Bob, thanks for the threads! I read them, and I have heard about emails being sent to people with links that will install things on your PC. Microsoft has come out with a number of critical updates to protect people from some of these where people are tricked into clicking a link mostly contained in an email. I suppose someone could sucker me into clicking on a link that could be a bad one and I could get something. But not very likely from email I get. I have my mail set up so I only can get mail from who I want and all Spam is deleted off the server.
I can see a small chance it could happen to me, but I make a image backup almost everyday to another hard drive (takes less than 10 minutes) usually when I take a shower. At times I burn a backup onto a DVD which is bootable. I can restore my PC to just about any week I choose up to 1 1/2 years ago, so I don't worry about bad programs, PC problems, viruses, and such.
I think most people are too click happy when they get on the web and don't pay attention as to what they click on and the consequences of their actions, or just plain get tricked to click on something. I'm sure you've seen the one that says "Your Computer is Not Optimized for the Web, do you want to Optimize it Now", so they think sure go ahead Optimize my PC. Many examples could be given of these ads and pop-ups that trick people to click on them.
For a long time I never used any antivirus software, and never picked up a virus when it seemed like everyone was getting them, and it was people who had a AV program installed who were still getting viruses. I guess they thought the attachment was ok to open because the AV program didn't see a virus in it. What seems strange to me is why these people never learned and still wind up getting a virus who have a AV program. I really think they think ' I have AV protection' and don't think or learn you don't open attachments. I have read and heard people make statments 'Man I sure am glad I have my AV program, it caught such and such a virus'. I know these people will open any blooming thing if the AV program doesn't tell them it's a virus.
One thing that was a shock to me was to find out there are other people like me who never even use AV software ( I use avast now, but a lot just for some testing I do.). I was listening to TV Tech on the radio here one day this year and Leo Laporte was interviewing Steve Gibson who is very big on security
http://grc.com/default.htm During the interview Leo asked Steve what AV program he used, he said he didn't use any, then Leo said he didn't use any either. And Leo is also very big on security. Leo's site is at
http://leo.typepad.com/radio/ and I'm sure you can even fined the interview still at Leo's site.
BTW, I recomend avast! to all my friends and on my web site, I have tried about 7 different AV programs out and like avast! the best. <S>
PS: last thing was I think I found the link to the interview if someone wants to hear it.
http://www.leovilletownsquare.com/archives/20040411-3.mp3J