This morning talking with a fellow publisher, the topic of antivirus programs came up. Seems someone somewhere is always talking about them.

Why? Because without a good system in place not only do you run the risk of a potential, complete computer shutdown, but you put your friends and associates at risk each time you contact them.

Let's face it, the world is full of brilliant people who's only apparent source of satisfaction is to make the rest of us using the internet completely miserable.

Unfortunately, they do a good job of it. However, you can, and must, do everything to protect yourself and others.

A quick little story might help illustrate my point...

My son's school is a public, charter affair. He "home schools," and the curriculum is on the internet. There are numerous families in Odyssey Charter, each emailing the teacher, and sometimes each other, with important information.

Last year, one of the mothers called me. She was desperate. Her child could not access the computer. She recalled getting a suspect email a few months earlier (few MONTHS?!) and since then nothing had been working right for them. Now it was a total disaster, the computer refusing to do anything.

After spending several hours a day at their house for several days, I did locate the problem - yes, a virus. A truly sneaky one at that.

Unfortunately, there was no saving anything nor any way to eliminate this threat. Yes, her hard drive had to be completely wiped. They lost everything - no backups, of course - but that's another story.

The thing is this tragedy could have been avoided. Why DID it happen in the first place?

The reason? Oh, they had an antivirus program, Norton, a good one, but guess what...? They never updated it! However, the truly sad (and comical!) part of all of this was Norton had expired THREE YEARS earlier!!

True! They thought once it was on the computer, it magically did everything itself, with no assistance from them. They were "protected!" Nary one live update, nor renewal of their subscription!

Norton AntiVirus does have an automatic Live Update feature. However, you must TELL IT to update by opening your software and setting the settings TO update (and more!).

Symantec, producers of Norton products, also have another program for those truly at risk. It's called the Intelligent Updater, and is located in their download area.

The Live Update virus definitions are released every Wednesday, more often if they deem it necessary. Manually downloading and installing (daily) through the Intelligent Updater link, your machine is always current - right then and there!

If you receive tons of email, and send lots of email in return, you'd do well to take a trip to Symantec's website each day and keep your own antivirus program current, manually.

http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/defs.download.html

Remember, those out there causing the grief are smart, if misguided. You must be smarter! Make sure you know your own antivirus program inside and out - and keep it current!

To your success!