There is evidence that any computer and its network can be compromised. I've read stories about the Pentagon and military bases being hacked. Just about every government agency that has not been eradicated yet has been hacked. The IRS was hacked. That level of expertise is not found in a high school computer lab. There are government sponsored actors hard at work on breaking into secured systems every moment of the day. So, yeah, why would my bank or hospital be exempt?
State actors are working on a different level than the hacks who break into your local financial institution. You know, Putin really doesn't care about how much money I have nor does he want to take it from me. His cronies have more important things to do. But, the Dark Web Mafia is very interested in login credentials and personal information that can be used for identity theft. They guys who stole my medical records aren't going to mess with the hospital records, but they might make some phony insurance claims using my identity, for example. It is all about money. Probably more alluring than my login credentials is the fact that my computer is high end and has a lot of memory and unused processor cycles. An undetectable Trojan on my computer could not care less about the porn sites I visit. LOL They simply want to use my excess resources to mine for bitcoin.
Illegally fixing traffic tickets is kids play, as your story indicates. Even that ransomware attack you experienced was likely some kid who bough a program on the Dark Web and wanted to see if he can con you. You certainly don't want to be lax with the security for your home network and computers on it, but you are not in as much danger as those panic peddlers would want you to believe. Storing personal information on the cloud is about as safe as traveling by air. Some planes crash, but they are safer than driving your car.
Kudos From Linus Torvalds
Re: Kudos From Linus Torvalds
Although my router has a firewall, and so does Debi's computer, she is always getting malware, not necessarily a virus though. It loads something that causes pop-up ads for things. Most recently she keeps getting a pop-up that is claimed to be from Microsoft about a program on her computer doing this that or the other thing. Naturally the URL does not go to Microsoft, nor does the phone number they give to call. I can usually go in and remove the program doing this, but it seems to reload again a week or a month later. But when it does pop-up it locks her out, mouse, keyboard, etc. stop working.
I can unplug her keyboard and move it to another USB port long enough to hit ctrl,alt,del to bring up the manager to delete the program that is running, which usually also gives me the file name of where it is located. I will also go and delete that file too, but I know in windows computers they hide files all over the place, sometimes with the same name as system files. This alone is one reason I prefer Linux over Windows. It won't let you hide files where they don't belong.
As far as protecting your files. Is there anything safer than a pair of external hard drives with the same data, one stored elsewhere and not connected to anything, except during the time you are running a backup to it?
OK, yeah, the HD could go bad. But you have two of them, maybe three like I do.
I have too much data to make keeping it all on the cloud affordable.
I do have some things in the cloud on a free account I earned extra space on, but rarely if ever update what I have there.
I still don't understand how a company keeps all of their data on-line in a way they can never lose their data.
I'm think of the game companies who have servers in different locations, with millions of players.
I'm sure they back up their actual programs, but as far as user data goes, it changes hundreds of times per second per player when they are playing the game. One day you are fed from one server, and the next day a different server. Heck, some days you will be one server in the morning and another in the afternoon.
Yet they never lose a players game data, even when they have a major server crash.
I can unplug her keyboard and move it to another USB port long enough to hit ctrl,alt,del to bring up the manager to delete the program that is running, which usually also gives me the file name of where it is located. I will also go and delete that file too, but I know in windows computers they hide files all over the place, sometimes with the same name as system files. This alone is one reason I prefer Linux over Windows. It won't let you hide files where they don't belong.
As far as protecting your files. Is there anything safer than a pair of external hard drives with the same data, one stored elsewhere and not connected to anything, except during the time you are running a backup to it?
OK, yeah, the HD could go bad. But you have two of them, maybe three like I do.
I have too much data to make keeping it all on the cloud affordable.
I do have some things in the cloud on a free account I earned extra space on, but rarely if ever update what I have there.
I still don't understand how a company keeps all of their data on-line in a way they can never lose their data.
I'm think of the game companies who have servers in different locations, with millions of players.
