A colleague at work has drawn up a very good checklist explaining how to keep a Windows PC safe and secure, and to keep the information on it private. His advice basically boils down to the following:
- Install a personal firewall;
- Install anti-virus software and keep it up-to-date;
- Get rid of Outlook, Outlook Express and Internet Explorer – replace with a Mozilla-based product;
- Don’t use MSN Messenger or Yahoo Messenger;
- Replace Microsoft Office, and its components such as Word, Excel, with OpenOffice, a free equivalent;
- Install AdAware, software which checks your system for ‘undesirables’, such as spyware;
- Ultimately, go the whole hog and get rid of Windows entirely, and use a nice Linux distribution.