How do you know if you can trust a website?

We use anti virus software, firewalls and spyware blocking software to keep our computers safe but it may not be enough. The truth is, if you continue to go to "bad websites" eventually something is going to get through and you'll be calling a company like ours for virus removal. So how can you avoid sites that may be "untrustworthy?"

Web of Trust is a free browser plugin that you should really look into. This great little utility ranks websites in a number of ways including trustworthiness, privacy, vendor reliability and child safety. It uses a simple, easy to recognize "traffic light" method of green, yellow and red color to inform you of the site's rating in any particular category. Based on the rating, you determine if you want to visit the site or not. It's simple, easy to use and gives you one more line of defense in the battle to keep your computer safe!

Is Web of Trust Perfect?

Of course it isn't perfect and it can't prevent you from going to bad sites if you choose to ignore the warning. We installed this on a customer's computer that was recently infected and cleaned up. After getting their computer back the customer called to explain that Web of Trust was giving  a red light on a particular page that they liked to visit. It was a trustworthiness and privacy warning but the customer insisted that they wanted to visit that page. A few days later the computer was back in for a virus!

Web of Trust is not a replacement for an anti virus software, it's simply one more layer of security. If you've been using an anti virus software and find yourself getting infected perhaps you might want to consider a smarter anti virus solution, one that is actually monitored by professionals to make sure it's working! We also highly suggest that our customers consider backing up their data on a regular basis. A great solution is a cloud based backup that simply operates in the background so you don't have to worry about it. This way, if you do get a virus you can be sure that your music, movies, pictures and documents are safe and sound.

Blueline Network Solutions is a computer sales, service and repair facility providing service to consumers, businesses and educational institutions. We can be contacted at (888) 748-2583 or by visiting our website.

Your own personal cloud...

Over the past few years we've heard more and more about "the cloud". At first it seemed to be some sort of mythical, magical wonderland but the truth is that the cloud is just the internet. I say "just the internet" as if it means nothing but the internet is of course much bigger than that. Mbaonline recently posted an Infographic detailing a day in the life of the internet that demonstrates just how much we use the web! It's a pretty amazing graphic with some interesting statistics (daily iPhone sales outpace daily birth rates!).

Looking at the article got me thinking about the internet, the cloud and about how we access our personal data. Whether we realize it or not, many of us are developing our own personal cloud. Each day the use of web connected smart phones and tablet devices is growing as people are recognizing the value in staying connected. Companies like Evernote have developed great applications that let us share notes between devices and access them anywhere we like. Apple and Google both give users the ability to store music on the web instead of their home computer and access it from anywhere we like.

For our company, we use an application to provide a cloud based backup of our critical files and data (if you aren't backing your info up to the cloud you really should consider it). This particular product also gives us the ability to provide our staff and customers with a "Cloud Drive" on their computers. The Cloud Drive acts like any storage device (hard drive, USB flash drive, etc...) and lets you drag and drop files to it for storage. No matter where you are, as long as you have an internet connection you can access the files from any device including smart phones, tablets and traditional computers. I often use it for storing information I may need for a meeting. That way, I have it available to me at any time! One of our customers uses it to allow their marketing team to save information to it so that the sales team can access the information anytime, anywhere on their tablets.

So just how are you using the cloud and what does your personal cloud contain? Music, photos, video, what else? If you give it some thought you might be surprised at how much you use "the cloud".