by Rob Douglas

One of the great advantages of editing a web site about identity theft, digital crime and information security, is the luxury of reading almost everything written about the topic on a daily basis.  From reports about unfolding criminal cases to the methods used to combat cybercrime, I get a gander in real time as the stories break.

Additionally, I get the opportunity to try out tactics or products to see if they work.  Today, while looking at Wired.com - a favorite site of mine – I came across an article by Ryan Singel at Wired’s Threat Level Blog titled Security Report: Most PCs Run Outdated, Hacker-Friendly Software. 

The article begins:

“Hardly anyone runs a PC without known holes that hackers can exploit, a Danish security company reports. Of those who run the company’s free security-scanning tool, nearly half have more than 11 out-of-date programs.

“Secunia Software’s Personal Software Inspector checks programs installed on a user’s computer to see if the latest, patched version is installed. More than 98 percent of users had at least one program that wasn’t the latest version, the company found in a study of 20,000 users of its software.”

True confession time.  Count me among the 98 percent of users with at least one program not up to date.  Fortunately, it was only one.  But, in the process of determining that the program needed patching, I also learned that I still had several older versions of the program installed that had the potential to leave me vulnerable – even after installing the latest version.

So, it just goes to show, even those of us who think we’re good about keeping our computers protected to the degree we can, need to be vigilant and stay abreast of the latest methods of attack and tools to detect vulnerabilities.