Protect Yourself! Easy, Step-by-Step Help from the World's Most Trusted Security Provider The Internet is crawling with risks; if you bank or shop online, or even just surf the Web and send e-mail, you are exposed to hackers, thieves, and con artists. Today's bad guys don't need to pick your locks or break your windows: they can attack you and your family over the Internet. Are you prepared? Enjoy a safer online experience with easy, step-by-step help from Symantec, the world's most trusted security provider. This easy-to-understand book helps protect you against Internet threats. Written specifically for nontechnical computer users, you'll learn simple ways to keep you and your family safe and secure while online. *Keep your PC free of spyware, adware, worms, viruses, and intruders. *Protect your identity and privacy. *Browse the Web safely and eliminate junk mail from your inbox. *Keep eavesdroppers out of your wireless network. *Make the most of the new security features built into Windows XP. *Shield your children from pornography and online predators. *Protect your new Internet-based phone service. *Download free tools that help you keep your computer safe.A (c) Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From the Back Cover
Protect Yourself! Easy, Step-by-Step Help from the World’s Most Trusted Security Provider
The Internet is crawling with risks; if you bank or shop online, or even just surf the Web and send e-mail, you are exposed to hackers, thieves, and con artists. Today’s bad guys don’t need to pick your locks or break your windows: they can attack you and your family over the Internet. Are you prepared? Enjoy a safer online experience with easy, step-by-step help from Symantec, the world’s most trusted security provider.
This easy-to-understand book helps protect you against Internet threats. Written specifically for nontechnical computer users, you’ll learn simple ways to keep you and your family safe and secure while online.
- Keep your PC free of spyware, adware, worms, viruses, and intruders.
- Protect your identity and privacy.
- Browse the Web safely and eliminate junk mail from your inbox.
- Keep eavesdroppers out of your wireless network.
- Make the most of the new security features built into Windows XP.
- Shield your children from pornography and online predators.
- Protect your new Internet-based phone service.
- Download free tools that help you keep your computer safe.
© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Andrew Conry-Murray is the technology editor at IT Architect, an award-winning publication for information technology professionals. He has been writing about computer and network security since 2000.
Vincent Weafer has an extensive range of experience, gained from more than 20 years in the information technology industry, ranging from software development, systems engineering, to security research positions. For the past eight years, he has been the operational leader of the Symantec Global Security Response team, where his mission is to advance the research into new computer security threats and provide security content solutions such as anti-virus, antispam, intrusion and vulnerability response, real-time alerting, content solutions, research, and analysis.
Weafer has also been one of Symantec’s main spokespeople on Internet security threats and trends, with national and international press and broadcast media, appearing on CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, and BBC, among many others. In addition, he has presented at many international conferences on security threats and trends, presenting papers and contributing to technical panels run by the European Institute for Computer AntiVirus Research (EICAR), Virus Bulletin, Association of AntiVirus Asia Researchers (AVAR), and Australian Computer Emergency Response Team (AUSCERT), among many others.
© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A no-nonsense approach to security for nontechies...,
By Thomas Duff "Duffbert" (Portland, OR United States) - See all my reviews (VINE VOICE) (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: The Symantec Guide to Home Internet Security (Paperback)
If you're a techno-geek, it's easy to find material on how to secure your computing environment. It's considerably more difficult to find readable and understandable material that you can give to Uncle Joe to prevent him from becoming the latest spam zombie. A good entry into this niche is the book The Symantec Guide to Home Internet Security by Andrew Conry-Murray and Vincent Weafer.
Content: Understanding Internet Risk; Preventing Identity Theft; Firewalls; Getting Rid of Unwanted Guests, Part 1 - Viruses and Worms; Getting Rid of Unwanted Guests, Part 2 - Spyware, Adware, and Trojan Horses; Just Say No To Spam; Securing Windows; Keeping Your Family Safe Online; Wireless and VoIP Security; Privacy and the Internet; Conclusion; Index This book doesn't attempt to "entertain" the reader or dazzle them with funny graphics or drawings. It's just solid material on internet security presented in a clear and concise manner. The target is for nontechnical Windows users, and in my opinion the authors pretty much nail it. The heavy duty jargon is either avoided or explained clearly, and nearly any internet user with a small amount of interest should be able to use this book. Each chapter ends with a Checklist that covers the things you need to do (or things you shouldn't do) in order to enhance your security. Even if you can't get Uncle Joe to read the entire chapter, he can get the gist of the useful info in a short page or two. I'd prefer they understand *why* they are doing something, but I'll take whatever I can get with some people... If you're the target audience for this book, it's a definite recommended purchase and read. And if you're a techno-geek who's tired of incessantly cleaning spyware and viruses off the neighbor's computer, buy them a copy of this book. It's a relatively cheap way to get your life back...
