Online Gaming Could Be Threatening the Safety of Your Computer

Online gaming is something that just becomes more and more popular. A survey was conducted in June of 2010 by Nielsen NetView about Internet usage. It was discovered that the time that individuals spend playing online games has overtaken the time that individuals spend on their e-mail. The only other thing that consumes more individual's time when they use the Internet is social networking sites. According to the survey, U.S. citizens spend more than 407 million hours of time per year gaming online.

Unfortunately, Nielsen NetView is not the only one that has taken notice of this trend. Cybercriminals have recognized this latest time consumer for Americans as well. They have not only recognized but they have also begun to infect gaming websites. Anything from a legitimate forum and tutorial assistance site to a sketchier download site could possibly infect your computer.

Obviously not every site is infected with some sort of virus, but it is necessary to be careful and to be aware of the possibility of a hacker. Ondrej Vlcek, chief technical officer of the Czech security company Avast, said, “As the gaming industry continues to grow, hackers will inevitably develop more ways to target this massive group.” Avast is an antivirus supplier that constantly gathers data about infected websites. Every month they release a “Most Wanted List” that reveals the very worst sites currently on the Web. On October 6th Avast released their riskiest gaming websites so that customers could be warned before their computer becomes infected. Here is the list:

• Gamesfactoryinteractive.com
• Games-digest.com
• Mariogamesplay.com
• Anywhere-games.com
• Galacticflashgames.com
• Towerofdefense.com

Avast recommends a few simple things to keep your computer from being infected while you are gaming online. One important thing is to make sure that you keep all of your apps and antivirus programs up-to-date. You should also make sure not to turn off your antivirus program while you are playing online games. It can be annoying to have an antivirus program running when you’re playing a game, but you can switch over to your antivirus gaming function so that you can play uninterrupted. One last tip is that you should be extremely careful when downloading games via warez sites because they are known for spreading malware.

Viruses are a huge deal. It is definitely something that you don’t want to have to deal with on your computer. With just a few simple precautionary steps, you can make sure that your computer is safe from threats, and you can still enjoy your online games. Don’t give up your online gaming. Just be smart and safe, and your computer should be just fine.

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