a lengthly form you can fill out to file a formal complaint). Some estimates say that as much as 90-percent of all email is SPAM, although I think that figure could be really inflated. Add to the sheer volume of spam the ever-more-sophisticated phishing attacks unleashed on unsuspecting users and it is obvious that the email method of communication is under serious attack.

One can no longer just rely on Blacklisting or blocking certain email addresses. E-mail address spoofing has rendered that technique all but useless. Blocking emails containing certain “words” is another technique that is so ’90s. Spammers are just rewriting these words so that filters c@n’t bl()ck them.

The bad guys go to these lengths because SPAM is far too lucrative a business for it to just go away. The average spammer sends 100 million messages at one time. Let’s say that only 1% get past the spam filters. That is 1 million messages that are actually delivered. Now take it a step further and let’s say that 1% of those messages are actually answered – that is 10,000 SPAM emails that are actually answered in some way by the recipient. There is not another advertising method available that provides that kind of success rate and all the spammer has to do is create an email and push the “send” button.

Make no mistake, spammers are in the lead in this race. They are hiring professional software developers to create more and more effective programs. They are also using botnets to avoid detection by ISPs and to send the emails from multiple nodes, making it harder and harder for security vendors to stop or even slow the flow.

So the next time you see spam in your inbox, try to remember what the web hosting company is up against. It requires constant effort and even that sometimes is not enough. You, however, can make things a little easier by protecting your email addresses. For example, if a website requires you to enter a valid email address in order to sign up for something, try using a temporary email address service. One that we have mentioned before is Guerrilla Mail. A service like that will keep your personal email address from ending up in some spammer’s database.

Also, if you receive an unsolicited email from someone you don’t know, don’t click the little link that sometimes appears at the bottom of the email saying “Click here to be removed from our mailing list.” Usually, clicking that link will just notify the spammer that he/she has actually discovered a valid email address.

Morehead City To Jacksonville: Computer Repair and Tech Support »

During the process of creating a web design for a client, we are almost always asked if we do computer repairs or computer network troubleshooting or virus removal or something along those lines. Although we know a little about handling those types of requests and we always try to help our clients with their problems, those fields are certainly not within our area of expertise.

So, in an effort to provide our clients with enhanced, comprehensive technical service, I have been looking around for just the right person to handle everything from network administration and computer repair to installation of printers and virus removal.

I am proud to announce that Jaredd Bell will make a perfect fit for this position. He and I have been working together on several projects for the past month or so and he has certainly impressed me with his abilities but most importantly with his attention to detail and superior customer service.

Our clients can rest assured that they will receive the same level of professionalism and quality that they have come to expect from Crystal Coast Technologies, Inc. In fact, here is a testimonial from one of our first clients that have taken advantage of our new service.

“The Town was glad to see CCT expand their services. We were extremely satisfied with the development of the Town’s website and fully expect to use them for future needs”
Christopher Seaberg, Town Administrator, Town of Cedar Point

In the past, Jaredd served as Network Administrator for Marine Federal Credit Union in Jacksonville NC and IT Administrator for Atex Technologies in Pinehurst NC.

We are going to offer on-site computer tech support, including things like PC cleanup, computer hardware installation, network troubleshooting, and data backup solutions from New Bern to Emerald Isle and Morehead City to Jacksonville, NC. If you are out of that area, please contact us because we may still be able to travel to your location or, we are setup with the ability to access your computer remotely and can fix many issues that way. See our price list (opens in PDF) for a complete breakdown of what we offer and the costs.

If you want more details or to setup and appointment, contact us for all the details.

Top 10 Security Tips For Your Small Business Part 2 »

To continue our Top 10 list of simple (and mostly free) security tips for your small business.

7. Watch out for email attachments

Email attachments can be a wonderful thing. They allow people from all across the world to send pictures to family and friends, businesses to send documents to clients, and sometimes the occasional Powerpoint presentation that somehow didn’t make the trip can be sent directly to you in a matter of seconds. Though, for all of these wonderful things, email attachments can also be very harmful. Many of the most common and harmful viruses are spread through email. These will infect your machine as soon as you open the attachment. The main ways to avoid these nasty viruses are:
Never open an email attachment from someone you do not know. Only open an attachment if it is from someone you know and you were expecting it. If you are sending an attachment to someone else, let them know ahead of time. And last, but certainly not least, have an Anti-Virus program, such as Norton Anti-Virus (updated daily) that will scan incoming and outgoing emails for viruses.

6. Anti-Virus Software

Having a properly updated Anti-Virus program on your PC is crucial these days. Most Anti-Virus programs such as Norton Anti-Virus, Trend Micro, McAfee, and AVG all do updates daily in the background, so you don’t have to worry about it. Without an Anti-Virus program, accidentally opening the wrong attachment, or clicking on the wrong pop-up on a website, may open the door for spyware, adware, malware, and viruses to take over your PC.

5. Windows Updates and patches

I was just working on a PC yesterday and noticed that we are up to 93 Windows Updates AFTER the Windows XP SP2 update. That’s quite a few updates! Most of these updates are actually security patches for either Windows or the programs that are running with Windows, such as Microsoft Office, Windows Media Player, etc… These updates are important because they help to close “backdoors” that hackers have found that allow them to compromise your data and your privacy. Having some type of firewall, an anti-virus program and not opening strange email attachments will protect against most of your common threats. Though, to take it one step further and keep your data safe, set your Windows Updates to automatic and let it do it’s thing. There can be exceptions to this rule, though not commonly. Feel free to ask me any questions if you are having any troubles with your Windows Updates.

 Click here to see tips 8 through 10 and stay tuned until next time for the Top 4 security tips!