How to Keep Your Web Browser Secure

Looking to upgrade your security on a Windows PC without spending a dime? Angela suggests you avoid using Microsoft's Internet Explorer--a browser with more holes than Lindsay Lohan's fishnets--and hook up with the Firefox browser from Mozilla. Firefox is built to ignore certain "features" in IE that have turned out to be major security liabilities. Great, says Steve--but you'll still need to keep IE around for those sites too lazy to avoid using those "features."

The Duo also suggest that avoiding Webbishness can help you with e-mail-based virus attacks. HTML mail--the kind that comes in looking like a Web page, complete with graphics and so forth--essentially is a Web page, and, like some Web pages, can have some nasty stuff lurking in the background. Instead, look at your mail as plain text; a good e-mail program will even let you switch from text to HTML for particular messages if you really, really trust the sender.

Both Steve and Angela also suggest caution about where you surf, both physically and in cyberspace. Angela notes that public terminals (for instance, those at the public library) can keep copies of whatever you've been doing, including online banking, and Steve points out that hooking into public Wi-Fi hotspots can also lead to trouble if you send sensitive stuff over an unencrypted connection. Angela reminds users to check for the little lock or key at the bottom of the browser; if it's there, you're on a security-conscious page and your information is encrypted to protect it from prying eyes.

Of course, some neighborhoods in cyberspace are as unsavory as those in the offline world. Porn sites, warn the snickering Duo, are notorious for bad behavior; some have even been known to install software on visitors' machines in order to run up giant phone charges. (The theory is that most porn patrons are simply too embarrassed to report what's happening.) Steve also flags certain peer-to-peer services like Kazaa and Grokster as purveyors of spyware and the like.