Security or stupidity?
Posted on August 10, 2008 at 5:12 am
I have a friend, let’s call this friend Fred, now Fred is a PC expert, he buys all the magazines, visits all the right websites, and in his spare time, when he is not carrying out his normal trade as an interior decorator, spends every minute tinkering with his PC, or talking about PC’s with his other expert friends.
I popped around to visit Fred a few days ago, and he started telling me about the new PC he was going to build next week, this surprised me, as he had only built a new one a few months previously. I asked him why he needed another new PC? He told me the old one was too slow. I found this surprising, as Fred always buys the most expensive high performance parts available on the market, he upgrades every time a new model is introduced, and generally spends a small fortune on his toys.
I offered to take a look at Fred’s PC for him, to see if I could find out why he thought it was so slow, Fred looked at me in the way Fred does when he thinks I’m talking out of my rear end, although Fred knows I spent my entire life in IT, including a decade in corporate PC support, he doesn’t actually think I know anything, as I don’t buy all the magazines, and I don’t visit all the right websites.
Fred sat me down at his PC, still giving me that “yeah right” look. What I found was something quite shocking, installed and operative on his PC was a full Internet security suite (Norton), no problem with that, but he also had a separate anti-virus application running (AVG), along with Microsoft Defender, and was running Ad-Aware daily, he also had the Windows Firewall switched on. So to sum things up he had:
Anti-Virus x 2
Firewall x 2
Anti-Malware x 4
This is just a ridiculous situation, and was eating system resources at an incredible rate. When I asked Fred why he had so many security applications running, he just gave me another one of those looks and said I should know that PC security was a big issue these days. I just gave up in the end, after all, Fred is the expert, he must be as he buys all the magazines and visits all the right websites.
It occurs to me that people just do not understand what is required to secure a systems to an acceptable level. So I am going to cover the three basics below.
Firewall – There is a great free firewall product out there, arguably the best available, and guess what? You already have it installed, that’s right, the standard Windows Firewall is excellent, I cannot see any reason why anybody should feel they need to replace it. Ok it doesn’t have a pretty front end, it doesn’t bother you with popup windows telling you it’s doing it’s job every two minutes, it just works.
Anti-Virus – I used to be a big AVG Free fan, but the recent changes to the application have made me drop it, it is just getting too fat. I have switched to Avast! now, as it is a nice thin application and does the job well.
Anti-Malware – Microsoft Defender is another excellent piece of software, I have to recommend it, I cannot see any reason to use a 3rd party application when Microsoft offer a product that is integrated into the OS.
And that is ALL you need, no expensive all-in-one package with all the bells and whistles, almost no administrative overhead, and all using a minimal amount of system resources.
I have NEVER had a virus, I don’t do anything that could cause me to become infected, as always, sensible use is the best form of security. In a similar fashion I often do not enable my firewall, as the chances of somebody choosing my IP address out of the millions on-line and then finding a security vulnerability in my OS are so remote as to almost be impossible.
Security software companies are really creaming it in with all the hype that surrounds PC security these days, they love people like Fred, who buy all the magazines and visit all the right websites, the very same magazines and sites that are receiving advertising revenue from the security software developers. Figure the rest out for yourselves.
» Filed Under Computer Tips
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I couldn’t agree more! When someone tells me their PC is slow, I first ask if they remember paying for security software. If they say they don’t know, I delete ALL security bloat, put on AVG 8, and make sure windows defender and firewall are running.
Usually this makes a big difference and is a good start.
Thanks for the article.
Oh my god, I used to know such a “Fred” guy myself – and he drove me up the wall with his stupidity. In the end I always laughed hen he had a virus or trojan yet again, or when he wasn’t able to actually work on his computer because the bloody thing was busy crashing or doing god-knows-what.
Some people just can’t be helped.
i’ve been surfing the net for 7 years now
i’ve never enabled my anti-virus (i use it only for manual scan) cuz i dont just open any Unknown.exe and
i’ve never used a firewall.
its not that i’m a super expert but i know what to do and i learn from my mistakes and other people mistakes so all it takes is using simple logic and use that muscle in your head.
regards to fred
I too use Windows Firewall. It is excellent, though I do wish the interface had an overhaul!
Switched from AVG to Avast! as well a few months back because I realized that Avast’s detecting is a lot better. Installing it on an infected PC is best since it conducts a thorough bootup scan.
For Anti-Malware, I’ve relied on Spybot for several years now. It just keeps getting better with every release.
I also agree wholeheartedly. The only other measure I take is to set IE to prompting for activeX. It means a few more clicks (usually ‘NO’), but it does assure more security as well as limiting annoying ads. (Would love it if Microsoft put in a “deny 3rd party activeX” option.)
Well I would say one thing, Speed of any computer depends on user using it.
Even after installing all these number of anti viruses , firewall and anti malwares, he can get infected by the most simple viruses through removable drives.
So, it is the user which can make a computer slow or fast not the computer itself.
I agree that there are people who think much more by reading some nifty tips and tricks in the magazines..but we can’t help that nature.