21 September, 2010
One of the many programs that you have already installed on your computer is Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE). This is essentially what we call a web browser and is used for that purpose. IE is not the only web browser that you can use as other manufacturers have produced web browsers going by the names Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari & many others. We don’t normally recommend using anything other than IE but it can come down to personal preference. All of these browsers are also getting constantly updated with patches and even version changes to keep them both efficient and secure. What is significant here is that you should always have the most recent version installed and some configuration is also a good idea. IE has dozens of settings and some of them should be changed away from their defaults. IE version 8 is the latest and has been out for a while now. If you are still using IE 6 or IE 7 you should consider updating using Microsoft Updates or even downloading version 8 and installing separately. Once you have version 8 we recommend that you go to Tools – Internet Options and the Delete radio button. Put a tick in in all of the boxes except maybe passwords and click Delete. It will think for a while and go back to the previous screen. Then also then put a tick in the box for ‘Delete browsing history on exit’ – click Apply and OK. These settings will help to keep you safer on the Internet by getting rid of temp internet files, cookies and browsing history as these areas are often responsible for harbouring virus files and tracking cookies. These settings will also give most users greater security when using Internet banking. Kerr Solutions is at 128 Musgrave Street & is contactable on 49 222 400.
