The fifth instalment of the AVG Digital Diaries study, “Digital Coming of Age“, reveals some really interesting new stats about how today’s parents perceive their teens’ online activity.

One of the most surprising findings from the research is that 44% of parents keep tabs on their teens by accessing their Facebook account without their consent.

This brings us to ask, is this a new kind of parental relationship, or is it spying?  

AVG (AU/NZ)’s Security Advisor, Michael McKinnon, adds:

“AVG’s latest research encourages us to consider whether Facebook and other social networking sites are creating a new kind of parental relationship, or whether we are in effect spying on our teens? These sites are providing parents with new methods to monitor what their kids are doing without necessarily having to be ‘heavy handed’ or to quiz their child directly.”

It seems that while parents may have previously turned a blind eye to their kids’ activity online, they are now starting to wake up to the dangers presented by this private playground. But with that said, there are ways to address concerns around teens’ online activity, without the need to spy.

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User attitudes towards technology have changed. Gone are the days of green screens, slow downloads, clunky keyboards and complex set up procedures. Today we find ourselves surrounded by touchscreen user interfaces, geolocation-aware mobile devices and ‘one-click’ installation procedures.

The sum result of these developments is that we expect three things from technology today: usability, usability and usability.

It is perhaps little surprise then that when it comes to endpoint protection for managing small business to medium sized business networks – ‘ease-of-use’ is surely ranked to be of paramount importance to most firms.

This fundamental user consideration has been at the heart of the development of AVG’s Internet Security Business Edition 2012 from the word go. So much so that independent management usability testing of IT endpoint security solutions for small businesses (SMBs) rated AVG as Best-in-Class Usability for performing a number of management tasks. Read more…

The mobile revolution offers flexible businesses a significant productivity boost, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of security.

Thanks to the rise of laptops, smartphones and tablets, your business now extends far beyond the front desk. These smart gadgets let staff spend less time tied to their desks and more time on the job, but there’s an alarming level of complacency when it comes to these devices and the issue of mobile security.

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Could your computer or networking equipment be one of more than 10,000 that are still affected by the “DNSChanger” malware from last year?

Let me first explain what DNS is, and then explain this amazing situation – which has left the FBI holding the bag, and over 10,000 users in Australia and New Zealand potentially in the lurch, with no access to the Internet after July 9 2012.

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At AVG (AU/NZ), we take our community’s protection seriously – so as well as providing you with great security software, we also want to keep you informed about the latest online threats and scams.  

We have become aware of a new mobile security threat, courtesy of our AVG Mobilation™ Research Team.

The threat is a malicious application named ‘Crazy Vampire’ – a modified version of a calendar application, in which the developer has added malicious code, changed the name, icon, sign and user interface.

The malware targets Chinese users, and aims to have them upgrade to the premium service of the infected application.

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Since 1991, AVG has been at the vanguard of consumer protection. We’ve been working to protect you and your family from computerised security risks well before the online community had even heard of Yahoo!, and we already had a trusted AVG Free product by the time the dot com bubble burst all over the US stock markets in the year 2000.

With the release of today’s AVG 2012 Service Pack 1, we are excited to mark a new milestone in our online security journey. From today, AVG 2012 will let users decide how their activity is tracked online and put control of online privacy back in their hands.

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At AVG (AU/NZ), we take our community’s protection seriously – so as well as providing you with great security software, we also want to keep you informed about the latest online threats and scams. 

Here’s what to look out for this week, courtesy of our Threat Research Group:

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When you were born, you were given a “name” and like it or hate it, in the years that have passed by it has been kicked around the schoolyard and written on all of your birthday cards. It is something you recognise immediately, whenever you hear it shouted from across the room or whispered quietly into your ear.

So, I ask you this, what would you be without your name? After all, your name is merely just a label given to you by someone else – surely the “unlabelled” you is just human flesh and blood, right?

Okay, I think you get the point that names are pretty serious things that form your very identity – in fact, if you don’t have a name, then society gives you one, and you’d be called John or Jane Doe!

Along with your name, there are lots of other important pieces of personal information and documentation that make you who you are (or, at least prove it to others!), and these things make up your identity.

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We all love a great story, and many of the great stories usually involve some nasty villain getting their just desserts, while celebrating the victim who becomes the victor… and it’s even better when a scammer is involved!

In the online world, some of the funniest stories about getting back at scammers encourage a thing called scam-baiting, which according to Wikipedia, is a form of Internet vigilantism. 419 Eater is an example of this.

I’m not one to condone or condemn such vigilante actions against scammers, but when we look at scam-baiting, we can see how scammers have a very deep and emotional effect on people. Victims feel the need to fight back.

Indeed, scammers appear to constantly push our buttons. Whether you have to slam the phone down after an abusive phone call, or you’re annoyed at being inundated with spam messages promising fake jobs or romantic affairs, it’s hard not to be affected in some way or another.

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As always, Twitter is a flurry of activity, with many people around the world talking about AVG and its products.

However, it has been brought to our attention today that a scam exists, whereby tweets contain a link (hidden by a link-shortener) that encourages users to access a website made-up to look like the official AVG site.

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