I'm sure they back up their actual programs, but as far as user data goes, it changes hundreds of times per second per player when they are playing the game. One day you are fed from one server, and the next day a different server. Heck, some days you will be one server in the morning and another in the afternoon.
Yet they never lose a players game data, even when they have a major server crash.
Re: Kudos From Linus Torvalds
Probably because the data is stored on the client's computer and not the server. Also, there is more than one type of server involved with places like Steam, for example. The game itself and a few other critical bits of information are on the game server. Multi-player connectivity is on some other server. And, the user account with profile information is on still another server. I'd be surprised if they were not all RAID or something else that is hot swapable, but even RAID gets backed up at some point.Yet they never lose a players game data, even when they have a major server crash.
Malware has become very sophisticated and deleting the files you can find won't fix a lot of it. Linux and it's derivatives are no exception. Hackers pay big bucks to buy malware that cannot be detected by convention means. If you can come up with the name of what infected Deb's computer I'm sure you can find the fix on Google. Possibly looking up specific symptoms would give you some valuable information too. My favorite anti-virus software is called Dr.Web CureIT I download and run it about once a year whether I need to or not, or whenever I suspect I've been invaded.
Re: Kudos From Linus Torvalds
Traditionally, Virus detectors only find files that they have listed in their search list. Which basically means, until they learn about it and add it to their list, the Virus Detector does nothing.
I normally turn off all virus detectors anyhow, because most of them cause more problems than they solve.
The Win7 machine Debi uses came with a couple of programs that were interesting.
I don't remember the name of them, but one checked the installation data and compared it to the installed data and valid upgrades. But then it would stop and ask, did you install this (name of program) and wait for a response. This made it useless to run overnight. It should have just listed them at the end so they could all be checked at once. After trying it a few times, and waiting for it to pop up the names and ask, all of them they asked about we said yes to, which was supposed to keep it from asking again. It still did though so we never used it again.
The other program would stop anything from loading until you said yes it was OK to load it.
Here's one, the past couple of days we had requests to install Microsoft C++ 2012, C++2015 to 2019.
Before I allowed it to install, I wanted to know why a programming language needed to be on her computer.
Spent nearly two hours trying to find out why.
Everything looked on the up and up. One of the URLs I checked was a Microsoft URL or looked like it anyhow.
The phone number given was answered by Microsoft support, way too fast for me to believe it.
So I exited all the install windows and forgot about it.
Two days later it pops up again.
This time I finally got to the bottom of it.
Games that originally used Flash Player have converted over to using their own Game Engine.
When you try to play the game, it opens the install window and links you to the Microsoft website for the download.
Once we did this, some of her older games from on-line that had stopped working were now working better than ever.
This prompted me to send a chat message to BigFish Games, where most of her games came from.
That is how I learned about this. I said you guys should give a warning or message or something that your games now require C++ installed. Getting those pop-ups without warning scared the bejesus out of us, hi hi.
The lady said, there is a BIG WARNING on the game download page that says "A C++ Installer will appear prior to game download, Please install this file to run the game."
Obviously, Debi does not read the info before hitting the download button on her games, hi hi.
I know I asked about game servers once before and you gave a great explanation.
But it didn't fit with how Slashkey says their data is safe.
They say they only back up the program, not user data, since the user data is spread across all the nodes.
Another game company said their data is more like block-chain for security reasons.
This is quite unlike how our local grocery store works.
All of their data is both on-site and remote at the same time, plus the daily files are backed up hourly both onsite and offsite, and with the home office as well. But each program works differently on how it saves its data and where.
The store manager said it would be so much easier on us if the home office maintained the bar codes file and only sent us the ones for the products we carry. But no, each store has to download their own bar codes list from the main database, then go through and run a compare to our inventory lists, then take that generated list and make changes to the prices we charge for the item. Once our list is complete, we back it up here and offsite, and to our file at the home office.
And that is only one of many things that have to be added to our point of sale computers.
