Sunday, September 07, 2008

Glossary of Terms

Anti-spyware program

Anti-spyware programs are designed to protect your computer from spyware, adware and various other parasites; and are useful in ensuring your computer remains parasite-free .

Anti-virus software

Anti-virus software is designed to detect patterns of known and unknown viruses (typically propagated via email) and prevent them from infecting the PC. New viruses can spread very quickly, so you should ensure that your anti-virus software is always running and is kept up-to-date to be able to inoculate the future threats.

Popular sources for anti-virus protection software are McAfee, Symantec (Norton) and Sophos.

Broadband

A high-speed method of connecting to the Internet, faster than a traditional modem.

Browser

A browser often referred to as a Web Browser, is the software that allows you to graphically browse the Internet. The two most popular web browsers are Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator.

A cookie is a small file stored on your computer by your Web Browser. This file could include information about websites, sessions or your browsing trends whilst surfing the Internet. For example, it may include the information that you have previously populated (filled in) on the website to be re-used next time you visit it. Cookies are also used to identify you – or to be more precise your computer – so that you can receive a more consistent experience at a particular website.

Cybercrime

Any criminal activity which uses the Internet as a media .

Daemon

Pronounced dee-mun or day-mun. A process that runs in the background and performs a specified operation at predefined times or in response to certain events.

Downloading

The process of copying files, information and images from the Internet to your computer. Every time a visitor accesses a page on the Internet, they are downloading the contents of that page.

E-commerce

Electronic Commerce (e-commerce) refers to the conducting of business on the Internet. This includes buying or selling goods and services over the Internet.

Electronic mail, more commonly referred to as email, is an electronic letter or memo that you can send to anyone on the Internet who has a valid email address.

Encryption

Encryption is the process of scrambling sensitive information into unreadable code to be unscrambled on the receiving end . This ensures that sensitive information such as personal and credit card details remain secure. Encryption is the most effective way to achieve data security. To read an encrypted file, you must have access to a secret key or password that enables you to decrypt it.

Firewall

Firewall is a checkpoint station, where all inbound and outbound traffic running through your computer is inspected and blocked if it is considers undesirable. The computer user can set the firewall's sensitivity, depending on the type of traffic they want running through their machine.

Anyone with Internet connection should have a firewall running on their computer.

Ghost website

A ghost website is one which poses itself to look similar to a financial institution's legitimate site, but is fake, capturing customer's details and using them to transact on the customer's account.

Hack(ing)

An unauthorised user who attempts to or gains access to an information on system connected to the Internet. Also, ‘hacker' is a slang term for a computer enthusiast. A person who enjoys exploring the details of computers and how to stretch their capabilities. A malicious or inquisitive meddler who tries to discover information by poking around. A person who enjoys learning the details of programming systems and how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users who prefer to learn on the minimum necessary.

Hoaxes

A hoax is an attempt to trick an audience into believing that something false is real. Generally there is some material object involved, which is actually a forgery.

These warnings often describe fantastical or impossible malware program characteristics that often fool the user into performing unwanted actions on their system or suggests that users should forward the warning to other users. A hoax can be considered a nuisance by the mere fact that by forwarding it causes a waste of time and bandwidth.

Identity Theft

Identity theft is a crime in which a fraudster obtains key pieces of personal information, such as date of birth, bank details, or driver's license numbers, in order to impersonate someone else. The personal information discovered is then used illegally to apply for credit, purchase goods and services, or gain access to bank accounts.

Internet

This is a world-wide public computer network. Organisations and individuals can connect their computers to this network and exchange information across a country and/or across the world. The Internet provides access to a number of communication services including the World Wide Web and carries email, news, entertainment and data files.

ISP

An Internet Service Provider (ISP) is a business or organisation that offers users access to the Internet and related services.

Keystroke Capturing/Logging

Keystroke logging is often used by fraudsters to capture personal details including passwords. Keystroke loggers upon execution, log every keystroke or activity in a system. Some recent viruses are capable of installing such software without the user's knowledge. The risk of encountering such keystroke logging is greater on PCs shared by a number of users, such as those in Internet cafes.

Running anti-spyware software would reveal the presence of any such software on your PC.

Malware

Short for malicious software, it is designed specifically to damage or disrupt a system, such as a virus or a Trojan horse.

Phishing

Phishing is a scam that uses fraudulent emails to entice people to surrender their banking or credit card details. The emails are crafted to look like a legitimate email from a financial institution and often contain links to authentic looking but fraudulent websites.

Pop-up ad

A type of window that appears on top of (over) the browser window of a Web site that a user has visited. Pop-up ads are used extensively in advertising on the Web.

Pop-up window

A window that suddenly appears (pops up) when you select an option with your mouse or press a special function key. Usually, the pop-up window contains a menu of commands and stays on the screen only until you select one of the commands. It then disappears.

