Warning--- large increase of updates likely needed to keep your computer virus and worm free

Now i recognize that the vast majority people reading this are at least as computer literate as me if not more so. However the way i see the situation it is getting serious enough that a warning should be put on my blog.

There are two new viruses (well one is a worm) that were identified on the 31st of May. If you haven't updated you virus checker DO IT NOW. I know it can sometimes be easy to skip a day or so.

I noticed something was going (other the usual) because my virus checker automatically gives me an update when one is available. The company i'm with favours small updates so there is one on Monday and then whatever is new since then. However it's uncommon to have a week with 5 updates (although not unheard of). But i kept getting them, more than one a day. By today (Wednesday) i'm on my seventh update. Since Monday! Also yesterday my backbone went down for a while, which is likely related and the combo of the number of updates and that had me checking(in this case i went to Norton because they keep records on new outbreaks, McAfee i also go to sometimes...Both are good). .

From what i understand one things tries to turn off firewalls on top of everything else. You can go look at Norton for a recent threat analysis (i see there are a few more that have popped up since then. Or go whether you usually do. I don't know how common that is as i just keep my system updated and I've had a lot of updates. I think this must be unusual. By now they and McAfee should have tools to take them off particularly if you have it but can't update your anti-virus as a result (and if you can't update you likely have them...).

I only have two other suggestions. Put up a firewall. It won't work so that you can't get a virus but it makes it harder and you would be notified if you had unusual traffic going out easier. I put one on in August and i've been quite amazed. It's blocked over 36,000 things since then. I wouldn't have believed it if i hadn't seen it.The only other thing i would say is if you are using AVG think of switching to something else. This is totally personal opinion and it comes after i changed (as i got a virus, not necessarily the fault of AVG it happens, that's life) and the two new programs i tried found all sorts of stuff that AVG had missed (mostly small trojans that didn't look like they were a major problem, but it showed what had been missed and should have been cleaned off, and neither program was for trojans).

Both the firewall and the virus program i use are free. If you are using AVG or another free program (i'm sure Norton does as well if not a lot better than my program, i'm biased and think as close to as well) for viruses that i would be willing to send out on email what program i'm using although i take no responsibility for how it works. Keep in mind having multiple running virus programs can cause real problems. I've been with my virus program for almost a year now and i'm quite happy with it. I like that you can get automatic updates. Also it recently added Linux to the type of systems it works on, although if you have Linux running you probably don't need any information on virus programs. If you find firewalls hard i can tell you what i use (i had a hard time getting one to work). If you don't have one but it's no problem to get it working you can go to various freeware spots to download something in general. Mine is simplistic and doesn't given me as much info as many firewalls (or as much as i would like) but i was able to get it to work (i tried with other basic firewalls first and i couldn't get them to work) and i find it very user friendly if you are the non computer or user but not techy.

If you do want to contact me a link to my email is in my profile.

Update It is Thursday evening and i'm now on my 11th update for the week. And my server has gone down twice. Whatever is going around is nasty. Protect yourself.P

Electronic Voting Machines in Refendum in France Had Three Buttons: On the democratic right to spoil a ballot or leave it blank

France is voting today on the EU referendum [I started this entry on the 29th of May] (and i'm reading about it). One thing that struck me was in their pictures section. They have a picture of a voting machine.(i'm hoping to track it down soon but the article is just as interesting without the picture..It's from either the Guardian or the Observer). Now i don't know how that machine keeps tracks of votes, so i can't really comment on that (is there a paper trail to follow if there is a problem and such). There can be many problems with machines and i tend to favour a good old paper vote...They can always be recounted later and if need be go to court over votes (this used to happen around where i live in municipal elections a lot, they tend to be close). But what interested me was that in a yes, no referendum there was a third button.

There was a Yes, No and a button that you would press if you were going to leave a ballot empty. I think it is a real innovation and something we should be thinking about and keeping in mind as more of the voting becomes electronic.

They brought in an electronic system in my city for municipal voting a number of elections ago. Now, i tend to be the type that votes not spoils their ballot. But i have been known to spoil ballots if i'm not happy with any possibility. In university i regularly spoiled at least one of the eight to ten ballots i would get on voting in student elections. I wanted to vote for president and financial Officer and often referendum questions, but that didn't mean i felt i knew enough to vote on all of the different ballots there were. If i didn't know enough or didn't have a clear position i spoiled the ballot. Considering less than 20% of students voted at all i was satisfied with that.

When the first election in my area occurred after it became obvious we would have amalgamation but it hadn't happened yet it was the first time i came across a ballot that would be counted by a computer. And i remember being terribly frustrated. There had been no real race for mayor because it was obvious the position was only for about a year. At the same time i didn't want to vote for the unknown small candidate as i knew i didn't support his positions.

All of the things you could vote for were on one ballot. It was like the old standardized tests at school, from what i can tell it read the lead of the ballots. So i filled in my ballot with the mayor vote spoiled (but with a vote on school trustee, local representative etc. and handed it in. They had a feature whereby the machine could read the vote and tell you if there was a problem in it (even while it was in an enveloped where it couldn't be seen) which was smart. There was a problem however:

It wouldn't read a spoiled ballot. At all. I couldn't spoil for mayor and vote on anything else. When it said i couldn't read mine i told them I'd spoiled in one area and that i felt it was my right to express displeasure over who was available. Well it turned out either i needed to spoil the whole ballot or none of it.

I tried talking to the representative of the returning officer in my poll. In federal and provincial elections there is still a way you can hand the ballot back after being given it and get noted in the book. This is there so that people can feel they have done their citizens duty (turning up to vote) and not voting for whatever reason, but not spoiling the ballot. So i tried this. But i couldn't return part of the ballot if i wanted to return it i had to return the whole thing.

Now in North America my right to spoil a ballot doesn't seem to be taken all that seriously. Most voting machines I've looked at don't allow you to deliberately spoil your ballot (they seem to be set up so you can't, idiot proof if you want). I find it very interesting that it is considered an important enough right in France that they put an extra button on the machines that were used for voting. Maybe we should take an example from them. People should have the right to say they think the choices suck, but still vote on other candidates. I checked and the machine didn't even keep track of spoiled ballots in my city. If and when we start doing more electronic balloting (i still think the good old put your X on the paper is the best way to vote!). And making sure there is only one person to vote for on each piece of paper...Even if it is more papers overall.P