As we addressed in our last blog post, “Why You Need to Update Your Computer” updates are extremely important to keep your computer’s security up-to-date! There are different kinds of updates that a program or OS sends out to keep your performance quality high: general system updates and patches.
What are patches?
Patches are software and operating system (OS) updates that address security vulnerabilities within a program or product. Software vendors may choose to release updates to fix performance bugs and to provide enhanced security features.
While general software updates can include lots of different features, patches are updates that address specific vulnerabilities. Vulnerabilities are “holes” or weaknesses in the security of a software program or operating system. These updates are smaller and much more frequent than whole operating system updates. And you will see almost all of your apps and programs doing patches constantly.
The reason they are so frequent is that cybercriminals and security researchers are constantly looking for a weak spot in your operating system’s fabric that could be used to break in and steal valuable data. Once they find that “hole”, security researchers will then create a patch and send it out as an update. It is up to us to be looking out for these patches and updating our apps, programs, and software as they come.
How do I ensure that I am keeping my computer most up-to-date?
Enable automatic software updates whenever possible. This will ensure that software updates are installed as quickly as possible.
Do not use unsupported software (for example, Windows stopped giving support to the Windows 7 operating system. This means that if you are still using this OS, you will not receive the security updates and will be extremely vulnerable to cybercriminals)
Always visit vendor sites directly rather than clicking on advertisements or email links.
Security vulnerabilities are forever present, but we can prevent complicating our user experience by simply updating our programs and software regularly.
Have questions? Call us at 855-728-6824 or come into the shop at 750 US-Hwy 24, Woodland Park, CO 80863