Why Is Malware Prevention Important?

<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">The term &&num;8220&semi;malware&&num;8221&semi; comes from malicious software&comma; and it&&num;8217&semi;s important that consumers start to take these Internet viruses seriously&period; So many websites today are infected with malware software because it&&num;8217&semi;s easy for cyber criminals to infiltrate most websites&period; Whether it&&num;8217&semi;s a small business that can&&num;8217&semi;t afford the best cyber security or a major website like Target that can&&num;8217&semi;t prevent an attack&comma; your information is in the hands of businesses who may not have <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;carbonblack&period;com&sol;products&sol;solutions&sol;use-case&sol;stop-malware-non-malware&sol;">data protection<&sol;a>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Computer viruses today are not just after your identity&period; They are after your data&comma; including your passwords&comma; personal information&comma; and photos&period; It isn&&num;8217&semi;t just celebrities who are getting hacked and exposed online&period; Many people are being targeted because they visit certain websites that are infected with viruses&comma; and they don&&num;8217&semi;t realize it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h2 style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">How to Spot Malware Websites<&sol;h2>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Today&&num;8217&semi;s cyber criminals are most interested in your banking information&period; They want to know your credit card number or bank account number so that they can withdraw funds or steal your identity online&period; However&comma; you never know what these criminals will do with your data&comma; and due to new viruses like ransomware&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s imperative that you get some type of data protection to prevent malware from ransacking your life&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Malware websites may show a red warning if you try to navigate to them from Google&comma; which is able to crawl and detect viruses&period; Many of these websites are removed from Google search&comma; but many still pop up on the first page of search results&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">However&comma; the most popular way that criminals get into your computer is through your email&period; You should never open any emails from unknown senders&comma; and if you spot an email from a familiar address that looks fishy&comma; you need to report and delete it right away from your inbox&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">In addition&comma; unless you trust the website with 100 percent certainty&comma; you should never download any files&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Most of all&comma; you should always have an antivirus running&period; If you have Microsoft Windows&comma; then you can simply use their built-in firewall&comma; but there are more advanced tools that may protect you better&comma; such as a high quality VPN service&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h2 style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Keeping Yourself Malware-Free<&sol;h2>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">The best thing to do is simply watch your activity online and pay attention to the sites that you navigate to&period; If you notice red warning signs or if something tries to automatically download to your computer&comma; then delete that file and block the website in your browser settings or add it to your firewall&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">You also want to make sure that you have an antivirus installed on your computer&period; These programs can detect nefarious activity and block or quarantine these files so that your computer isn&&num;8217&semi;t affected&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">In addition&comma; you may want to use a VPN to connect to the Internet and privately browse&period; A <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;newsforpublic&period;com&sol;unblock-netflix-vpn&sol;">VPN service<&sol;a> allows you to completely mask your activities online as you are browsing through a server and not your own computer&period; While it&&num;8217&semi;s still possible for you to download a dubious file from the Internet on a VPN&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s much more unlikely that you will be able to if you have VPN protection&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">Finally&comma; before you input any sensitive information into an online merchant&&num;8217&semi;s form&comma; such as your credit card number&comma; you should make sure that the website is protected and secure&period; Typically&comma; a site will <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;newsforpublic&period;com&sol;top-best-world-popular-cheap-ssl-certificate-providers&sol;">use HTTPS<&sol;a> or have a badge on their website indicating what type of security they use&comma; such as Norton&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; justify&semi;">&NewLine;