Compliments of Pixabay
Working from home during the COVID-19 lock down/quarantine/confinement sure has had its challenges! Since I last posted, a lot has happened to every one who inhabits this blue marble we call Earth and home. Not only are we still living in an alternate reality, that was created by those in power, but that alternate reality is slowly morphing into our new reality. What we knew to be true is being challenged daily. We seem to be ‘ruled’ by a new government that wants to take everything that was and change it. Normally I would say that change is good, but when you start with Cancel Culture and shaking the very foundations of what I/we believe in.
Let me go back to the beginning of February 2020. A lot was happening in my household at that time. No different then what was happening at anyone of a 100,000+ homes and families. I came down with what may have been COVID-19, before they had a name for it or a test. I had a massive upper respiratory infection, that kept me from work for a week. People that know me, thought I died, because I never took off of work. If it was not for the doctors at Fast Med who took a chest X-Ray and promptly prescribed an antibiotic, I may not have fared so well. I live in a household where we live paycheck to paycheck, just like most of you. At the time, my stress level was at DefCon 2. I had family issues that I won’t get into, but shall we say that when I had my heart attack on May 11, 2020, it came as no surprise! Again the doctors at Fast Med diagnosed me quickly and sent me to the local ER, where I found myself on an operating table and a surgeon was performing an angioplasty and after a few minutes said to the rest of the surgery team, that he was backing out because he couldn’t take a chance. As I lay there semi conscious, I was told that he did not have the talent on hand to continue the procedure and that I would be moved over to Charlotte Medical Center. After a quick ride in an ambulance and some more tests, I found myself on another operating table and the surgeon performed the procedure and was able to insert a stint in one of my two blocked arteries. Two were blocked, one 100% and one 60%. He opened up the latter one and inserted a stint. He said that he could not do anything with the other one and that they would try to remove the blockage via medication. Fun fact, my heart had grown a third artery to bypass the 100% blocked one! The body is a wondrous thing! I went back to a room to be monitored and then sent home to my extremely happy wife and family. As everyone knows, there were no visitors allowed at the hospital at that time, and she couldn’t get any answers to what they were doing to me. I was prescribed 7 different medications, which I am still on as of this writing. My stress levels have dropped dramatically because my household got smaller by 2. My Mom went back to NY to live with my brother and my Mother In Law passed on at 92 of natural causes.
I got home on Thursday and was sitting in front of my computer by the next morning. (I told you I didn’t like missing work!). Luckily for me, I was still working remotely from home to support the company that I worked for. Which I am still working from home to support them. I go into the office a few days a week when the need arises. Which is good because it is a beautiful 30 minute ride. My company’s management team meets once a month to discuss coming back to work. Which has not happened as yet. Right now, we are looking at June 1, 2021 as a return date. Which will, with all that is going on, I think, will get postponed again.
Compliments of Pixabay
During this time security concerns have always been top of the list. Hackers, Cyber Terrorist, etc have unleashed so many attacks on the citizens of the world that it has kept me very busy. No matter which hat I am wearing (W2 employee or business owner) the treats and concerns are still the same. With so many people out of work or on the government sponsored stimulus plans. But no matter what their employment status or income level, hackers still want and will continue to try to breach their computers and get what they want. Sometimes that is personal information, that they will bundle like a bank does with mortgages, and sell it, or it is taking control of government systems and waiting for the right time to execute their plans to compromise anything from the power grid, to nuclear power plants, to our water systems or our armed forces systems. Imagine trying to fire a missile to deter a foreign power and because the missile’s guidance system has been compromised because it is guided by computers and it either doesn’t fire or it hits the wrong target!
My business suffered just like everyone else’s except I provided remote monitoring and management of peoples’ computers. Due to layoffs, etc. a lot of people had to make tough decisions. My service was one of the first thing that was cut from their budgets. I can’t blame them though. I tried to steer them to the best paid antivirus products such as Malwarebytes Premium. I am not fan of free antivirus products as you get what you pay for and in the case of free antivirus products, you think you are protected when you are not. To educate my friends and clients, I found a great website that posted the following: https://www.cprou.com/software/7-disadvantages-of-a-free-antivirus-program/ I highly recommend that you read it. Knowledge is power. BTW, I am not in any affiliate programs with any products, so I gain no monetary rewards for you buying their products. Right now it is easier to post their URLS and let you make informed decisions on your own, or if you feel you need another view, please feel free to drop me a message.
So as to not get political, because that can not only be easy at times, but can cause unwanted problems. I prefer to write about computers, security, and how to help people become more educated about using them. If you think you are safe, you are wrong. Chances are your information has already been harvested from a company that has had its systems breached and they downloaded millions of people’s personal information, including your DOB, email addresses, passwords, and phone numbers. Here is another utility that I like. Another free one! https://monitor.firefox.com/ Type in your email address, old or new, and see which breaches your information was included in. Then you can work to resolve that. Most times, that is just changing your passwords, which I recommend doing at least every 90 days.
Some other tips on protecting yourself that I give to my clients is to make sure that your computer’s Operating System, ie Windows 10 has all the latest updates. If your computer is running extremely slow and buggy, there might be a partial downloaded Windows update that is preventing your computer from functioning properly.
Another tip is to remove any and all programs from your computer that you have not used in a while or ones that you downloaded and never used. You would be surprised at what can be downloaded on to your computer without your knowledge.
More in a week (not a year) …
Rich Schierer
Survivor