Session Time-out

This is an automatic disconnection, for security reasons, from any secure session after a period of server inactivity. It may occur even if you are typing something into a page or data field, the event being triggered by no communications with our serves, rather than by keyboard or mouse inactivity.

Skimming

Skimming involves the unauthorised copying of electronic data from credit or debit cards. In recent years this activity has involved more sophisticated electronic devices. This can include stealing credit card data by swiping the card through a machine (which may be concealed within a valid ATM) that reads information on the magnetic strip. These details are then used to make counterfeit cards, which are often sold on.

Social engineering

The goal of an expert fraudster is to win the trust of people to gain access to computer systems and other information that he will then use to obtain money. He may use the phone, posing as the employee of a financial institution or government agency. He may “tailgate” an employee into a corporate office through a secure door, pretending to have lost his card key.

For example, a fraudster may wander around a room and spot passwords lying around on sticky notes. Or they may just watch an oblivious employee type in a password. Another favourite trick is to search through the corporate rubbish behind buildings until key data is obtained.

Spam

Spam is the term used to describe bulk and unsolicited electronic messages. They can have a commercial focus, promoting or selling products or services, but increasingly are associated with banking or other fraud, pornography and other questionable aspects of the Internet. Individual spam messages are usually distributed in very large numbers automatically and are sent in such a way as to disguise the originator. Spam often contains viruses and other unsavoury material.

Various types of anti-spam software are available, but the first line of defence may be your own Internet Service Provider, many of whom offer spam filtering services.

Spam Filters

Software filters which are pre-programmed or 'educated' to block, delete or divert email messages which contain certain words in the address, heading or text.

Spoofing

This is a technique used to fool a person or system into thinking it is dealing with a legitimate user or system by taking the ‘from' credentials or other address details.

Spyware

Spyware is generally considered to be software that is secretly installed on a computer, which gathers and takes information from it without the permission or knowledge of the user. It can get into your computer as a software virus or as the result of installing a new program.

Knowing the symptoms of spyware
It can be difficult to tell if spyware is installed on a computer - it is designed to run secretly in the background. There are some signs that indicate that spyware may be on your computer:

1. Your web browser starts on a different homepage than it normally would.
2. Your computer's performance is slower than normal.
3. If you have a dial-up internet connection, you may find unauthorised premium rate phone calls on your bill.
4. The appearance of random error messages.
5. An unusual amount of pop-up windows appear.

Steps to prevent spyware
Using up-to-date anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-spyware, personal firewall software or software designed to protect against identity theft is good computing practice and essential protection when going online. These systems secure your computer and can allow you to control the areas of the internet that you and your family or co-workers can access.

Less obvious but more important is user awareness and attitude when online.

SSL

Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol provides a high level of security for Internet communications. SSL provides an encrypted communications session between your web browser and a web server. SSL helps to ensure that sensitive information (e.g. credit card numbers, account balances and other proprietary financial and personal data) sent over the Internet between your browser and a web server remains confidential during online transactions.

Trojan (Horse)

A program that pretends to be something it's not. Trojan horses are usually malicious, causing damage to their host computer. It normally arrives via an email attachment misleading or enticing you to open it. However once opened it can do all sorts of things, from erasing files to changing your desktop. It then sends itself along to other people in your address book so that it can propagate itself. One of the most insidious types of Trojan horse is a program that claims to rid your computer of viruses but instead introduces viruses onto your computer.

Uploading

Uploading is the process of copying files, information and images from your personal workstation to the Internet.

URL

A Universal Resource Locator (URL) is an Internet page's unique address (i.e. location). Every page on the Internet has a unique URL. You can see a web page's URL in the address field at the top of your browser window each time you access the page on the Internet.

Virus

A malicious software program that invades your computer. It is generally distributed via email, website, an infected floppy disk or CD and when loaded onto a computer is capable of replicating itself repeatedly. It may be benign but usually has a negative impact, such as slowing a PC or corrupting a computer's memory and files. While some viruses will not cause any damage, there are many malicious viruses which attempt to execute damaging activities such as sending random emails using your own address book, deleting files from your PC, disabling various components such as anti-virus software.

World Wide Web (WWW)

The World Wide Web (WWW) is a global system of Internet servers that host pages and other resources that are accessed using a web browser. The WWW is another term for the Internet.

Worm

A worm is a malicious program that is designed to replicate itself from machine to machine until it fills all of the storage space on a drive or network. Such worms may use up computer time, space, and speed when replicating, with a malicious intent to slow or bring down entire web servers and disrupt Internet use.

Zombie

A computer that has been implanted with a daemon that puts it under the control of a malicious hacker without the knowledge of the computer owner. Compared to programs such as viruses or worms that can eradicate or steal information, zombies are relatively benign as they temporarily cripple Web sites by flooding them with information and do not compromise the site's data.

Zombies are normally created after a virus or worm infection.