The importance of Internet Safety

Melissa Spencer

Introduction

People use the internet more and more these days so it is very important that we make sure everyone is safe and knows what can happen and how to prevent it.

Risks over the internet Risk Explanation

Identity Thieves The more information you make available online, the greater the risk of identity theft. It can be very tempting to reply to an email or open an attachment or post information about yourself on social networking sites, but you should never do it.

Cyber stalking Unlike when your meeting someone face-to-face, you don’t always know who your actually ‘talking’ to online, even if they think you do. This makes it easy for someone who may want to hurt you, to pretend they are someone else and become their 'friend'.

Viruses and spyware  Opening infected email attachments Visiting corrupt websites. USB connected devices (eg memory sticks, external hard drives, MP3 players).CDs/DVDs.Serious consequences:Identity theftFraud.Deletion, theft and corruption of data.A slow or unusable computer.

Phishing Phishing is a common trick used on websites that have been hacked or are pretending to be legitimate. PayPal and eBay are two of the most common targets for phishing scams

Viruses

Viruses and spyware can be caused by: Opening infected email attachments Visiting corrupt websites. USB connected devices (e.g. memory sticks, external hard drives, MP3 players).CDs/DVDs.Serious consequences:Identity theftFraud.Deletion, theft and corruption of data.A slow or unusable computer.

Phishing

Phishing is a common trick used by hackers wanting to gain information fraudulently.

Common ways are by posing as real companies asking for personal information e.g . a bank requesting log in details, PIN number etc.

Another example would be posing as a real charity and asking for an online donation.

PayPal and eBay are two of the most common targets for phishing scams

Spyware

Spyware is similar to a Trojan horse in that users unwittingly install the product when they install something else. A common way to become a victim of spyware is to download certain peer-to-peer file swapping products that are available today.

Spam

Spam emails are emails sent to you without consent. It is email that you don’t want and didn’t ask for, and its content can cause embarrassment and distress. However, it’s worth remembering that the sender generally doesn’t target recipients personally.

Firewalls

A firewall is a system designed to prevent unauthorized access to or from a private network. Firewalls can be implemented in both hardware and software, or a combination of both. Firewalls are frequently used to prevent unauthorized Internet users from accessing private networks connected to the Internet, especially intranets.

Pop-up Blockers

A pop-up blocker is a program that prevents pop-ups from displaying in a user's Web browser.

 Pop-up blockers work in a number of ways: some close the window before it appears,

some disable the command that calls the pop-up, and some alter the window's source HTML.