support newsletter annual edition - siu newsletter/vol-1... · 2020-03-11 · 4 | it computer...

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In this special annual edition, we’re going to recap on some of the most important things to keep consider while using computer systems.

Conserving power and preventing surges

Living in Carbondale and considering its random weather, our electronic components are susceptible to power surges during storms. For large organizations that have several dozen/thousand computers it may also be beneficial to turn the computer off each night or at the end of the work day to help conserve power and protect from power surges. Although many computers and electronic devices have power saving features, they will still consume some power, and hundreds of computers consuming power over night is a wasted resource.

IT Computer Technical Support Newsletter

May 19, 2015

Vol.1, No.23

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Conserving power……..…1

Heat and Dust………...….2

Windows 8…………….….4

Managing spam……….…10

Avoiding Virus……………16

Data Backup………….….22

Locked out……………….25

Computer information…..27

Strong passwords……….34

The IT Computer Technical Support Newsletter is complements of Pejman Kamkarian

Annual Edition

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| IT Computer Technical Support Newsletter

Heat and Dust

Most people take good care of their computer, installing antivirus before accessing the internet, scanning USB drives before using them on their computers. However, they ignore the dust that accumulates on their desktop over months and think that spring cleaning is something that their computers do not need.

This however is not correct. You need to understand that dust is actually quite bad for your desktop. Accumulated dust can lead to overheating of your desktop if it clogs the cooling system of the computer. Dust destroys data! As with smoke, dust can collect on the heads of magnetic disks, tape drives, and optical drives. Dust is abrasive and will slowly destroy both the recording head and the media. Most dust is electrically conductive. Invariably, a layer of dust will accumulate on a computer's circuit boards, covering every surface, exposed and otherwise. Eventually, the dust will cause circuits to short and fail.

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IT Computer Technical Support Newsletter |

Here are some guidelines for dust control:

• Keep your computer room as dust free as possible.

• Avoid placing your computer on the floor or under a desk.

• Wipe down your computer on a regular basis. Be sure to dust behind your computer. You may also wish to clean your keyboards.

• A computer desktop’s placement is crucial, housing it at an elevated, open space with good airflow helps prevent dust buildup. We also want to avoid placing computers in closets due to lack of airflow, a compute needs good airflow to keep it cool.

• Placing your computer away from a window or AC helps protect it from elements of nature like sunlight and rain.

• For computers located in a podium, due to lack of airflow in the closet, users have to keep the podium doors open whenever the computer is in use.

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Windows 8 Let’s recap on some of the new features in Windows 8 as it is now SIU’s standard operating system for most desktop computers.

• Start button

If you're just getting started with Microsoft's newest operating system, these tips and tricks will turn you into an 8.1 wizard in no time at all. For starters let’s take a look at the new Start button

With Windows 8.1 Microsoft has added back a modified version of the old familiar Start button, but it doesn’t work quite like the Windows 7 Start button.

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• Turning off Windows If you simply click the Windows 8.1 Start Button, it does not produce a pop up menu. Instead you’re taken directly to the Live Tile interface. So follow a few quick tips to make the most of this feature.

o Hover over the Start Button.

o Right-click using a mouse, this will produce a pop-up screen.

o Hovering over Shut Down opens an additional and familiar pop-up that allows you to put your PC to sleep, shut it down, or restart it.

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• Burn a CD or DVD in Windows 8

o Log on to Widows 8 computer with your user account.

o Insert a blank CD or DVD is inserted into the CD/DVD optical media drive.

o If not in desktop mode, click Desktop tile form the Start screen to go to the desktop.

o Once on the desktop screen, click File Explorer icon from the taskbar.

o Click Computer one the left pane.

o On Computer window, under Devices with Removable Storage category, double-click the optical media drive on which a blank CD or DVD is inserted.

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o On the displayed Burn a Disc box, type the appropriate title for the disc in Disc title field.

o Click to select With a CD/DVD player radio button, and click next.

o On the opened window, copy the desired contents from the hard disk that are to be added, and paste them to the blank CD/DVD window.

o Once added, right-click on the white area.

o From the displayed context menu, click Burn to disc.

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o On the opened Burn to Disc box, select the appropriate burning speed from the Recording speed drop-down list.

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o Once done, click Next to start the burning process.

o Click Finish when done.

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Managing Spam Identifying Spam

o Who is it from?

o Look for links.

Only click links from trusted senders. The entire purpose of spam is to get you to click a link. If an email contains a link and you don’t recognize the sender, chances are it is spam. Hover your mouse over any link to see the destination in your browser or email client’s status bar.

