{"id":6806,"date":"2004-12-28T15:20:33","date_gmt":"2004-12-28T22:20:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/12\/28\/tech-support-6.html"},"modified":"2004-12-28T15:20:33","modified_gmt":"2004-12-28T22:20:33","slug":"tech_support_6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/12\/28\/tech_support_6.html","title":{"rendered":"Tech support"},"content":{"rendered":"

This year has been remarkably free from the usual tech support calls on my parents’ and in-laws’ computers. Not sure why — no specific complaints, perhaps. I did run through an update of AdAware and Spybot S&D on the Ks’ machine, but haven’t installed Spyware Blaster yet. Should probably do the same with the ‘rents’ computer as well, if I get back back over there for any length of time this trip.<\/p>\n

Which was all called to mind by this article<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Went home for the holidays this week, and of course, the annual fix-Mom’s-computer event. This year things on my mother-in-law’s Windows 98 PC were especially bad; it could’ve been used as a software showcase of the latest and greatest in malware.<\/p>\n

For future reference, here’s a laundry list of steps I took to get Mom’s computer working and secured from evil software.<\/p>\n

It’s a pretty reasonable list. I might argue over some of the specifics (my last few experiences with ZoneAlarm on an XP machine were not pretty), but it’s a good conceptual <\/em>laundry list, at least, to look over.<\/p>\n

I did like this anecdote in the AdAware section: <\/p>\n

True story: my mother-in-law heard a Barenaked Ladies song on the radio that she liked, so she Googled “bare naked ladies.” …<\/p>\n

Clicking, and massive malware infection, ensue. (It’s rather ironic that both the real-life and virtual sex industries lead to massive infections …)<\/p>\n

(via J-Walk<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This year has been remarkably free from the usual tech support calls on my parents’ and in-laws’ computers. Not sure why — no specific complaints, perhaps. I did run through…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-my-computer"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2699,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/05\/15\/crying_wolf.html","url_meta":{"origin":6806,"position":0},"title":"Crying wolf","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 15-May-02 6:55am","format":false,"excerpt":"When is a computer virus not a computer virus? 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