Hijack This!

HijackThis™ opens you a possibility to find and fix nasty entries on your computer easier.
Therefore it will scan special parts in the registry and on your harddisk and compare them with the default settings. If there is some abnormality detected on your computer HijackThis will save them into a logfile. In order to find out what entries are nasty and what are installed by the user, you need some background information.

HijackThis™ is a free utility which quickly scans your Windows computer to find settings that may have been changed by spyware, malware or other unwanted programs. HijackThis creates a report, or log file, with the results of the scan.

IMPORTANT: HijackThis does not determine what is good or bad. Do not make any changes to your computer settings unless you are an expert computer user.

Advanced users can use HijackThis to remove unwanted settings or files.

Not an expert? Just save the HijackThis report and let a friend with more troubleshooting experience take a look. A large community of users participates in online forums, where experts help interpret HijackThis scan results to clean up infected computers.

*Trend Micro provides HijackThis as a free utility, without technical support. For answers to some common questions about HijackThis please visit the Help/FAQ page.

To analyze your computer, start HijackThis and run a scan. HijackThis will display a list of areas on your computer that might have been changed by spyware. Do not change any settings if you are unsure of what to do. There are many popular support forums on the web that provide free technical assistance by using HijackThis log files to diagnose an infected computer.

System requirements:

Operating System:

• Microsoft™ Windows™ Vista
• Microsoft™ Windows™ XP
• Microsoft™ Windows™ 2000
• Microsoft™ Windows™ Me
• Microsoft™ Windows™ 98

Software:

• Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 or 7.0
• Mozilla™ Firefox™ 1.5 or 2.0

To download HijackThis, click HERE .

What Is Firewall?

FIREWALL

A system designed to prevent unauthorized access to or from a private network. Firewalls can be implemented in both hardware and software, or a combination of both. Firewalls are frequently used to prevent unauthorized Internet users from accessing private networks connected to the Internet, especially intranets. All messages entering or leaving the intranet pass through the firewall, which examines each message and blocks those that do not meet the specified security criteria.

There are several types of firewall techniques:
* Packet filter: Looks at each packet entering or leaving the network and accepts or rejects it based on user-defined rules. Packet filtering is fairly effective and transparent to users, but it is difficult to configure. In addition, it is susceptible to IP spoofing.
* Application gateway: Applies security mechanisms to specific applications, such as FTP and Telnet servers. This is very effective, but can impose a performance degradation.
* Circuit-level gateway: Applies security mechanisms when a TCP or UDP connection is established. Once the connection has been made, packets can flow between the hosts without further checking.
* Proxy server: Intercepts all messages entering and leaving the network. The proxy server effectively hides the true network addresses.

In practice, many firewalls use two or more of these techniques in concert.

A firewall is considered a first line of defense in protecting private information. For greater security, data can be encrypted.