• Check the spelling.

Spam often contains misspellings and oddly-worded sentences. This can include bizarre capitalization and weird punctuation. Many have gibberish at the end of the message.

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• Read the message. Anything that claims you are a winner for a contest you never entered, offers you access to unclaimed money, or promises free electronics or pills is ever legitimate. Any message that asks for your password is never real (all legitimate websites have automated password reset programs). Requests from strangers should always be ignored.

• Look for attachments. Malware and viruses are often disguised as email attachments. Never download an attachment from a sender that you do not trust or were not expecting.

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Preventing Spam

• Don’t give out your email address online. “Bots” (scripts created to scrape websites for addresses) can quickly gather thousands of emails at a time from websites where the email addresses are made public. Also, sometimes humans actually grab e-mails off websites to use them for sign-up offers in order to get free stuff (iPods, Ringtones, Televisions, etc.).

• Make your email address unscan-able. If you must provide contact information, try writing it out in creative ways (me [at] siu [dot] edu). There are alternative ways of displaying your e-mail address while making it hard for spam bots to harvest it. Such methods include using image picture of your e-mail address or using JavaScript to dynamically construct the display of your email. Don’t make your username the same as your email address. Usernames are almost always public, and it’s simply a matter of figuring out the correct service to add at the end. Services such as Gmail make this even easier, since chances are everyone using it has a @gmail.com email address.

me [at] siu [dot] edu

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• Never respond to spam.

Replying or clicking the “Unsubscribe” link will only generate more spam, because they now know that the email address is valid. It is best to report and delete the spam.

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• Blocking and Reporting Spam

o Report it.

Once you identify an email as spam, it is best to report it by marking it as “junk” as shown below.

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• Delete it.

If you receive spam from the same sender multiple times, it is best to “delete” it.

• Blocking spam in Outlook. Outlook comes installed with a Junk Filter which is set to Low protection. This will catch most obvious spam and direct it to the Junk folder. You can increase the strength of the filter by clicking the Home tab and then clicking Junk. Select “Junk E-mail Options”. Click the Options tab and set the filter to the strength you want. Each level of filter strength is explained. Setting it to high may move legitimate emails to your Junk folder, so be sure to check it periodically. For more information, please visit the following SIU link:

http://oit.siu.edu/infosecurity/training-awareness/spam-scam-advice.php

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Avoiding viruses

• Avoid clicking on everything

There are thousands of banner ads and popups on the internet that are designed to get your attention and make you click. Due to the way most modern browsers work, there are very few ways for you to get infected with something online UNLESS you click on it yourself. This means you should avoid clicking on banners for offers that are too good to be true

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• Beware of misleading popups.

Some of the most nefarious popups on the internet are designed to mimic the look of legitimate anti-virus software. These popups attempt to trick the user into thinking their antivirus software has found an infection. When you click the popup, however, the adware is actually installed.

Instead of clicking the warning, close the popup window and open the antivirus program on your computer. You most likely will not see any warnings. If you are still worried, run a scan using your installed software.

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• Don't go where you're not supposed to.

As viruses are illegal, they thrive on other illegal sites. Avoid sites that let you download copyrighted content or other illegal communities. File sharing is a quick way to get infected files. You will find that your computer is much less prone to infection if you avoid things you shouldn't be doing.

Besides viruses from files you download, many of these sites will have a litany of annoying popups and misleading advertisements. All of these could lead to virus and spyware infection.

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• Be selective with your downloads

There are programs available for nearly every task you can think of, but ask yourself if you really need the program that you are about to download. Do a little research about your task; you may find that you already have a program capable of what you want to do. Downloading extra programs for every task you want to complete increases the likelihood that you'll download something malicious. Download from trusted locations only. If you are downloading a program or other piece of software, it is always advisable to try to download it from the developer's site as opposed to a download service. Many of these services install their own download managers, and can infect your browser with adware.

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• Scan your downloaded files.

If you have an antivirus program installed, you should make a habit of scanning files that you've downloaded from unknown locations. Most antivirus programs allow you to immediately scan specific files by right-clicking on the file and selecting your antivirus from the list of options.

• Always scan ZIP files as these often contain multiple files in one archive.

• Email programs will often scan your email files for viruses automatically, but you should still scan any downloaded files with your own antivirus program.

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• Be careful with USB drives.

USB drives are a popular vehicle for virus transmissions, usually without the owner being aware at all. You could get an infection just by inserting the USB drive, or could get your USB drive infected by plugging it into a public computer. Try to use other methods for file sharing, such as online storage or email to send files.

