What are computer viruses, and where do they come from? Is online banking safe? What makes a good password, and why should you care? How do you tell a safe website from one that’s dangerous? Why do you have to keep “updating” things? How do you keep your email account from being hacked?
Come to The Well Event Hall (210 James Garner Ave, across the tracks from the Depot) April 29 at 6:30p.m., and take my free one-night class, “Fight The Internet Bad Guys & Win.” There, I will teach you how to prepare your Internet safety bug-out bag so you can stay safe on the Internet. Register first, please, seating is limited. Open to all ages, visit https://thewellok.org/all-classes/ or call 405-366-0671 to register and learn more. Sponsors include McClain Bank, McClure Law Office and The Norman Transcript.
Unlike old automobiles, which you might still be able to drive around town, perfectly functional computers can actually become worthless to their owners.
Sure, they may still turn on and work just as well as the day they were new, but they’re now too slow to run secure, modern programs and operating systems. These problems make them no longer safe to put on the Internet, which, for most folks, turns them into junk.
Throwing such junk into a dumpster, though, is not a good idea. You may already know that electronics waste can be bad for the environment. In addition to that, you may be throwing away something that someone else could use against you.
To prepare your computer for recycling, you must first take care of the hard drive. The “hard drive,” or the “SSD” (solid-state drive) is where all of your information lives; all of it.
All of your pictures, documents, everything you’ve ever made with your computer lives on the hard drive. Before getting rid of your computer, you must first clean up the hard drive (read my article, “Delete Your Files For Good”), or remove and keep the hard drive. You don’t want your private information falling into the wrong hands. Once that’s taken care of, it’s time to recycle what’s left of the computer.
Every year, at least once a year, the City of Norman has an event that allows Norman residents to recycle old electronics (they say, “anything that has a cord”) for free. It used to be called the “Hazardous Waste Recycling Event;” now it’s just called the “E-Waste Collection Event.”
“Do you have old electronic items like monitors, cell phones, printers, computers and other equipment at home?” the announcement at normanok.gov/events/e-waste-collection-event reads. “Safely dispose of them at the E-Waste Collection Event!”
They state that “all personal data will be wiped,” a claim I urge you to ignore. You have much more to risk than they do when disposing of your gear, so simply remove the hard drive yourself (call me if you need help with that) and you’ll know for sure what’s going on.
On May 3, from 9 a.m. to noon at 2501 Jenkins Ave (Reaves Park), bring your computers, televisions, copiers/scanners/printers, fax machines, laptops/tablets, ipods/MP3 players, audio/video equipment, PC speakers, keyboards, VCR/DVD/CD players, modems, telephones, computer monitors, and “anything with a cord!” They’ll see that it’s properly disposed of.
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