Why You Need To Clean Your Windows Registry?

Registry is the database where data of programs and windows is stored. Registry cleaner is software, used to run your computer faster and smoother. Registry cleaning is very important for a smooth running of your computer system. Whenever you delete a file form your system, the registry does not remove this data. Thus, a reference to the deleted file remains in the registry. Gradually as the registry gets filled up with these databases, the computer gets slower and slower in its functioning. If the registry is not cleaned up regularly, severe damage can be caused to your computer. A registry cleaner scans the windows and finds out the outdated and incorrect information stored in your computer’s registry. The software fixes this improper information enabling your system to be error free and run faster. The software is enabled with advanced features that make your computer run smoothly and efficiently. Registry cleaning makes your computer run very quickly and also safely. There are many advantages for registry cleaning. Your computer will have a cleaned up registry and no information in the registry will be cluttered. You can regain the lost disk space and use this for installing new software. Registry cleaning will also block the installation of spyware and adware in your computer. If your computer was having any application errors, you can see that this has been fixed after you clean up your registry. Your system will be maintained as it was in its initial stages and you can also understand your computer much better. If you do not clean up your computer’s registry timely, you can face different types of problem while using the computer. When you are in the midst of doing important work related activity, your computer can suddenly crash or the system can get stalled all of sudden. This can have damaging impact on your work. Timely cleaning up and fixing of the registry will prevent you from facing such crisis. There are different kinds of registry cleaner available. You can use the best registry cleaner available in the market to maintain the registry of your computer. Keeping your PC clean is very important if you want it to run efficiently all the time. The registry cleaner software will help you in repairing some applications that are not working in your computer. The software uses speed detection techniques to very quickly identify the missing and invalid reference from your windows registry. After identifying the problems, the software with the use of its advanced technology can easily clean your registry. After this your computer will start functioning, like a new PC. After installing the software you can customize its different options according to the requirements of your computer. Many online sites provide registry cleaner software for its customers. Before you buy a registry cleaner, make sure that you are aware about its different features. This will help you in customizing the features of the software according to the needs of your computer. Buy the best registry cleaner that is available for your computer.

Identity Theft - Is The Internet A Major Factor?

Identity theft – also known as ID theft, identity fraud and ID fraud – describes a type of fraud where a criminal adopts someone else’s identity in order to profit illegally. It is one of the fastest growing forms of fraud in many developed countries. In the UK identity theft is increasing at the rate of 500ach year and, according to Which Magazine, 25f the population have either suffered from identity theft or know someone who has. In the USA, a report issued by the Better Business Bureau revealed that, in 2004, over 9 million Americans became victims of identity theft with the total sum defrauded being $52.6 billion. With figures like this, it’s no surprise that there is a certain amount of concern regarding computer and internet security. After all, the internet is basically a mechanism for exchanging information and the possibility that some of the information exchanged may be more than intended is never far from many internet user’s minds. It’s easy to imagine criminal masterminds worldwide using the internet to hack into computers in order to gain access to information with which to advance their devilishly cunning schemes. However, as revealed in the report, the facts of the matter are a little more down to earth and the internet, far from making you more at risk to identity theft, can help to significantly cut your losses if you do fall victim this form of fraud. According to the Better Business Bureau’s research the main methods by which criminals gain access to information used for identity theft fraud are as below: Lost or stolen wallet, chequebook or credit card. 28.8Ú Accessed as part of a transaction. 12.9­Accessed by friend, acquaintance or relative. 11.4Ú Don't know, refused, no answer. 11.1Ú Information accessed by corrupt employee. 8.7Ú Stolen paper mail or fraudulent change of address. 8.0Ú Obtained some other way. 7.4Ú Computer spyware. 5.2Ú Information stolen from garbage. 2.6Ú Computer viruses and/or hackers. 2.2Ú Emails sent by criminals posing as legitimate business. 1.7Ú * 12.9 ue to transactions – 10.4ffline transactions, 2.5nline transactions. In total, when the instances where information was accessed during transactions are subdivided into online and offline transactions, only 11.6f the information used to carry out identity theft fraud was obtained from computers. Of this more than half was obtained by the use of spyware, viruses or hacking – the risk of which can be greatly reduced by installing the appropriate protection software and ensuring that this is kept up to date. Not only did the survey reveal that the internet was not a major source of illegally obtained personal information, but it was also found that those fraud victims who checked their financial records using the internet, ATM machines or other electronic methods suffered financial losses which were, on average, 8 times lower than those of victims who used traditional paper statements to monitor their accounts. This very significant reduction was attributed to the rapid discovery of the fraud due to “real time” monitoring. Of course, that’s not to say that you shouldn’t exercise caution when using the internet or take care to protect the personal information which you may have stored on your PC. However, as long as you install suitable virus, firewall and spyware protection, and keep this continually updated the internet can should be more of a help than a hindrance when it comes to avoiding identity fraud.

