Abstract
Results of a recent study highlight the lack of awareness among a wide majority of home computer users about malicious code and the tools they could use to protect their computers against it. The study was carried out by America Online and the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), which is promoting October as National Cyber Security Awareness Month.Technicians from AOL and NCSA went to the homes of more than 300 computer users and inspected their systems. Among the study's more alarming findings were that 80 percent of home computers are currently infected with spyware and that 90 percent of users with infected machines were completely unaware of the infection. Authors of the report's findings also noted that close to 60 percent of home users do not know the difference between a firewall and antivirus software and that two-thirds of users do not have a firewall installed. Although 85 percent of users had antivirus software installed on their computers, only one-third had updated it within the previous week. Of the computers studied, 20 percent had active viruses.