Child porn and your computer
The Associated Press came out with a disturbing story on November 9. It describes how child pornographers can hijack your PC to store their images and links remotely from their own computers. Unbeknownst to the user (you and me), through the use of a virus, they can silently use your computer to gather, distribute and host their pornography collections. This is disturbing for many reasons.
Your very first inkling that you have been hijacked is when your computer tech calls to tell you that he has found child pornography images on your computer and he’s just reported you to the police. You’re in big, big trouble.
The police are wary of the AP story for an obvious reason. It makes for a great defense to cover the tracks of genuine pedophile and child pornography gatherers. It is however a reason for real concern for computer users that should be ignored at your peril.
The virus or Trojan horse can get onto your hard-drive through a visit to a website, clicking on a popup link or opening an attachment or link in an email. It can lay dormant on your PC until it senses that you’re away from the machine. It will go into action searching for and gathering images, videos, and links; all stored on your hard drive.
You probably (falsely) feel confident that your anti-virus software will do its job and protect you. Sometimes it will. Sometimes though, the virus can slip through. More worrying, the virus, once activated, can turn off your virus protection while it does its business and turn it back on again when done. (There's a link to the AP article at the end of this page).
So how do you protect yourself? Here are nine suggestions that you can do yourself. There are other methods, so ask around. Item one is the most important if you're in an office environment.
1. Make sure your IT department and your corporate management are aware of this article. Ask them to issue written
recommendations to staff on how they intend to combat it. Keep a copy of your original notice to them.2. When you're not using your PC turn it off. Off; not standby. Make sure that the wireless connection is also off.
Password-protect the restart process.3. Do not allow anyone to use your PC unsupervised; ever.
4. Make sure that you have the best virus protection available and that it updates regularly. There are many
free applications available – try AVG Free Anti-virus. Do a complete scan once a week.5. Do not allow remote access to your PC by anyone. Check under your Start Menu/Control Panel open the System
icon. Go to ‘Remote’ and unclick Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop. You can always turn them on if you
need to. Check equivalent setting for the PC you use.6. Delete all spam unread; ignore embedded links.
7. Don’t click on popup links, quizzes or notices that your PC has a security issue. If you can't get rid of a popup, close
the Browser and restart your session. Holding down Control/Shift/Esc together brings up the Task Manager and
will allow you to force-close a window or program that is causing a problem.8. Empty your browser Cache, Cookies and Temporary Internet files regularly.
9. Buy an Apple computer - they seem to have fewer problems with viral infections.
You don't need to be over-bright to know why this is important. Having child porn found on your computer is a potentially career or life-ending event. Protection in this case is a personal issue.
You’ve been forewarned, hopefully forearmed.
Link to Associated Press article: PC virus
can frame innocent of child porn
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/10/pc-virus-can-frame-innocent-of-child-porn/
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,573085,00.html
