When a friend moaned that “the computer keeps crashing and it’s so damn slow”, I had a feeling there was more to her problem than she realized. The problem wasn’t her “ancient” three-year-old computer, as she thought, but her “young and innocent” 13-year-old son, the boy she was so proud of for being such a computer nerd. A quick scan with a new anti-virus software revealed that her computer was infected with spyware. Fortunately, it was easy to cure. Her son’s desire to surf sites he shouldn’t, however, probably won’t be.

You could say she was lucky, but she was also naïve. She hadn’t installed any anti-virus software, any anti-spyware and she hadn’t activated her firewall either. She was also accessing the internet via a wireless access point – using the default settings on the router! She was doing everything she could to be infected with a virus. (Some might say she was stupid, rather than naïve.)

Find out how much you know about keeping your computer safe and secure by doing our quiz. We test you on the language of computers and on whether you know how to surf safely, and wirelessly.

By the way, the questions refer mainly to PCs, as Macs are (touch wood!) safe from viruses. I have both a Mac and a PC so I’m keeping a close eye on problems with both systems.

Deborah Capras

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