Friday, October 1, 2010

Microsoft Security Essentials now protecting over 31 million computers.

Have you switched to Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) yet? Remember, this is FREE! I have been using it ever since I first learned about it. It has low overhead, and that is what I like best about it. It's time to give some serious thought to dumping your Norton, McAfee, Kaspersky, Trend Micro, AVG, or whatever.

This article by Paul Lilly is from Maximum PC.

Antivirus vendors went on the offensive when Microsoft announced it was dropping its Windows Live OneCare in favor of offering a free security suite, Microsoft Security Essentials. One year later and with 31 million installations now under its belt, Microsoft is free to serve up a slice of humble pie to the competition.

"It's been a busy year for Microsoft Security Essentials. As we observed right after the first week of release, Microsoft Security Essentials had already detected threats on over half a million computers," the Redmond outfit said in a TechNet blog post. "As Microsoft Security Essentials enters into its second year with over 31 million installations, 27 million of those computers have reported infections to the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC)."
In other words, MSE isn't just popular, it's also working (you can read our review of Microsoft Security Essentials right here). It's also a global hit.

"The country with the most installations is the United States, but the next 10 countries with the most installs show that Microsoft Security Essentials has a global install base," Microsoft points out. "It is available in 27 languages – so language shouldn’t be a barrier to good security. Money is no problem, either – Microsoft Security Essentials is available at no cost!"

Thursday, September 30, 2010

New Gmail Feature Lets You Turn Off Conversation View

Halleluia! I think. Although my primary e-mail address is a Google one, I continue to use Outlook and POP3 to access my e-mail. However, when on someone else's computer, I am forced to use the Google webmail version, and I have always hated Google's Conversation View. This feature groups e-mails by subject and presents them to the user in that way. It makes it very difficult to find and isolate a single e-mail one might be looking for. So now Google has introduced a new feature found in Settings that allows the user to turn off Conversation View. This is what I have always wanted, and I just did that. It remains to be seen if after all of this time of using their conversation grouping if I won't prefer that, but for now Conversation View is turned off.

This article by Ryan Whitman can be found at MaximumPC.

"When Gmail launched, it brought a new way of organizing emails that saved space and made many users quite happy. Of course we're referring to the Conversation View. Gmail groups all messages in a particular reply thread together under a single heading. While the majority of users have been happy with the system, a small, but vocal, minority have been looking for a way to disable it. Now Google is obliging with a new feature addition.

Users that want to ditch the Conversation view and go back to the traditional way of showing emails (i.e. each message gets its own entry), can do so. In the main Gmail settings page, There is a new section called "Conversation View". There is a simple toggle for turning this on and off. Some feel that it is easier to find specific emails without the Conversations enabled. If you fall into that camp, look for the option to roll out to your account in the next day or two.

While most users might be perfectly happy with the way Gmail works, we want to know what you think. Will you leave Conversations on, or turn it off?
gmail
Image via Google"

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Monday, September 27, 2010

How Flash cookies threaten your privacy

I learned something I didn't know in this Kim Komando Tip of the Day of September 25. I read the whole tip with great interest and then followed Kim's advice on how to get control of this Flash Player invasion of my privacy. I had no idea. I recommend this as a worthwhile exercise. You may be surprised.

How Flash cookies threaten your privacy