My sisters computer
Posted by creining | Filed under Security
My sister complained about her out of date computer that is slow and that she “can’t do anything with”. I agreed to take it into my possession and make it so she can [insert whatever the opposite of can't do anything with is]. I basically wanted to look at the specs and do some upgrades if needed and to install a new operating system. When I first boot the computer up I find she is running Windows 98, unpatched of course. Her virus definitions haven’t been updated since August of 1999. Yes, that’s over 65 months old. She is using Internet Explorer version 5.00.2614.3500, which according to SecurityFocus’s Vulnerability page has no less than 46 unique vulnerabilites in it. I decided to download and run Spybot on her computer and it found *plenty* of spyware and registry changes. I think one of the saving graces that her computer was still functioning is that she still accesses the internet via dialup and spends less than 10 hours online a month so the “always on” security aspect of consumers on broadband doesn’t apply to her. In any event, I have rebuilt her computer with Windows XP Home Edition. I was contemplating installing Fedora Core 3 but decided against it. If I find myself rebuilding her computer in the near future it’s definitely getting a FC3 install with 2 icons on the desktop, Open Office and Firefox. After I installed XP, I fired up Internet Explorer and downloaded Firefox. I then uninstalled the Internet Explorer Windows component. I installed Spybot, AVG Anti-Virus, free for home use, and ZoneAlarm, also free for home use. She needed an office suite and didn’t want to buy one so I downloaded and installed OpenOffice.org. I’m not quite sure but am thinking OOO might be a bit to heavy for her so I installed AbiWord as well, which in my opinion is a great free standalone word processor. I used automatic updates to install all the current hotfixes and I set up XP to notify her that there are updates available. I’m not sure about the feasibility of her getting updates over dialup automatically but I want her to know that there are updates she needs to install as a reponsible computer/internet user. I remember hearing about receiving Windows security updates via CD for computers with no internet access or dialup but the page I found at http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/protect/cd/order.mspx states “The Windows Security Update CD is no longer available”. It appears that you can, however, order Windows XP SP2 on CD. I plan on sitting down with my sister when I give her computer back and showing her how to be a savvy security-conscious computer user like her brother 
Comments are closed.