How To Stop Spyware From Robbing You

Spyware elimination software is designed to detect and eliminate spyware. A large number of spyware elimination software products are available. Some of them are available as freeware and some as shareware. Shareware can be used for a specified period, usually 30 days. One must evaluate and compare the features of different spyware elimination software products before selecting one. Some of the features of an effective spyware elimination software product are: * It should give a list of detected spyware, to enable users to allow them to decide, about which ones they want to delete. * Auto update ensures that the software automatically downloads the latest spyware definition file. * Auto scheduling means that the system is scanned for spyware at defined intervals automatically. * The "undo" facility allows the user to remedy accidental deletion of useful files. * The product should provide real-time protection. It should prevent installation of spyware, instead of just deleting it when it is detected. * The software should be effective in detecting and deleting, the different types of spyware. * The product should be easy to download, install, navigate and use. * Product support ensures that there is someone you can call or e-mail, whenever you have a problem. * The right spyware elimination software will ensure your privacy and keep your computer free of advertisements. Some of the most popular spyware elimination software products are: Spyware Eliminator, Spyware Doctor, MS AntiSpyware, McAfee, Pest Patrol, Spy Sweeper, Counterspy, Ad-Aware, Spybot Search & Destroy etc. The most popular personal firewalls include McAfee Firewall, Norman Firewall, Windows Firewall, Surf Secret, Sygate Firewall, Zone Alarm, Outpost Pro, and Norton Firewall etc. Spyware Eliminator Spyware Eliminator is one of the most popular spyware elimination software products. It also provides you with anti-virus and anti-Spam capability and prevents malicious software from entering your PC. It gives users specific threat recommendations and its consumer ware facility identifies legitimate ad ware companies and their software. The user then has the option to delete this software or to keep it. Spyware Eliminator is particularly effective in dealing with cleverly concealed, self re-generating spyware and adware. =========================================================== Click to find a daily updated blog of articles and news about spyware ! Get advice and information about how to protect your computer from attack, and disinfect it.. Click http://www.spyware-101.com/

Alexa: Why You Should Be Using The Toolbar.

Why on earth would anyone want to install a piece of spyware onto their Web browser? No sensible right minded person would …unless you are a webmaster and you want to improve your SERPS ranking that is. The Alexa toolbar is not “technically” spyware as it doesn’t retrieve any private or personal information. It does however log all the sites you visit and as webmasters we can use this to our advantage. It uses this information to compile traffic ranking statistics and a relational list. The relational list is very useful as it shows what other sites people who have looked the current website have also visited. Alexa is owned by Amazon and it is possible to make your own Alexa toolbar with your Amazon affiliate code included. You can then place this on your site and get credited when anyone buys through Amazon using the Amazon button on the toolbar you’ve distributed, it is also possible to include a link to your site in the toolbar. Alexa ranks sites from 1 to 5,000,000 and sometimes higher. Ranking 1 has the most traffic and so on, anything below 250,000 and you should be getting some decent traffic levels. This information can be used to determine how well your advertising campaigns are going and how traffic levels are growing over a period of time. This information can also be used to determine how you rivals are doing and keep you one step ahead of them. The Alexa information is also picked up by other search engines so you benefit from an increase in you SERPS as your site progresses up the rankings . One drawback of the Alexa toolbar is that it only works on Internet Explorer and not the tool of choice for most webmasters Firefox. However I personally feel this is a small price to pay for the benefits I get when using the tool bar for research and to check my sites daily. Checking the stats of your own site has a positive impact on your Alexa ranking as the toolbar is not generally used by the general public so every extra hit from a browser with the tool bar installed is valuable. I have 1 site that is almost exclusively used by webmasters , As webmasters are the people who use Alexa more than any other group 500 page views a day are enough to get this site into the top 500,000 Another site that has 3 times the traffic but the visitors are mostly the general public so this site is languishing in the 2,000,000 ‘s. Why not try an experiment for a month, Download the toolbar and monitor one of your sites, once you see the data you get and the way it can be used you won’t know how you survived without i

