4 replies to this topic

[hello2007]

if my families computer gets infected thats sharing the internet with my computer, will that make any difference at all for my computer?

[AdvancedSetup]

It's possible. It depends on the infection and what security settings you have to thwart it. If you're up to date on all of the Microsoft Security Critical Updates and you have a good up to date Anti-Virus program running at all times and a product like MBAM running the Protection Module, and disable your shares to other computers then in general you should be reasonably safe from attack from another computer. It would have to be a very sophisticated targeted unknown attack vector to also infect your machine at that point.

If you're using file sharing or p2p apps etc.. then it's quite easy to get infected from another system on your network.

[Firefox]

just to add to what AdvancedSetup said....

If you have several computers that share an Internet connection, if one of them is infected and causing a lot of Internet traffic, the other computers may have issues accessing the Internet also because of all the traffic coming from the infected computer, so it would be a good idea to disconnect it from the connection until you get it cleaned up. This would also help from spreading the infection.

[hello2007]

AdvancedSetup, on Oct 6 2009, 11:32 PM, said:

It's possible. It depends on the infection and what security settings you have to thwart it. If you're up to date on all of the Microsoft Security Critical Updates and you have a good up to date Anti-Virus program running at all times and a product like MBAM running the Protection Module, and disable your shares to other computers then in general you should be reasonably safe from attack from another computer. It would have to be a very sophisticated targeted unknown attack vector to also infect your machine at that point.

If you're using file sharing or p2p apps etc.. then it's quite easy to get infected from another system on your network.

no i disabled the updates on my windows security centre because i felt there is no need since i dont use windows defender or win firewall. I dont have any windows security features active. What am i missing here? because i dont see why i need windows security updates if im not using nothing windows security related. So am i right in disabling it or am i missing something here

[exile360]

Nope, security updates from Microsoft aren't necessarily updates for their security products, usually they're patches for critical vulnerabilities in Windows itself or its components. Office also regularly receives security updates. There are also updates that fix bugs in Windows and improve its stability. You can find more info about Windows Update and what it offers here.

Keep your system updated:

Microsoft releases patches for Windows and other products regularly:

• I advise you visit Microsoft Update
  
• Install the Active X
  
• Once installed it will recommend that you turn on Automatic Updates if not set and you then you will be able to manually check for updates also via:
  
• Start >> All Programs >> Microsoft Updates
  
• Install any critical updates that are available then reboot when it asks you to
  
• Return to the site again to check for more updates and install them
  
• Repeat this process until it says there are no important updates to install
  
• I highly recommend you visit Microsoft Update regularly to help in keeping your system secure and stable. You can access it in the future by clicking Start>All Programs>Microsoft Updtate.

Use Secunia OSI to check for software vulnerabilities (Note: Java is required for the online scan. If you do not have java you may download and install it from here):

• Visit this page and click on the Start Scanner button
  
• Once the scanner loads click on the Start button on the page to start the scan
  
• Review the results and update your software using the information provided, making sure to uninstall older application versions that are out of date before downloading and installing newer versions