Wilson Ng started helping the family business since 9 years old. Since then, he had dreamt to be a successful entrepreneur, one who starts great businesses  ( he has started 7) from scratch with insight, guts and initiative. He keeps his focus on growing the business by creating value-- not on politics, or wasteful distractions. He brings the same focus to community service, teaching, life and family.

This is the main page which contains all postings. The reader can also choose a category: techdrivenlife, on life, on business, quotes, jokes, tidbits & reading reviews.  A new category, EntrepreViews, talks on entrepreneurship and also answer reader's queries.

	Thursday, January 13, 2005

What is your Computer doing that you don't know?  ( on tech) When I started this blog, it was with the goal that I would  share about how to manage business and understand technology to have a more successful life.   For the last few weeks, I have been talking a lot about business and life principles, and I must not forget that while helping people succeed is my passion,  helping people use technology is my business.  I do a lot of talking and writing on technology to earn my recognition  as a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional, but I guess I will have to do more also in my blog.  For non technical readers, don't worry. I will keep it basic, and make sure I talked about issues that touches basic technical concerns on our everyday life. Last week, I was feeling that something was wrong with my computer. I had performed all the requisite safety practices to insure that I was not infected by viruses, but I really felt that there was something wrong -- some web pages were taking 20 seconds to load, while some of my colleagues could have their sites load in 3 seconds on the same connection. So when Microsoft announced that they have free new beta software that would check spywares for free, I took the offer. On my notebook, they found out four infected files, and on my desktop one. By the way, you should be wary on this -- a good part of services we receive as a business now are related to virus and spyware, and everyday, I receive over a dozen infected emails from friends. It is more prevalent that is generally believed. Most people who surf regularly who think they don’t have, may actually have at least one.  I believe I did all the right things, and I have more protection than I want, but still, I got infected. Spyware is a new class of software that tries to hide inside your computer and collects personal information without your knowledge. It can collect for instance what web sites you visit, but more seriously, it can also collect your user name and passwords when you visit these websites. So in a sense, it is not only irritating that it slows your computer, or display more pop up web page ads that you don’t want or change your settings without you knowing it, it can be stealing information. You should always exercise caution to prevent these programs like: 1.) try to make sure you get windows updated to the latest patch. 2.) make sure that your internet explorer or browser setting is set to at least medium security or higher. 3.) Turn on the personal firewall of Windows. 4.) try to download and surf only on recognized sites, and minimize downloading pirated software sites. 5.) install anti-spyware protection. You can get a free download here from Microsoft.  Although still in beta version, it works fine, and is quite fast. You can also check out this comprehensive guide to spy and anti-spy software. 12:12:12 PM     comment []   trackback []

Past Archives:

2005  --  June , May , April,  March , February,  January

2004  --  December, November, October, September