Recognizing a PC with Malware

What can you do if you think your computer is affected by spyware or a virus or other malware? (Malware is short for malicious software.) First let me assure you that you aren't in this alone. There are excellent resources and community sites dedicated to helping dig people out of the mess that malware can make. Many of them are free and I'll point you to them in this column. I'll also explain how to recognize if your computer has malware running on it and point you to antivirus programs and anti-spyware tools to help you get rid of it. And I'll describe how to use recovery options that help get your PC back to working the way it's supposed to. And, finally, I'll talk about "The Last Resort"-rebuilding your PC from scratch. How to recognize malware Malware is designed to run undetected in the background. So how can you tell if you have undesirable software on your system? The signs to look for include: • Advertising pop-ups that appear every few seconds. • Extra toolbars in your browser that won't go away. • Browser going to sites you didn't tell it to go to. • Browser settings changing so your home page won't open. • Unexplained system slowdowns. • Sudden rise in computer crashes. If you're experiencing these kinds of problems, it's a good idea to treat your PC as if it might be infected by checking it out thoroughly. Although there are other reasons why your system might slow down or frequently crash, if you're noticing these obvious indications of malware, your system has probably been compromised. It's time to take defensive action. Update antivirus programs The first step in any attempt to repair or recover a compromised PC is to update your defensive tools. Your antivirus or anti-spyware tools need to be updated to the absolute latest versions and the most recent definition files. If you can do this on the PC that has the problem, then do it there. If not, you'll need to use another PC to download the latest versions and put them on a CD or USB drive that you can use to work on the infected PC. I like the USB drive because it's highly portable and easy to update if you need to. And everything you'll need will fit easily on a 128-MB USB drive. Gather your original software CDs and disks as well, including your original Windows CD and the Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) CD. You may need them before this is over, and it's good to get everything organized and ready before you start. Windows XP SP2 provides better protection against viruses, hackers, and worms. If you don't have a copy of the Windows XP SP2 CD, you should borrow one from a friend, order SP2 on a CD, or download the Network Install and copy it to a CD. If you don't already have an antivirus program running on your computer, you'll find a number of companies offering antivirus software and firewall protection programs, among them: • Computer Associates (http://www.ca.com) • F-secure (http://www.f-secure.com/protectyourpc/) • McAfee (http://www.mcafee.com) • Panda Software (http://www.pandasoftware.com/microsoft/english.htm) • Symantec (http://www.symantec.com) • Trend Micro (http://www.trendmicro.com) • Grisoft (free for home users - http://www.grisoft.com/doc/40/lng/us/tpl/tpl01) Important: Uninstall any antivirus software you are currently using before installing a new product; having two different programs might cause problems on your computer. Typically, these software companies make special offers of free trial versions of their antivirus and firewall packages, which should be enough to get you through this process. But to help avoid being back in this mess again, you'll want to choose one of them and get a full subscription to it so you stay up to date. If you still have good working Internet connectivity, you can also use one of the excellent, free, online virus scanners. My favorite and one of the best is Panda Software's Panda Free Online Scanner (http://www.pandasoftware.com/activescan/com/activescan_principal.htm). One of the most annoying and difficult to remove pieces of unwanted software is Cool Web Search and its variants. To remove this, you're best bet is CWShredder, a dedicated program that just goes after this. You'll also need a good anti-spyware product that can help you with the detection and removal of spyware or other malware. Here, one is good and two or more are sometimes better. They don't interfere with each other, generally, and they each seem to have slightly different strengths. The two I use regularly and recommend are Spybot search & destroy (http://www.safer-networking.org/microsoft.en.html) and Computer Associates PestPatrol 5. There is new anti-spyware software from Microsoft, which is in beta testing now and holds some promise as well. (Beta software is pre-release software that is distributed for feedback and testing purposes.) The Microsoft product is a security technology that helps you detect and remove known spyware from your PC. It also helps prevent spyware from getting on your computer in the first place. I've been using it and really like the way it works, but because it's a beta version, it won't be the right choice for everyone until the final release. For one thing, Microsoft doesn't provide technical support for beta releases. Although formal support is not offered for this beta, you can go to the newsgroups to help get your questions answered. Finally, it's a good idea to have a couple of other programs available. LSPFix and WinSock XP Fix can help restore your Internet connection if the cleanup process messes that up. Back up critical files If you can, now would be a really good time to back up critical files you'd hate to lose. Don't try to back up programs or the operating system-there's no point since they may be compromised and can be