On Friday I reported that Microsoft claims it has essentially destroyed the Storm Trojan. You know, the one that has been rounding up computers into a botnet. Turns out, reports of Storm’s demise may have been exaggerated. Researchers at security company Trend Micro say Microsoft’s claims are simplistic and incomplete.

was indeed degraded by 20% - 25% by Microsoft’s Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT). The MSRT is distributed every month on Patch Tuesday, and is supposed to clean your computer of malware. But Storm may now be making a comeback.

In any case, Storm’s controllers have been diversifying into other areas. They seem to have split the huge into many parts, hosted all over the world. This makes it harder to track, detect and counter.

The Firefox browser from Mozilla has long been touted as safer than Internet Explorer, because Firefox does not accept those infamous controls, or mini-programs, and because it is not part of Windows. However, Firefox and Apple’s Safari for Windows have become so popular they may be attracting more attention from the bad guys.

You must update these browsers regularly, just like any other program. Launch and click Help, About Mozilla Firefox. You should have version 2.0.0.14. If you don’t, click Help, Check for Updates, and update the browser. Pay close attention to the download and update. Do not accept any add-ons or toolbars, unless you really want them.

If you have , update to version 3.1. If you don’t have Safari and find that you can still live a happy and fulfilling life, you will need to be careful. You will automatically get Safari when you update iTunes, unless you refuse it by unchecking the appropriate box.

Thunderbird and SeaMonkey will also need to be updated. Thunderbird is Mozilla’s email application. SeaMonkey is a community-driven Internet suite containing a browser, email and newsgroup application, HTML editor, IRC chat, etc. It relies on Mozilla for much of its source code.

Syd Tash is a noted computer security consultant and author of How to Protect Your Computer Online. He has been keeping Internet surfers safe and secure since the last century. Find out how he does it; protect your own computer with five layers of protection right here:
= > http://MyPCSecuritySite.com

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