Is your home PC at risk from online hackers?

In association with BT

These days you can access your family photos, bank details, private emails and personal information all in one place. But as home computers have become more powerful and better connected, they have also become more vulnerable to attacks. Hacking, viruses and online ‘spying’ can result in lost sentimental material, or even serious fraud such as identity theft.

The risk was underlined recently, when the full extent of the DarkMarket network was revealed in court. From a Wembley internet cafe, a former pizza bar worker ran an international cyber "supermarket" selling stolen credit card and account details. The network connected to 2,000 criminals, selling personal data and hacking tutorials essential for identity theft and fraud.

As broadband came into the home, so did a new threat to PC security. Because broadband services give your home computer an IP address, a unique Internet Protocol number, it can be ‘seen’ by other computers on the internet. Hackers constantly scan the internet for vulnerable computers by sending out millions of simple automated requests for security information. As technology journalist John Naughton wrote in the Observer, "An unprotected PC on a broadband link is an incredibly valuable resource for online criminals and vandals. It can be used as a relay station for spam, as a slave to launch denial-of-service attacks against e-commerce sites, as a base for phishing expeditions to steal personal data - and for other activities too unpleasant to mention in a family newspaper."

For a home PC connected to the internet via broadband it is essential that you protect against this scanning with a firewall, internet security software which hides your computer details, and filters requests from other computers to ensure they are from trusted source.

Some broadband service providers will offer firewalls within the package, or it can come as part of a bundle of computer security software.

While firewalls are designed to stop online intruders getting to your computer via the internet, there’s a whole host of other ways your PC can be vulnerable to attack. Memory sticks are now as common as floppy disks once were, and they can easily pick up viruses and other forms of malware. These programmes are created by hackers and distributed online. They include Trojan horses, which sit on your computer and open a ‘back door’ into the system; and worms, which can distribute themselves to other computers without the user even opening an application.

Because your home computer may be used by the whole family, and people often distribute photos and music on memory sticks, mobile phones or iPhones, it‘s easy for malware to get onto your computer. Anti-virus software will regularly scan your system and delete malicious code, or just quarantine it and recommend further action. New viruses are always being written by hackers, so anti-virus software also includes a renewable subscription which updates the programme to recognise the latest threats.

Just in case viruses or hackers do get through, it’s also good idea to guard against the risk of losing data, whether it’s family photos or the last five years small business accounts. Regularly backing up data is part of sound housekeeping for all computers. You could do this by copying files to data CDs or an external hard drive which is kept off-line. Using external online storage is another option. Some broadband providers will keep copies of your data safe with online file storage services and will provide IT support as part of a package with internet security included.

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