Internet Password Management

What is a keylogger?

Passwords used for your Internet accounts can be open to the world. The same rules we discussed for regular passwords apply to Internet passwords, and we need to add a few more.

There is a very good chance that you bank online, purchase products online, and, perhaps, manage investments online. You may access your office computer from home. You may access all of the above from a WIFI location with your wireless laptop.

Do you know what a keylogger is? Look at this sales pitch from a company that makes them. It allows you to secretly track and record all users' activities on any PCs or laptops, including:

The Kicker: Remotely deployed keylogger spy software can be installed on a remote PC through an email attachment without the PC user recognizing the installation at all (no physical installation needed)!!! It also allows you to monitor the target computer from any location through any web browser via your own member account - regardless of whether the target remote machine is online or not!

Do you think the bad guys might use this to obtain login and password information? Here's a more difficult question: do you think the sun might rise in the East tomorrow morning?

Please allow me to repeat a sentence from the first article: Password Management. Think of your passwords as keys to everything you own. Now, you receive an email from someone you do not know, and you open it to find a message like:

Mary and Jack went up the hill because Jill was busy tending sheep.

And you wonder, 'What was this fool thinking?' There's a good chance that fool just installed a keylogger on your computer and can now track everything you type.

Why is this legal?

Companies use it to track what employees are doing. Parents use it to track what their children are doing. And, surely, it's a tool used in the war against terror. See our article on Computer Spyware.

How Do You Protect Yourself?

Realize that you cannot be careful enough to fully protect yourself. You have a computer with email. That's all you need to become a victim. It is not necessary for you to visit any website.

Next, and this is the more difficult part, realize that free programs are not nearly as good as those that cost a few dollars. You get what you pay for is certainly applicable in this arena.

Now for the most difficult part. Realize it can happen to you. You will open one of those emails if for no other reason than curiosity. You should also know that there are other programs that may have infested one of your friends' computers, got access to your email address and emailed you a keylogger from your friend.

Help is Available

Beth and I use two particular software products. One is an encrypted password manager that is available in two versions, one of those versions being free to allow you to see just how powerful it is. Of course, their hope is that you'll upgrade to the more powerful version and spend a few dollars. We have used this for quite some time now and have found it to be everything it says it is. Here is a link to an article about our preferred Password Management Software for the Internet.

The second product is PC Magazine's highest rated (October 2006) Antispyware Program. It is powerful, easy to use and, among other things, roots out any keyloggers you might have on your computer now in additional to knocking them out of emails you receive in the future. Because of its importance, we have prepared an article entitled Spyware Buster Plus you can read by clicking that link.