As far as the master bar code data goes, we have over 20 different sites where we can download it from, and if something is added or changed, all 20 places know about it at once. He had no idea how they knew either.
I know about Mirror Sites, but they don't all update instantly, some are weeks or months behind the others.
I normally turn off all virus detectors anyhow, because most of them cause more problems than they solve.
The Win7 machine Debi uses came with a couple of programs that were interesting.
I don't remember the name of them, but one checked the installation data and compared it to the installed data and valid upgrades. But then it would stop and ask, did you install this (name of program) and wait for a response. This made it useless to run overnight. It should have just listed them at the end so they could all be checked at once. After trying it a few times, and waiting for it to pop up the names and ask, all of them they asked about we said yes to, which was supposed to keep it from asking again. It still did though so we never used it again.
The other program would stop anything from loading until you said yes it was OK to load it.
Here's one, the past couple of days we had requests to install Microsoft C++ 2012, C++2015 to 2019.
Before I allowed it to install, I wanted to know why a programming language needed to be on her computer.
Spent nearly two hours trying to find out why.
Everything looked on the up and up. One of the URLs I checked was a Microsoft URL or looked like it anyhow.
The phone number given was answered by Microsoft support, way too fast for me to believe it.
So I exited all the install windows and forgot about it.
Two days later it pops up again.
This time I finally got to the bottom of it.
Games that originally used Flash Player have converted over to using their own Game Engine.
When you try to play the game, it opens the install window and links you to the Microsoft website for the download.
Once we did this, some of her older games from on-line that had stopped working were now working better than ever.
This prompted me to send a chat message to BigFish Games, where most of her games came from.
That is how I learned about this. I said you guys should give a warning or message or something that your games now require C++ installed. Getting those pop-ups without warning scared the bejesus out of us, hi hi.
The lady said, there is a BIG WARNING on the game download page that says "A C++ Installer will appear prior to game download, Please install this file to run the game."
Obviously, Debi does not read the info before hitting the download button on her games, hi hi.
I know I asked about game servers once before and you gave a great explanation.
But it didn't fit with how Slashkey says their data is safe.
They say they only back up the program, not user data, since the user data is spread across all the nodes.
Another game company said their data is more like block-chain for security reasons.
This is quite unlike how our local grocery store works.
All of their data is both on-site and remote at the same time, plus the daily files are backed up hourly both onsite and offsite, and with the home office as well. But each program works differently on how it saves its data and where.
The store manager said it would be so much easier on us if the home office maintained the bar codes file and only sent us the ones for the products we carry. But no, each store has to download their own bar codes list from the main database, then go through and run a compare to our inventory lists, then take that generated list and make changes to the prices we charge for the item. Once our list is complete, we back it up here and offsite, and to our file at the home office.
And that is only one of many things that have to be added to our point of sale computers.
As far as the master bar code data goes, we have over 20 different sites where we can download it from, and if something is added or changed, all 20 places know about it at once. He had no idea how they knew either.
I know about Mirror Sites, but they don't all update instantly, some are weeks or months behind the others.
Re: Kudos From Linus Torvalds
I've abandoned all antivirus software except the one that Microsoft forces upon Windows 10 users. You can't delete it and it can only be disabled temporarily. I understand why they do that and given their former reputation for being a virus magnet it makes sense for Microsoft to secure it's main operating system. Many reviews rank their software pretty high but I have yet to be notified or have it detect anything wrong with my computer. That could be due to the fact that the OS gets changed (totally swapped out) once a week. But I've talked to other people who have never heard from Windows defender. I have my doubts about it, but, I can say that laptop has never had any viruses or malware that I have known about.
