A Proton Storm

Aurora Computers have been offering computer repairs in Wetherby, Harrogate, Leeds, and surrounding villages for over 8 years.

We have built up a unique client base of over 4,000 unique clients, if you have any issues you need us to help you with please call 01937 586888 or visit http://www.auroracomputers.co.uk/genericrepairs.php

January sees the highest numbers of server and workstation failures, with offices left cold and unused for the last week of December.

Server failures can cause catastrophic issues for companies with as many as 80% of companies failing to survive a major loss of data, if you’ve come back to your office this January to find any of your systems are not functioning as expected please call a member of our team on 01937 586888.

HAPPY NEW YEAR HAVE A GREAT ONE

a Sky News investigation has found some computer repair shops are illegally accessing personal data on customers’ hard drives – and even trying to hack their bank accounts.

In one case, passwords, log-in details and holiday photographs were all copied onto a portable memory stick by a technician. In other shops, customers were charged for non-existent work and simple faults were misdiagnosed.

The investigation was carried out using surveillance software loaded onto a brand-new laptop, it operated without the user being aware that every event that took place on the computer was being logged.

All activity on the screen was captured in still images, and the identity of whoever was using the computer was recorded using the laptop’s built-in camera. Sky engineers then created a simple, easily diagnosable fault, by loosening the connection of the internal memory chip. This prevented Windows being able to load. To get things working again, the chip would simply need to be pushed back into position.

The investigation targeted six different computer repair shops. All but one misdiagnosed or overcharged for the fault. The most serious offender was in Hammersmith, West London. Shortly after identifying the real fault, an engineer called our undercover reporter to say the computer needed a new motherboard (most shops can fix faulty laptop motherboards in all but a few cases, Aurora Computers included).

The surveillance software then recorded one technician browsing through the files on the hard-drive, including private documents and intimate holiday photos, including some of our researcher in her bikini. As he snooped through the files, he is seen smiling and showing the pictures to another colleague. Later on in the same shop, a second technician loads up the machine and also looks through the photos, which are inside a folder clearly marked ‘private’.

He then plugged his own portable memory stick into the laptop and copied files, including passwords and photos. Inside one of the documents copied to the memory stick was a text file containing passwords for Facebook, Hotmail, eBay and aa bank account. Once the technician had discovered this information, he opened a web browser on the laptop and attempted to log into the back account for around five minutes but was ultimately unsuccessful as the details were fake.

When confronted over the findings, staff said they did not want to respond to Sky News on camera. However in a telephone conversation, they denied all knowledge of the alleged abuses.

“It’s a big abuse of trust. If you were expert in computers you wouldn’t have to hand in your machine to be repaired. They know that. They know you won’t be able to tell what they’ve done afterwards, they know you’re putting your trust in them and unfortunately, as we’re seeing, there are too many people willing to abuse that trust. What you’ve shown is that there is a much wider problem in the industry than we knew about. It suggests we need to look at the area again and we do need to test it like you have done, but with a view of taking criminal enforcement action if these problems are found and evidenced.”

PC World in Brentford demanded an advance payment of £230 for a new motherboard. However, on collection Sky engineers discovered that only the loose memory chip had been replaced. PC World have since apologised and refunded the £230.

You may or may not have realised that Windows Vista is not the fastest Operating System available.

One simple way of getting a bit more from your system in terms of performance is to turn off Windows Vista Aero Theme.

Disabling Aero on Windows Vista

Right-click on the desktop and choose Personalize. Click the “Window Color and Appearance” link:

Then in the next screen, click the link near the bottom for “Open classic appearance properties for more color options”

Now you should be able to disable Aero altogether by choosing Windows Vista Basic in this screen:

And there you go one (slightly) faster computer, for any more advice on computer repairs or maintenance call Aurora Computers on 01937 586888.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/dec/05/google-panda-update-endangered-species?newsfeed=true

A tweak in the way Google ranks websites has had serious consequences for many web-based businesses and has led to accusations of anticompetitive practices.

All relationships should have give and take. We are very thankful to all the companies and residential customers using our repairs service and want to give a little something back.

Send us an email at customerservice@auroracomputers.co.uk and we will take a few minutes out to answer all you queries to the best of our ability.

Please be aware we do receive a high volume of traffic to this address and we will en devour to reply ASAP.

Schools hit by last-minute £155m budget cut | Education | The Guardian.

Huge budget cuts mean that more and more schools are having to squeeze budgets as much as possible, we have been working closely with a few schools to make sure that their delivery of service isn’t affected by squeezed budgets.

We work hard to ensure that the quality of education they deliver through I.T. is as high as always.

BBC – Watchdog: Are you a Techguys-ophobe?.