Hopedale‘s Hometown News Site

If you think you’re safe just browsing the internet for gift ideas, think again. Scammers are trolling your searches to identify which products shoppers are looking for. “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. If no one else has that product, and it’s a great price, just be very careful and proceed with caution.” says Melissa Lanning Trumpower, the Executive Director of the Better Business Bureau’s Institute for Marketplace.

The spinning rainbow wheel of death is one of the more frustrating sights in our modern world. A slow computer that takes forever to load web pages, open documents, and respond to pretty much any basic command is more common than you think. It’s often just a matter of poor maintenance or disorganization. If you're ready to get your computer back on the fast track, below are common culprits for a sluggish computer, plus the maintenance solutions that can have you up and running smoothly in no time.

Call 2020 the Year of the Phish. “Phishing” is when cyber criminals try to extract your confidential information by sending a phony email or SMS text that appears to be from a trusted source. According to a new report by Lookout, a mobile security platform, 88 percent of US consumer phishing attacks in 2020 have targeted mobile devices. Why the uptick? The COVID-19 pandemic has more of us working at home, using our phones and tablets to keep in touch and attending virtual meetings.

If your computer seems like it’s been extra sluggish and crashing a lot lately, you aren’t the only one feeling over-extended during this never-ending pandemic—your PC or Mac is feeling the burn, too. Internet usage has skyrocketed by 70 percent since many of us started staying home back in March. You’re connected all day long on platforms like Google Classroom, Google Hangouts, and Zoom. Then when you’re done for the day, you queue up Hulu or spend the evening shopping online. Your computer collects lots of data and files that quickly clog up its system with such frequent use. Here’s the good news: you don’t have to live with a frustratingly slow computer.

More than one million children were victims of identity theft in 2017, according to a report by Javelin Strategy & Research. Parents and grandparents aren’t powerless, though. The first thing you need is rock-solid anti-virus software program. Norton Security Online blocks out all the malware, viruses, and ransomware that could compromise your family’s most sensitive personal information, and it does it in real time. A single subscription applies to PCs, Macs, Android devices, iPhones, and yes, the iPads your kids are glued to.