Voices from the Future: November 2016

Monday, November 21, 2016

Computer Class November 21, 2016

Hi everyone,

It's that time of the year; the air gets cool and crisp, people start baking and inviting family over for visits. Lots to be thankful for; family, friends, a roof over our heads, food in the fridge, electricity. Not so thankful for Windows

, oh well!

But, we still need to be on our toes for scammers. And there's a lot of those going around now.

The big one is the "Your computer is sending out viruses"

or "You've been hacked." You'll go to a site, a pop up will take over your screen and you'll reach for the phone. But don't do it! Do not call them. They'll want a credit card to charge you at least $200. Money that could be better spent elsewhere. Chances are you haven;t been hacked or downloaded a virus. It's not impossible though. If you think anything strange is going on, run a full scan with your anti-virus and your anti-malware right away. Those are both programs you can start up and walk away from for a bit. Then check when you get back from making lunch or something.

If you need a second opinion, you can run ESET's Online scanner.

To check a few other places, you can download and run ADW Cleaner. This is an easy to use program. After you download it, run the program from your Downloads folder. Click the button and then sit back for a bit. The scan usually takes less than ten minutes. When it's done, ACW Cleaner will show you tabs for the places it scanned. You can click on these and read, but you don't have to. ADW Cleaner will give you a report later. Just click the button when the scan is complete.

I just did that, and ADW Cleaner found six threats. I'll finish this email after I reboot.

There, I'm back, all nice and scrubbed clean.

ADW Cleaner found some Registry entries. Which I do not recommend people mess with as making changes in the Registry are instant and dramatic. No reboot required and can turn your computer into a doorstop. (But, Darrell, you just said.... Yes, I know. I have yet had ADW Cleaner break a computer. The one I'm typing from is my main computer.)

There are a few other programs, but those are ones that should be run with some supervision. If not mine, find someone you know and trust to help you.

Bottom line: Do Not Call The Scammers.

Now, some teaching stuffs. Saturday, I spend the day with some very nice people helping them get their computers less out of control. The first stop was to fix some password issues. This is a reminder to check all the places a password might hide -before- leaving. Because with programs like Outlook, you have to change the password in the Account settings.

Second stop was check Internet Explorer. Yep, people use IE. And that's quite alright. IE does the job, and now it's been updated enough that if you like IE, keep using it. (However, I do recommend trying out Chrome and Firefox, even Seamonkey. They are all free to use.) IE was set to stop just about everything, which means no shopping online. Took a visit to the Internet Options and set the slider in Security down a few notches. Now, Cookies can be used and purchases can be made again.

Last stop of the day was to help with internet connection problems, but my advise was followed. The first things to do if you can;t get online is "power cycle" your router and/or modem. That just means to pull the plugs from the back of the devices. Routers and modems aren't the brightest of devices and can get confused if they are plugged in too long or get too hot.

Also, we looked at Word. Word is it's own little beast, with changes from version to version. In this case, I think we were working with Word 2010. One thing we needed to change was having gridlines on the page. That was corrected by clearing the box next to Gridlines on the View tab (or menu). Gridlines can helpful if trying to position pictures or tables.

We also added footers by using the Insert tab/menu. You can add a variety of Footers with page numbers, date, and other information.

List Of Links

CHP Incident Site: https://cad.chp.ca.gov/