Links to sites that are useful or just interesting —
All links are unpaid and unsolicited*,
Black Hills Computer Consulting, Inc. has no financial interest in any of the sites or products listed.
Best Practices for Securing Your Home Network is a Cybersecurity Information Sheet from the National Security Agency (NSA). It is a downloadable pdf.
A Defensive Computing Checklist by Michael Horowitz. This is a list of both things to be aware of and specific defensive steps that we can take in response to the common threats of 2019. No list like this can ever be complete, nor would anyone want it to be complete as that list would never end. I tried to limit this to the most important issues, still its long (25,000 words). It is always being updated.
Debunking worthless “security” practices. We tear down some infosec conventional wisdom—there's a lot of bad advice out there.
Half of all Phishing Sites Now Have the Padlock. The green padlock does NOT signify safe or legimate.
Why you REALLY DO need to have online accounts for banking, ISP, Social Security, US Postal Service, IRS, etc.
Internet of Things (IoT) device(s) can and are being used to attack other sites/services around the world. Hacked Cameras, DVRs Powered Today’s Massive Internet Outage and IoT Devices as Proxies for Cybercrime.
Malwarebytes Unpacked has a good article on Tech Support Scams – Help & Resource Page
CryptoLocker is really nasty malware. The Guardian has a good story here, and The Register has another one here.
Are YOU exposed to the UPnP vulnerability? Check at GRC using the Shields UP! test. To test your exposure go to GRC, click the Proceed button and then click on "GRC's Instant UPnP Exposure Test".
General security information:
Tools for a Safer PC — Krebs on Security
The Scrap Value of a Hacked PC, Revisited — Krebs on Security
Excellent article on how easy it is to crack even "good" passwords: Anatomy of a hack: How crackers ransack passwords like “qeadzcwrsfxv1331”
Good passwords are now more important than ever before - Learn how to make a great password
Get a high quality password: GRC's Ultra High Security Password Generator
Gibson Research - a variety of tools and information to help make your computer more secure
Gibson Research - Shield's Up! - a good test of how secure your connection is to the internet. Now tests UPnP exposure.
Gibson Research - Security Now! - podcasts of Steve Gibson discussing security issues with Leo Laporte.
Check the standards compliance of web pages - W3C Markup Validation Service
Why Bouncing Spam and/or Viruses is a bad idea
DSL Reports - useful information about DSL and cable, including speed tests
Speedtest.net - good site to test your internet speeds to different servers around the world.
Are your download speed issues with your wifi? Possibly the channel you are using is congested. This article might help: How to Find the Best Wi-Fi Channel for Your Router: A Step-by-Step Guide
Maybe a website loading speed isn't a client side problem but is a problem at the host. dotcom-monitor.com has a variety of tools to monitor the performance of your website from different locations around the world.
InfoWorld article: Your quick guide to malware types
Malwarebytes Anti-Malware - removes malware from your computer
Adwcleaner is a good, quick way to clean up adware. Download from ToolsLib.
Windows Security (previously named Windows Defender) comes built into Windows 8, 10 and 11. Many 3rd party Anti-Virus (AV) programs break Windows security so they can look into various areas of the operating system, in the process they actually create holes in the operating system. Because Windows Security is built in it doesn't need to poke holes into the operating system and therefore is more secure. It is my personal recommendation for any system running Windows 8, 10 and 11.
Eset NOD32 anti-virus software
Eset free online scanner
To determine which AV program you should use, you need to weigh speed and overhead requirements of the AV program and how well it protects you. AV-comparatives does both types of testing (and they test free versions). Because of the ever-changing nature of viruses, malware, etc. the latest detection test doesn't tell the whole story of the program. It is quite possible that for one test a program may perform extremely well, yet in previous tests it performed poorly. The opposite is also true. Therefore you need to look at several tests to see a longer term performance of a particular program.
While security suites may provide some security features that are not already included in Windows, most, if not all of those features are available for free from other sources. It may be less convenient than having everything in one program, but usually you have better protection using products from different sources and you can tailor the protection to your needs, not what the suite provider requires you to have. Also, most of the all-in-one solutions add more overhead than their protection is worth.
Pop-up blocker tests - takes a while to run through all of the tests, but gives a very good indication of how well your pop-up blocker works.
Firefox - web browser - or ftp access to Firefox released files
Thunderbird - email client - or ftp access to Thunderbird released files
SeaMonkey - for those of you that want the email client and web browser to be one application
Libre Office - a free suite of applications similar to Microsoft's Office suite. Contains programs for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, etc.
Recycling -
E-waste Recycling Guide for Small Businesses
* —
dotcom-monitor.com contacted me to let me know about their services. I checked them out before adding them to this page.
newfanglednetworks.com contacted me to let me know about their information and services. I checked them out before adding them to this page.
pixelprivacy.com contacted me about their article on checking wifi channels. After reading the article I decided that the information was worth linking to.
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