The Most Dangerous Places on The Web (according to PC World)

Websites that use Flash Danger level: Moderate Adobe Flashplayer has many vulnerabilities that are constantly being patched. Flash cookies are another danger; they are like cookies, but used by Flashplayer. Controls:  For Firefox: use an Add on called “Better Privacy”  n/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager03.html n/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager03.html Also: keep your flashplayer up to date.

Twitter Danger level: Very high The danger: URL shorteners  Take long addresses and replace them with something shorter  The danger is that a short URL may point to something sinister. Options:  Don't click links :(  Use a twitter client app: tweetdeck/tweetie for Mac  Bit.ly tries to filter out malicious links (manually??)  At tinyurl.com/preview.php you can turn on previews.

Your Inbox Danger level: Moderate Dangers:  Phishing s  Infected attachments The problem: The are getting more sophisticated and harder to detect every day. The remedy: If you are not 100 % sure, do not reply to an , do not click on links. Never, never, never, send account numbers, SSIDs, passwords, etc over .

Torrent and P2P Sites Danger Level: EXTREMELY HIGH The danger: Torrent Sites (and other content sharing sites) are used for sharing music, videos or software, often pirated. You don't really know who placed it there; it may well be somebody intent on taking over your computer with a virus. If you really want to do it: Use a secondary PC: use updated antivirus software, scan downloaded files and wait a couple of days before you scan again and then finally use the files.

Porn Sites Danger level: Moderate In spite of their reputation, many porn sites want to be safe to protect themselves. Having said that: many sites (porn or not) get hacked all the time and may lure victims to attack servers. It is very hard to tell a legitimate porn site from a malware-hosting site that uses porn as a lure. Cautions:  Videos may contain viruses  Video codecs may contain viruses  Use tools like from AVG orhttp:// from McAfee.  Consider using a secondary machine.

Video Download Sites, Peer to Peer Networks Danger level: Very high The Danger:  As mentioned before: trojan horses, disguised as videos or codecs, can infect your PC with Malware. An example is given in Remedies:  Stick to the true and known sites: YouTube, Vimeo, Hulu, TV.com, ABC.com, iTunes, etc.  Keep your video player(s) up to date.  Avoid downloading videos at random

Your Smartphone Danger level: Slight (at present) The threat: “Geolocation”. Most smartphones have a GPS which is aware of its/your location; there are apps out there which will share that information with other parties. Watch out for those apps which are “location aware”; Yelp might be OK, but Foursquare or Facebook Places might not be.

Search Engines Danger level: Very high The threat: “Poisoned' search engine results that go to malware-carrying Websites.  Search engine poisoning consists of building tainted sites designed to rank high in a search on a given topic. Remedy: Watch where you click in the results page: nyt.com is preferable to hackersrus.com;check the name of the website. Use something like wot.com

Malicious PDFs Danger level: Very high The threat: “poisoned” PDF files that have been crafted so that, when viewed, they will trigger vulnerabilities in the PDF viewer, usually Adobe Acrobat. In 2009, 49% of web attacks were of this nature. Defenses: Keep your PDF reader up to date. Use a different PDF reader from Adobe Acrobat Disallow opening non-PDF file attachments in Adobe Reader.

Hacked Legitimate Sites (I) Threat level: Highly unsafe A file can be downloaded and installed in your computer without the user noticing. This download can be started by a hacked website. Defenses:  Keep your OS and your security software up to date  Run regular (at least weekly)malware scans.

Hacked Legitimate Sites (II), your inbox Threat level: Highly unsafe The threat: Fake antivirus software that extorts money and your credit card numbers. Should really be called extortionware Remedy? If you get an alert saying you are infected with malware and it looks fishy to you, stop what you are doing, boot into safe mode and run a legitimate antivirus scan. You may have to call in a professional.

Just about any Ad-supported Website Threat level: Moderate The threat: Fraudulent ads that lead to scams or malware. Remedy?  Be careful where you click  Many places check their ads, but it isn't fail-safe.

Facebook Threat level: Moderate The threat: Questionable Facebook apps.  Who developed them?  What is their privacy policy?  How secure is their data storage? Remedy  Don't run every app or add it to your profile.  Check your privacy settings: 'Applications and Websites' lets you control which apps have access to your data. You can even turn off apps altogether.

Social Networks Threat level: slight The threat: oversharing: exposing too much personal information on your profiles.  A real danger is that enough information might have been shared to make ID theft possible. Remedies:  Watch what you post on the sites: your home address and phone number should not be on facebook.  Check your privacy settings.

5 Tips from the Pros Be sure to keep all the programs you use (specially the Operating System) up to date. Be Password smart. Use security software. If it sounds to good to be true, it is too good to be true. Assume that everyone on the internet is out to get you. No security software is perfect and no file download or link is safe, even if a friend sends it to you.