Protect Yourself and Your Company from Social Viruses with a Privileged User Email Account
This week during my session at the Progressive Business Forum, we had a great discussion about social viruses. You know, when you see your 70-year old aunt has sent you a Facebook message that says, “This video of you is so funny!” These viruses are horrible, malicious and very difficult to get rid of. (Hear, “Costly!”)
One of the people in the session just happened to be Dave Capretta, IT Manager for Wiley Wilson, a multi-disciplined architectural, engineering, and planning firm. Dave mentioned that using a privileged user email account could help. I live with an IT guy, so the language is not completely foreign to me. I had a sense that Dave had something worthwhile to share with the group. I asked him to explain further, which he did beautifully. Then I asked Dave if he would be willing to write up his thoughts so I could post them here on the blog. Following is his email to me:
We have all heard the following to keep your computer safe from viruses.
- Keep your computer updated with the latest security patches.
- Keep your anti-virus software updated with the latest security profiles.
- Have a firewall and update it too.
- Be suspicious of what people are sending you.
Another suggestion is to never use a privileged account for your daily computing activities. Privileged accounts (administrator accounts) have full permission to install, reconfigure and remove all software on your computer. By using a “standard user” account you limit the damage that a “social virus” can cause when you have that mental slip and activate a virus by mistake. A “standard user” account has all the permission you need to do your normal computing activity like web browsing, email, and run Office. You will need to switch to an “administrator” account to install software. Use the “User Accounts” program under Control Panel to create and change account status.
There is much more to this subject. Here is some additional reading if you’re interested:
Besides common sense, what else are you doing to protect yourself and your company from social viruses?
And if you have more specific questions, you can include them in the comments. Maybe I can bribe Dave to stop by and answer them.
Update: Forgot to include photo credit. Creative Commons photo on Flickr by JeffMaysh.
