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Computer Security Update

Gerald I. Isaacson

Countdown 7,6,5,4,3,2 1.

That's how many seconds it took for an unprotected Windows computer on our network to become compromised in the last round of attacks. Once compromised, a reasonably computer proficient person could restore the computer and previously saved data in about six hours.

Using Windows Update one could have installed the preventive patches in under half an hour.

Over 1,000 machines had not been patched against the latest announced vulnerability before the recent Network Security Team notification effort.

If you're not one of those with time to spend or research to lose then here are five things you can do to protect your computers or expedite their reconnection to the network once compromised.

1. Do keep up to date on your anti-virus software – on Windows machines daily updates are suggested – and they can be done automatically.

2. Do keep up to date on Windows patches, on Windows 2000 and XP machines it can be relatively automatic too.

3. Do keep contact information about your computers current and in particular have someone listed who knows where each machine is, and has the necessary access rights to the machine to make any necessary changes.

4. Do use TSM or other means to have your vital data backed up. See http://web.mit.edu/is/topics/backup/index.html.

5. Do subscribe to the security-fyi and mitvirus mail lists to keep up to date on tools, prevention and new vulnerabilities.

Here are a few Web links that you might want to bookmark:

For virus protection: http://web.mit.edu/is/topics/virus/index.html.

For network security: http://web.mit.edu/net-security/index.html.

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