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Be vigilant when you browse online

14 February 2012

Be vigilant when you use the browser/s on your computer.

ISD Banking and shopping online can make life easier and more convenient but can cost more than you bargained for.

A recent write piece by BBC Technology  explains that on-line banking is a huge target at the moment and how Anti-Virus products cannot always tell you that your machine has been compromised.

Anti-virus applications

You must make sure that your machine has a working and up-to-date Anti-Virus application running, plus a Firewall installed and turned on. F-Secure and Sophos both have a Firewall option; using Windows own firewall is not adequate.

UCL licensed Anti-Virus applications are available from the UCL Software Repository.

It's not just PCs! Macs should have their firewall turned on (it is usually turned off by default on new systems) and Macs should also have an up-to-date Anti-Virus product installed. Use your Anti-Virus and run scans on your machine a few times a month (once a week is best practice).

Log-in passwords

If a website/form is asking for your account details/password, look at it properly to make sure it is genuine. Don't automatically input your details.

Be careful when going to websites that you need to log into from emailed links and remember that no member of UCL staff (or any reputable business) should ever ask you for your log-in password nor ask you to send your password by email - any email or phone call or form sent by email that does, should be considered a scam.

Our UCL Computer Security training is online (there is also an interactive game to help to learn to identify phishing emails):

Use Firefox as your web browser

UCL Computer Security Team prefers using Firefox as a browser.

Version10 of Firefox and Chrome, both have 'safe browsing'. We also use the Firefox addon called 'noscript'. This allows you to view websites with or without scripts (Javascript and flash) running and stop pop up windows as well.

We  would recommend that you make time to watch the recent episode of BBC's Click and learn what to look out for when banking and shopping online:

UCL Computer Security Team