The old way of detecting viruses is to check some kind of signature that all foreign programs leave behind. It's those signatures that need to be detected first before they are put into the database. Even Microsoft knows that's not the best method of security. Now and days the signatures are still searched for but other things are monitored as well. Strange processes that pop out of nowhere get flagged and then there is heuristics. Any behavior, such as changing file names en masse get halted before they start. Supposedly that stops ransomware from being installed. I've taken the stand that they can obliterate my two computers and I'd be pissed but not out of business. Everything is backed up and I can recover in a matter of hours. The laptop can come back in under an hour. I do, however, check for malware and unwanted programs; the kind Deb has where they hijack your browser and display ads you don't want to see. Those things generally are installed by consent of the computer user and if you can recall who you gave that consent to they have a way to uninstall the nag-ware. The type of malware that is hard to find is the kind that is not intrusive but uses your computer's resources in the background. You got to be very clever to spot that in the first place and even more clever finding ways to remove it.
I have a whole list of different versions of C++ that have been installed on Windows 7. It's part of their .Net Framework and is typically used for gaming, but not always. Each new generation of the .Net software will require an updated version of C++. Apparently there are licensing issues that require you to consent before Microsoft can install it. Like Linux, C++ isn't entirely free for redistribution.
There are a ton of strategies for backing up servers. My previous explanation was a generic and general use case. The specific scenario used depends on exactly what you are doing and how valuable the information is. The retail grocer should indeed backup things every hour, or better yet in real time. Mirroring can easily be automated and it's no big trick updating a dozen servers simultaneously. The infrastructure at the grocery would be the big problem, but once that is installed upkeep should be easy peasy.
The old way of detecting viruses is to check some kind of signature that all foreign programs leave behind. It's those signatures that need to be detected first before they are put into the database. Even Microsoft knows that's not the best method of security. Now and days the signatures are still searched for but other things are monitored as well. Strange processes that pop out of nowhere get flagged and then there is heuristics. Any behavior, such as changing file names en masse get halted before they start. Supposedly that stops ransomware from being installed. I've taken the stand that they can obliterate my two computers and I'd be pissed but not out of business. Everything is backed up and I can recover in a matter of hours. The laptop can come back in under an hour. I do, however, check for malware and unwanted programs; the kind Deb has where they hijack your browser and display ads you don't want to see. Those things generally are installed by consent of the computer user and if you can recall who you gave that consent to they have a way to uninstall the nag-ware. The type of malware that is hard to find is the kind that is not intrusive but uses your computer's resources in the background. You got to be very clever to spot that in the first place and even more clever finding ways to remove it.
I have a whole list of different versions of C++ that have been installed on Windows 7. It's part of their .Net Framework and is typically used for gaming, but not always. Each new generation of the .Net software will require an updated version of C++. Apparently there are licensing issues that require you to consent before Microsoft can install it. Like Linux, C++ isn't entirely free for redistribution.
There are a ton of strategies for backing up servers. My previous explanation was a generic and general use case. The specific scenario used depends on exactly what you are doing and how valuable the information is. The retail grocer should indeed backup things every hour, or better yet in real time. Mirroring can easily be automated and it's no big trick updating a dozen servers simultaneously. The infrastructure at the grocery would be the big problem, but once that is installed upkeep should be easy peasy.
Re: Kudos From Linus Torvalds
No One Owns C++, there are no royalty fees to pay, and no permission needed to install or use it.
Just go to cplusplus.org and see for yourself. http://cplusplus.org/
There are some proprietary versions out there, but mostly this is due to proprietary processes they include with it.
It's sorta like XML can be used by anyone, so Mickey$oft decided to change some of the characters to screw the system up and called it Proprietary DOCX. I'm sure they have done the same thing with anything else they can steal, like C++.
As I have time, I'll look some of this stuff up on-line to see if there is a method that works for small guys well.
Just go to cplusplus.org and see for yourself. http://cplusplus.org/
There are some proprietary versions out there, but mostly this is due to proprietary processes they include with it.
It's sorta like XML can be used by anyone, so Mickey$oft decided to change some of the characters to screw the system up and called it Proprietary DOCX. I'm sure they have done the same thing with anything else they can steal, like C++.
As I have time, I'll look some of this stuff up on-line to see if there is a method that works for small guys well.