A security company reports that a trojan horse has stolen some 1.6 million records belonging to a few hundred thousand people from the Monster.com worldwide job search sites.   The stolen data includes the names, email addresses, phone numbers and postal addresses of the affected users. 

The information is then used to send these users realistic-looking, even personalized phishing emails that can infect their PCs with trojans and other malware. The trojans can monitor computers for logons, especially to banking sites.  Then it sends this username and password back to the hackers, and you can guess what happens to the bank account next.   

Or it claims to have encrypted all your files, and demands you pay a hefty fee for the unlock or decryption program.  This is so-called ransomware.  Monster.com is investigating, but at last word had not yet disabled the stolen accounts. 

(Get yourself a little thumb or flash USB drive, and back up your data.) 

If you are a Monster.com user, be extra careful and suspicious with your emails.  Update all your security programs and run them daily.  Update Windows.  If you have any difficulty with your computer, launch your machine in safe mode and run all your scans again.  In fact, that is good advice for all of us. 

Syd Tash is a noted computer security consultant and author of How to Protect Your Computer Online.  He has been keeping Internet surfers safe and secure since the last century.  Find out how he does it; protect your own computer with five layers of protection right here: =>http://mypcsecuritysite.com 

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