We’ve seen some good videos lately helping raise awareness of computer security issues.
For instance, the humorous anarchic puppet show about spam, the mindreader who has a little help from Facebook, and Sophos’s own movie about what happens when you go cycling around London, hunting for unsecured Wifi access points.
Now we have an affectionate spoof of the “Crocodile Hunter” TV shows made famous by the late Steve Irwin, with the intention of helping raise the public’s understanding of web safety issues.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqM3D83GBRE&rel=0&w=500&h=311]
The video, timed to coincide with National Cyber Security Awareness Month, comes from the folks at StopBadware.org and Bluehost.
Here are some quick tips:
- Keep your computers protected with up-to-date software and security patches – not just on the computers you use to browse the web, but the servers you use to host your website too. Malicious hackers are always on the lookout for computers that are not running the latest versions of software, hoping to exploit vulnerabilities.
- Remove any software or plugins that you don’t actually need. For instance, we recently described how to disable Java. This not only makes it easier to ensure that your computer is running the latest versions of software and is up-to-date with security fixes, it also reduces the number of potential opportunities for attack.
- Always use strong, hard to guess, unique passwords. Never use the same password for multiple sites.
- Keep your anti-virus software up-to-date – hundreds of thousands of new pieces of malware are discovered every day.
(By the way, is it just me who is surprised they didn’t make a joke involving the word ‘Safari’?)
