This involves going to a computer you trust that is well protected, and downloading the installation files for the anti-virus program that you will install on your new computer.

Then you can copy the anti-virus installation files to the new machine, install anti-virus, and then connect to the Internet so your new computer can get patches, etc.

Of course, if the old computer that you use to download the files is infected, there is a good chance that the new computer will catch that virus too – so be sure you trust the old computer.

Please forward this to everyone you know who might otherwise be tempted to connect a new computer to the internet before installing anti-virus first.

The post Protect Yourself: Do Not Connect a New Computer to the Internet appeared first on Foster Institute.

Note: This blog is written for non-technical executives. So, if this sounds too technical, that’s fine, just skip the rest and know your computers can, in theory, be protected even when a user opens a malicious attachment or downloads a malicious file.

The experience would be that, when a user needs to open five PDF documents, you could temporarily give that user five new computers. One computer to use for each opened attachment or downloaded document.

If one of the files contains ransomware, the infection would be isolated to just one of the computers, and would not affect the user’s normal computer, nor your network.

Instead of you needing to buy more computers to loan to your team members, what happens is that a brand new tiny Windows Operating System gets created automatically, for each attached or downloaded file.

A product called Bromium is designed to do this, and Microsoft has something more basic called WDAG. Bromium only sold to companies with 500 or more computers, but will be offering services to smaller companies, and is even shipping free on some laptops soon. Your IT professionals can get a free copy now at Bromium dot com forward slash freebeta to experiment with this micro virtualization.

There was so much to see at the RSA Security convention last week. I’ll be sharing some of the more interesting technologies with you over the next few weeks.

We do not receive any kind of compensation for mentioning products. Nor are we endorsing the products. It just helps for you to hear about these neat technologies.

Please forward this to your friends who are concerned about users opening attachments and downloaded files.

The post Protect Against Bad Attachments and Employee Downloads appeared first on Foster Institute.

Yesterday, someone told me their security was good since they only get infected by a few viruses each year.

Even a single infection means there is a possibility that their machines are already infected.

If one virus can get in, other undetectable viruses can too.

Unless security protections are very poor on a network or computer, visible virus infections are rare these days.

People who see virus infections need to act, including patching their Internet facing applications and enabling click-to-play. Those features already come with Windows and applications so there is nothing to buy or download. For more information, see foster institute dot come slash blog.

If you know someone whose computers on their network catch viruses, tell them the viruses are more like chest pain, not like the common cold. Infections are the sign of some greater damage that is about to, or already has, occurred.

The post Only One Virus is a Huge Problem appeared first on Foster Institute.

Every time you answer, they state, “You do not understand what I am telling you – your computer is infected!”

If you transfer them to your IT Pro, they will keep telling him, “The computer is infected. Go turn it on and let me take control of the computer to remove the virus.”

When your IT Pro tells the caller that they aren’t fooling anyone, the bogus tech person will call the worker back again.

If you ask the caller what company they work for, they give names like GoTechs247, or HS Info Technology, etc. There are even websites that look real but the phone numbers lead nowhere.

Make your workers aware and tell them to keep hanging up, over and over, because those guys won’t let up. Make sure your spouse and kids know too.

Once you, or members of your team, give hackers control over a computer, the attacker can use that machine for whatever they want. Steal your sensitive data, launch attacks from your machine against other companies, store illegal material, and the list goes on. All the while, your company looks like the culprit.

Some of you already know that the US Postal Service just announced they were breached as well. One of the differences between big and small companies is that the big companies usually find out that they’ve been breached.

Tell everyone you know to ignore those phone calls from “tech support” forever. If it was your real IT pros, they would have fixed the problem already.

Please post your comments below…

The post A Caller Says Your Computer Is Infected appeared first on Foster Institute.

One big problem with Shellshock is that it is very easy for attackers to exploit a system. They tell a system, “Here is a program. Run it.”

Apple has not, as of now, released a patch for OSX. There is a new patch for Linux, but it does not completely fix the problem.

As an executive, even if you have limited IT experience, you can go to Google and enter this search phrase:
filetype:sh inurl:cgi-bin site:fosterinstitute.com
(replace Foster Institute’s web site with your own actual website)

Hopefully, Google will tell you that the search did not match any documents. However, either way, it is still possible you are vulnerable. Ask your IT Pros to make sure your web server does not use Linux.

Please forward this to everyone that you know if you want to help him or her be secure against the ShellShock vulnerability!

The rest of this document is more technical, intended for your IT Pros.

There is a patch, but the patch only solves part of the problem. To see if the patch is in place, you can execute the bash command:
env x='() { :;}; echo vulnerable’ bash -c “echo patch this system”
There will be an error message anyway, but if you do see the words “patch this system” displayed as output, then the patch hasn’t been applied.

Even after you apply the patch, as of the time of this blog posting, your system is still vulnerable. To demonstrate, issue this command:

env X='() { (a)=>\’ bash -c “echo date”

You will see error messages similar to:
bash: X: line 1: syntax error near unexpected token `=’
bash: X: line 1: `’
bash: error importing function definition for `X’
Then, to find out if you are vulnerable, look at the contents of the file echo by issuing the command:
cat echo
If the response shows the date, then you are vulnerable:
Fri Sep 26 02:07:16 UTC 2014

To learn more reference CVE-2014-6271 and CVE-2014-7169

Please post your comments below…

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