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Data backup

• How important or sensitive is the data on your computer?

The importance of data can go a long way toward helping you determine if you need to back it up—as well as when and how it should be backed up. For sensitive data, you’ll need to back up the data regularly and ensure that the data can be recovered easily.

• How often does the data change The frequency of change can affect your decision on how often the data should be backed up. For example, data that changes daily should be backed up daily.

• Do you have the equipment to perform backups? You must have backup hardware to perform backups. Backup hardware includes optical drives, and removable disk drives. Additionally, you can also store backed up data on your Network Drive.

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• External Media

o Use an external USB flash/hard drive (or) burn your data on a CD/DVD.

o Get a USB flash drive / hard drive (or) Optical media.

o Copy all files from your computer to a

folder called “Backup” in your external memory

o Keep copying your data into this folder at

scheduled intervals.

o If you have the space, save old backups. If not, choose “Move and replace” when Windows prompts you with the file exists at destination error

o Burn your data onto a CD/DVD. Once you burn a disk, you may not edit/change

its contents later. This way you keep every copy of your back up.

o Typically DVDs come with a maximum capacity of 8.5GB (dual layer DVD, regular DVD holds 4.7GB) so if you have a lot of data, you might want to consider external USB storage

Note: Optical media has a finite lifespan.

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• Network drives

Use a network drive to store your data online and have it available everywhere.

1) SIU faculty and staff have network drives; they show up as one of your drives with the icon shown above. Note: network drives are only accessible on SIU computers.

2) You can transfer data into this drive/folder; anything you put in this folder will be available via other computers with this drive mapped on it.

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Locked out?

If you are locked out of your computer or have forgotten your network ID/Email password, go to https://netid.siu.edu/

Click on the ‘Claim Account with Dawgtag Number’ button.

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• Accept User Policy

Check the ‘I accept’ box and click - Next.

• Persona information

Enter your information and click – Next.

You will

now be prompted to enter a new password.

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Computer information Various methods of how users can check the amount of RAM installed and other system information details, such as the Operating system installed, and it’s activation status.

• PC’s – Windows 8

o Press the Windows key or the Start button

• This PC

o Type “This PC” o And Right click, and click on

‘Properties’

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• System

This top area information about your Operating system, Computer’s processor and amount of RAM installed.

This area contains information about your operating system’s activation status. It should always state ‘Windows is activated”.

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• PC’s – Windows 7 Press the Windows key or the Start button

• Computer

Right Click on ‘Computer’ and click on ‘Properties’

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• System

This top area information about your Operating system, Computer’s processor and amount of RAM installed. This area contains information about your operating system’s activation status. It should always state ‘Windows is activated”.

• MAC’s

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• About This Mac Go to the Apple menu and select ‘About This Mac’

• More Info…

o Click on ‘More Info…’

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• Model

o This screen shows your Mac’s model and misc. information.

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• Hardware This area contains information about your Mac’s Model, Operating system version, Processor information and amount of RAM installed.

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Strong passwords Passwords provide the first line of defense against unauthorized access to your computer and email. The stronger your password, the more protected your data will be from hackers and malicious software. It is recommended to have a strong password for all of your computer and email accounts

Tips for creating a strong password:

A strong password:

• Is at least 16 characters in length? • Does not contain your user name, real name, or company name. • Is significantly different from previous passwords. • Contains characters from each of the following four categories

Uppercase letters A, B, C Lowercase letters a, b, c

Numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 One or more special

characters ~ ! + -

{ } [ ] . ? * _

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Creating a strong password

• A password might meet all the criteria above and still be a weak password. For example, Hello2U! meets all the criteria for a strong password listed above, but is still weak because it contains a complete word. H3ll0 2 U! is a stronger alternative because it replaces some of the letters in the complete word with numbers and also includes spaces.

Help yourself remember your strong password by following these tips:

• Think of a sentence

• Add complexity

• Utilize special characters

o Create an acronym from an easy-to-remember piece of information. For example, pick a phrase that is meaningful to you, such as My son's birthday is 12 December, 2004. Using that phrase as your guide, you might use Msbi12/Dec,4 for your password.

o Substitute numbers, symbols, and misspellings for letters or words in an easy-to-remember phrase. For example, My son's birthday is 12 December, 2004 could become Mi$un's Brthd8iz 12124 (it's OK to use spaces in your password).

o Relate your password to a favorite hobby or sport. For example, I love to play

badminton could become ILuv2PlayB@dm1nt()n.

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