replaced. But those pictures of your daughter's wedding, your résumé, and your doctoral thesis-those are irreplaceable. Please, copy them somewhere safe, since anything you do to remove this kind of malicious software is serious and could leave your PC in a state where it might be difficult to recover or save your critical files. Where or what you copy them to doesn't really much matter. A CD or DVD if you've got the hardware and software to do that, or a Zip disk, or just plain old floppy disks will work. But whatever medium you use, having a backup will give you the confidence to attack this malicious software without fear of losing something critical. Ed Bott's Windows XP Backup Made Easy (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/setup/learnmore/bott_03july14.mspx) explains how to let Windows XP do most of the backup work. Scan and remove Once you have your defensive programs ready, located your original CDs and DVDs, and made a backup of your critical data files, it's time to start figuring out exactly what you have on your system that shouldn't be there. But before you start, disable System Restore. The last thing you'd want to do is restore to this point anyway, and this will prevent versions of the noxious software from being saved in the restore point. To disable System Restore 1. Click Start, right-click My Computer, and then click Properties. 2. On the System Restore tab, select the Turn off System Restore box, and click OK. The first step should be to try the obvious. Use Add/Remove Programs in Control Panel for programs that shouldn't be there and try to uninstall them first. Some of the annoying adware programs will actually uninstall and stay uninstalled so you might as well get rid of them first. Next I scan for conventional viruses. Use the antivirus software that you downloaded and updated or one of the online scanners if you're still online. Deal with anything it finds, either by deleting or cleaning as appropriate. Microsoft offers a Malicious Software Removal Tool (http://www.microsoft.com/security/malwareremove/default.mspx) that is updated on the first Tuesday of each month. This tool checks computers running Windows XP, Windows 2000, and Windows Server 2003 for infections by specific, prevalent malicious software-including Blaster, Sasser, and Mydoom-and helps remove any infection found. When you're done, it's time to disconnect from the Internet. Unplug the network connection or disconnect the modem. Next, run CWShredder. Although it only deals with a single (but pervasive) problem, many of the Cool Web Search variants can prevent the other anti-spyware programs from doing their job correctly, so it's best to go after this one first. Now it's time to run the anti-spyware scanners. It doesn't really matter what order you run them in, but be prepared for a fairly lengthy list of things to deal with. Initially, I'd ignore any that are described as cookies-they're low on our list of concerns for now. But everything that looks like a program or that they report as a critical issue should be quarantined or deleted. Running in safe mode One recommendation that some experts make is to run your antivirus and anti-spyware scans and cleanup in safe mode. Some problems that can hide from these programs in normal user mode are exposed in safe mode. Other experts disagree and suggest that there is little difference. I'm of the school that thinks it can't hurt, so I suggest you try running your scans first from a normal boot, but when you've done all you can from there, start in safe mode and try running the scans again. To start in safe mode 1. Click Start, click Shut Down, click Restart from the list, and then click OK. 2. While your computer is starting, press the F8 key until the Windows Advanced Options Menu appears. 3. Select Safe Mode and press ENTER as needed. For more on safe mode and the options available in the Windows Advanced Options Menu, see a Description of the Safe Mode Boot Options in Windows XP at http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315222. Finally, when you're done fixing everything and you think you've got it all, I think it's wise to install or reinstall Windows XP Service Pack 2. Now turn on Windows Firewall, turn on System Restore, and you can connect your PC back to the Internet. Before you do anything else, go to the Windows Update site (http://update.microsoft.com) and download all of the latest security fixes. Then, turn on Automatic Updates to make sure you stay up to date. Getting help Removing undesirable software can be a daunting task. But as I said in the beginning, you're not in this alone. There are a wealth of resources available to you at every stage of the process. I can't begin to list them all, but some that I know about are the following: • Microsoft Security Help and Support-the support is free for security problems and getting help removing malware is definitely a security problem: Located at http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/gp/securityhome. • Microsoft Security Home Users Newsgroup-good place to start, with a wealth of users and MVPs responding to your queries 24 hours a day: Located at http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?dg=microsoft.public.security.homeusers&cat=en_us_d06efcb7-0e61-00 ed-6e0f-a86481b6aa20〈=en&cr=us. • Broadband Reports Online Security Community Forum-an excellent resource for really persistent and difficult problems, with help from Microsoft MVPs and other users: Located at http://www.broadbandreports.com/forum/security. • SpywareInfo Forums-excellent help and fast responses: Located at http://forums.spywareinfo.com/. • AumHa Forums-a great resource for a wide variety of Windows problems, run and staffed by Microsoft MVPs: Located at http://forum.aumha.org/.