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent title for home Internet users,
By
This review is from: The Symantec Guide to Home Internet Security (Paperback)
Windows is today by far the most popular platform for workstation and
desktop computers. However, it has also proven to be the most susceptible to a wide variety of attacks, many of which being of a distributed (mass-spreading) nature. Regardless of the important steps that Microsoft has taken to provide a sufficient out-of-the box level of security, a default Windows installation remains far from secure and not likely to survive for long against the various hazards that access to the Internet hides. Truth is that few users are even aware of these hazards -until it is too late-, much less being able to make an educated choice among all these protective software titles with fancy names out there. This is where Symantec Guide to Home Internet Security comes to the rescue, offering a consistent and easy to comprehend source of information to both the completely novice users and those with limited knowledge in the ways of computer security. Without going into unnecessary technical details, it explains all that a user needs to know to protect his privacy in windows environments. For those that do not know, Symantec has been established as one of the leading companies in the field of computer security globally, offering it's own quality software solutions -with best examples the Norton Anti-Virus and Internet Security suite. However this book is in no way written to promote or focus to any specific software. It aims to educate the reader so that he is able to make his own sensible choices of security-related software and it definitely succeeds in it... Symantec's Guide to Home Internet Security is of the few security-related books that demand no experience or previous knowledge. In it's about 200 pages, it manages to teach with illustrative examples, tables and images everything from the ground, without becoming tiresome or confusing to the reader at any point. The material covered is well distributed into 10 chapters. More specifically: Chapter 1 is a short introduction to the main types of Internet risks. It shows how the Internet is full of cunning/malicious users that will do anything to take advantage of every valuable bit of information that we exchange. Chapter 2 covers the most well-established techniques of identity-stealing. It teaches you important methods to prevent them and react in the event of identity theft. Chapter 3 explains the logic behind firewalls, in which cases they can protect us and how they can be used to effectively do so. Chapters 4 and 5 cover the large subject of Malware (malicious software). You will learn in what ways Viruses, Worms, Spyware, Adware and Trojan horses can harm your system, how you can minimize the possibility of being infected, in what ways you can utilize protective software as a measure of prevention and restoration and what are the criteria according to which you should choose those software products. Chapter 6 continues with the subject of SPAM messages, whether they just carry annoying advertisements or act as means of Information Phising and Social Engineering techniques. This chapter will teach you a great deal of these techniques, how to filter out SPAM messages and determine the validity of any potentially harmful message. Chapter 7 focuses generally on good practices for keeping your Windows system in good health. Chapter 8 is dedicated in presenting methods for protecting other members of your family/environment that will use your computer with possibly less knowledge about security or underage from unwanted content. Windows features and extra tools for filtering access to unwanted content are described, along with recommendations for optimum implementation. Chapter 9 speaks about security in Wireless/Portable devices and VoIP applications. Common usage mistakes are pointed with regard to the severity of their potential exploitation. Finally, Chapter 10 introduces the basic principles of cryptography, it's most widely used applications and possible ways that we can take advantage of it to protect our privacy. Conclusion: If you are not familiar at all with security or have your doubts in some things, this book can literally save you! The material covered is absolutely necessary for the survival of any windows station connected to the Internet and reading Symantec's Guide to Home Internet Security is probably the easiest way to learn it.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
up to date survey of malware,
By
This review is from: The Symantec Guide to Home Internet Security (Paperback)
Symantec offers a general purpose guide to the dangers of malware, directed at a non technical reader, who might have a home computer to maintain. It shows how you might get email from anywhere in the world, containing spam or bogus offers, like "dates" with attractive women, or money offers from relatives of dead dictators are common come-ons.
The book warns against other perils. For instance, the https connection is used to prevent a third party listening in on your communication with a website. Many financial websites use this, when you are presenting a password. But any website can use https. Even a bogus one. Sometimes the latter might use it, in part to fool people who think that https per se confers validation of that website. Phishing is correctly described as the most damaging of current Internet frauds. The book outlines characteristics of many phishing messages, and how they often [mis-]direct you to a fradulent site ("pharm"). However, the only solution offered by the text is that the reader should beware of such messages and should not click on links in any that she believes to be phishing. (Let alone enter personal data in a page linked to by the message.) There is no technical answer suggested to defeat phishing. Basically, the reader is on her own. Phishing is still a relatively new phenomenon, at least as compared to spam. In contrast, the book goes into a bundle of antispam techniques, such as blacklists, whitelists, signatures, Bayesians and reputation filtering.
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