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Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

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Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#71

Post by daddykotex »

rwhitman wrote: post #66

My mom has had various Windows PCs since the late 90's. About every 3 to 6 months or so I get a call that it's "stopped working" and has either locked up completely or is moving at a crawl. Nearly every time it takes me hours if not days to do a bunch of scans, install updates and purge whatever garbage has been installed by various malware that she's somehow managed to find. I've done more than a few clean wipes, bo…

I'm genuinely not sure this is a Windows problem. They might get infected on pretty much any OS if they navigate anywhere without precautions (as most parents do, including mine).

I'd like to see if a something like DeepFreeze could help here (there are probably alternatives here, DeepFreeze just came first in my mind).

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#72

Post by mabbo »

mercer wrote: post #56
bsenftner wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the answer.

Yeah, I didn't even know this existed! I still think that the second-best answer is to get a tablet or phablet. My grandmother has mostly switched to an iPad and the vast majority of real problems disappeared. There's the occasional 'how I do get photo to target ', but nothing serious. Feels a bit like defeat though.

It's been around a long time- I'm 30 and my friends and I spent time trying to figure out ways around it in high school. (My little brother and his friends eventually did- they acquired the admin password).

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#73

Post by protomyth »

danieltillett wrote: post #69
thomaskcr wrote: post #9

Use Deepfreeze or something similar. You'll mark a their documents directory as excluded and then every time they restart their machine it'll be back to the exact state it was in when you first set it up. You don't want to have to support them using a new OS for the first time - you'll be in for a headache. I use Deepfreeze for anyone who is a "problem user" and most don't even realize they have it if it's set up rig…

What does it cost? The faronics website seems to avoid minor details like pricing.

$45 w/1 year maintenance https://store2.esellerate.net/store/checkout/CustomLayout.as...

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#74

Post by protomyth »

thomaskcr wrote: post #9

Use Deepfreeze or something similar. You'll mark a their documents directory as excluded and then every time they restart their machine it'll be back to the exact state it was in when you first set it up. You don't want to have to support them using a new OS for the first time - you'll be in for a headache. I use Deepfreeze for anyone who is a "problem user" and most don't even realize they have it if it's set up rig…

We run Deepfreeze in our library and its cut out all of the problems we were having. Very solid product, but a little spendy. We will probably deploy it a bit more widely when we go to Windows 10.

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#75

Post by andrewf »

imadfy wrote: post #59
antisthenes wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might be the best argument for using an adblocker indiscriminately. For whatever reason, the web got to this point where non-technical people get infected within minutes, whatever advertising revenue is lost by content creators isn't worth my headaches providing tech support to family members and friends.

It's truly pathetic that Google is selling ads that respond to a search for "Chrome" with malware.

to google for "chrome" on internet explorer

Is google being used as a generic verb here, in relation to Internet Explorer's default search engine?

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#76

Post by ben_jones »

Great post. My father is similar to yours, but is also incredibly vehement about his privacy. A few years ago he fell victim to a fake microsoft support scam (foreign accent, cc details over the phone, etc.) and gave them full root access over whatever screen share software they used. He paid a few hundred bucks for them to fix fake problems on the PC, and I could never convince him that it was in fact a scam.

I've since given up completely on locking down the computer or protecting them from themselves in that regard. I occasionally get talked into basic tech support, but thats it.

It's really a relationship problem if anything (IMO).

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#77

Post by thomaskcr »

danieltillett wrote: post #69
thomaskcr wrote: post #9

Use Deepfreeze or something similar. You'll mark a their documents directory as excluded and then every time they restart their machine it'll be back to the exact state it was in when you first set it up. You don't want to have to support them using a new OS for the first time - you'll be in for a headache. I use Deepfreeze for anyone who is a "problem user" and most don't even realize they have it if it's set up rig…

What does it cost? The faronics website seems to avoid minor details like pricing.

$45, I believe there are alternatives I just don't really know anything about them.

You're right about their site though, every single time they've changed it the site has looked more scammy/crappy and been harder to get where I need to go. If I hadn't used their product before I would go to that site and immediately leave.

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#78

Post by ben_jones »

rwhitman wrote: post #66

My mom has had various Windows PCs since the late 90's. About every 3 to 6 months or so I get a call that it's "stopped working" and has either locked up completely or is moving at a crawl. Nearly every time it takes me hours if not days to do a bunch of scans, install updates and purge whatever garbage has been installed by various malware that she's somehow managed to find. I've done more than a few clean wipes, bo…

You should try to automate that? Maybe auto-backup anything important and just have the ability to re-image remotely?

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#79

Post by ben_jones »

knz wrote: post #41
davio wrote: post #24

After my mom got scammed online, I had "the talk" with my parents and we agreed that they would just use iPads and iPhones. I've had no tech support calls for a couple of years now. I think a chromebook is a good option if a keyboard is required. It's a losing battle at this point. Your time is better spent educating them against social engineering attacks (I'm still afraid my mom is going to return a call to the voi…

> It's a losing battle at this point. Your time is better spent educating them against social engineering attacks (I'm still afraid my mom is going to return a call to the voicemail the "IRS" left) The "This is Microsoft calling..." scams are even worse. Many older people have very little understanding of what is actually installed on their computer and what the various pieces do. My mother in law has fallen for the…

To go into detail, you'll get a call from "Microsoft", generally with a foreign accent, and they'll have you sit at your computer, screen share, and give them root access. Then they'll do some powershell command that makes scary messages flash on the screen and have you buy whatever plan in order for them to "clean" it. Usually a couple hundred bucks.

My deeper fear is that they rooted my dad's machine and have been up to nefarious stuff ever since, but i'll never know. He won't let me touch it.

Oh and the IRS is now contracting private debt collectors, so there may now be "legitimate" calls regarding the IRS....

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#80

Post by Piskvorrr »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #32

tldr: Linux. I had more or less the same issue (except things still booted) with my parents about 5 or 6 years ago. In a move I thought was insane, I put them on Xubuntu. I moved them to Mint for a while, but they are back to Xubuntu. It's my preferred distro, and the Ubuntu base (for good support) and XFCE (Windows familiarity) made me comfortable it was Mom and Dad proof. Aside from showing them where things are, t…

This. I have an order of magnitude more issues with Windows (8.1, GWX, Anniversary Edition, oy vey!) than with Lubuntu (I support the same number of both box types for family). To wit, I'm typing this while restoring a WinX box to a point pre-Anniversary: Windows has become more of a bother than it's worth, sometime around Win8.
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