Your Hard Drive is Going to Explode – Why a UPS is Essential

It's most peoples worst computing nightmare. You wake up in the morning, flip on the computer, and it doesn't boot. Sometimes the problem rears its ugly head as a horrific clacking noise. Other times it simply gives a read error. At this point, most people panic. The first thing you wonder is whether or not the data is recoverable. There is no universal answer to this. In some cases, a simple scan with some data recovery software is all that it takes to retrieve the contents of the drive. In other cases, if you want it badly enough, it will take thousands of dollars and a shipment of the drive to a clean lab where they will pull the platters inside of the drive and access them that way. Now you're probably wondering if there's a way to prevent this from happening. Well, you're in luck. Getting a UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) is the very best and most effective way to prevent your data from pulling a disappearing act. While it is not fool-proof, having something that regulates the electricity flowing into your computer can reduce the risk of a drive failure by up to 70%. This figure goes up to around 90% if the computer is being used while in an electrical storm. (My computer repair business always gets a little boost after a thunderstorm, courtesy of the lightning wreaking havoc on people's hard drives.) Don't just run out and get any UPS. You want to get an intelligent one. The "intelligent" UPS will regulate the power without having to hit the battery every time the voltage takes a dip which greatly improves battery longevity. They also include options to hook the power supply up to your computer via a serial or USB port so you can monitor what the power is doing. This also gives the option to allow for a soft shut-down if the power goes out and you are away from your desk. You can get an Uninterruptible Power Supply at most computer stores. Best Buy carries a fairly wide selection of them. As for brands, I've personally used APC with much success. Opti-UPS is another excellent brand. In fact, I have an Opti that is 6 years old and still works fine, although the batteries now have no life to them. (That's to be expected. Rechargeable batteries only last so long) Now that you know of the importance of a UPS I would strongly encourage you to invest in one. It is far better to spend $100 now on some preventative maintenance than having to spend much more later on data recovery.