Red Pill Leadership: Wake up and be a better leader

Facebook has been riddled with some kind of trojan and/or spyware the past few months. Here are some ways to help limit your exposure to these nasty critters. 

1. Make sure you are running anti-virus software. McAfee and Norton are used in corporate environments. For home use I suggest Avast (which is free) and PcTools Spyware Doctor Spyware+Anti-Virus version (it is $20).
2. Install Spyware protection. My favorite is PcTools Spyware Doctor. If you purchase the Spyware+Anti-Virus version you’ll get great virus and spyware protection in one package.
3. Never click on any link (YouTube or otherwise) that looks suspicious. If a friend’s status update is a link or a link with a phrase such as “This is funny” or “You gotta see this” or “This is a great article”…DO NOT CLICK IT. Here are some examples of suspicious links.
4. Only click on links where your friend gives context to the link. For example, here are a few examples that I would say are “safe”.
   

   Note the verbose description to give context to the video and the embedded video itself.

   

   Note the link and the embedded article.

5. If you click on a link from within Facebook and you go to a page (even if it looks like YouTube, the New York Times, CNN, FoxNews, etc.) and the page asks you to download a “new version of Flash” or to download anything else…DO NOT DOWNLOAD.

Don’t be scared to click on links, just be smart about it. Post a status update asking your friends to give their links and YouTube videos context so you can decipher the bad links from legitimate ones. 

If you did click on a suspicious link, then you will need to IMMEDIATELY purchase spyware and virus scanning and removal software. I found PcTools Spyware Doctor to be particularly effective. 

Don’t take this lightly! These are insidious critters as some are keyboard loggers and capture EVERYTHING you type including bank account numbers, user names, passwords, credit card numbers, and perhaps sensitive work information as well. Everything captured gets sent to pretty seedy individuals who I’m sure do not have your best interests in mind. 

 Practice safe Facebooking!