The New Nation - Internet Edition

Your computer is an omnipresent part of your life: all your work is done on it, and then you book your holidays and buy your plane tickets using it -not to mention, all those on-line dating sites! But how many of us, can hand on heart say, that they do everything absolutely necessary to safeguard the data, whether it's having the latest anti-virus software to doing secure backups. We .give you five handy hints on what we should be doing. Ignore these at your peril.

We may all have computers in our homes but are we making sure we treat them with the best possible care? Certainly things can go wrong, but it's often a slippery slope from interrupted surfing to an unrecoverable crash.

And in the era of digital audio, video and pictures, a crash can result in much more than just a re-boot. It could mean the loss of your carefully collected music library or hundreds of holiday snaps and family photos. It could even mean an entire hard drive is corrupted and a new computer might have to be top of your wish listt

But there are a number of steps you can take to ensure fault-free computing from the comfort of your own home, without having to haul your beloved desktop or laptop down to a computer repair shop. Our tips range from protecting yourself while online, to getting your data recovered in case of a serious error.

Tip 1: Avoid a terminal illness

The biggest threats to home computing are viruses, worms, trojans and spyware - software applications, collectively called 'malware', that can infect your machine and get it to do things you don't know are happening.

A worm, for example, might install itself on your computer via an email from a friend unwittingly infecting your computer. Once installed, it could wreak havoc, including sending copies of itself to everyone in your address book (or just randomly deleting your data).

The best way to combat malware and ensure you still receive email newsletters and promotional offers from your favourite beauty brand is to have anti-virus software installed to catch anything suspicious. A personal firewall will also check the traffic in and out of your computer and flag any suspicious traffic.

Tip 2: Think without wires

Wireless computing is convenient, and means you don't need to rely on a phone or router connection - surfing from the comfort of your sofa or even in the garden is possible. In other words, no more trailing cables around the house. But wireless computing can be risky without the right security in place.

An unsecured wireless network in your house can be an invitation for bandwidth thieves to piggyback on your network and steal internet connectivity from right under your nose. More worryingly, a small number of people are capable of exploiting insecure wireless connections to view your internet traffic - such as reading your emails or instant messages - and even get access to your hard drive to see if there is any information stored such as bank account details.

The moral of the story? Make sure your router is protected with a password so only you - and people you know - can access your personal network.

Tip 3: Protect your identity

Identity theft continues to be a hot topic, but ID thieves don't need to rummage through your rubbish to find bank statements to be able to steal sensitive personal information. All they could need to sneak a look at your data or - even worse - spend your money for you, is an online password.

The most important way to protect your identity is to be suspicious. 'Phishing' emails - those that purport to be from a trusted source and ask for sensitive information, only to send it straight to an ID thief - are a common technique in online theft. Make sure you verify the source of any email you get that asks for personal information, even from high street stores where you regularly shop or your local gym, even if it looks legitimate.

And it may seem obvious… But don't tell anyone your online passwords or PIN numbers.

Tip 4: Call for backup

At the end of the day, there's no way you should lose any data at all if you're regularly backing your documents and work up. Back in the day, this meant hours of saving every file to disk, then storing them all in a cupboard to

gather dust.

Nowadays, there are online backup services that can save your precious work (and music, videos and images of friends and family) automatically online, without taking up valuable space on your computer, or in your house.

Tip 5: Maintain your composure

After all that, if something does go wrong, all is not lost - literally. Data recovery services are often extremely effective at getting back data that you think was lost forever (even if you've spilt a glass of coke on your laptop!).

There are also services to sign up to that will mean there's an IT expert on the end of the phone, seven days a week. And that doesn't mean calling up a technical expert who will pass your call around and spout jargon at you until you can't even remember how to work a mouse. Broadband internet speeds and always-on access mean experts can remotely take control of your PC and fix it there and then - right before your eyes.

But there is one critical piece of advice to remember should you suffer data loss, virus infection or fall foul of a phishing scam: Don't panic.