Freedom I.T. Solutions

The idea that they've just purchased a lovely, shiny and new notebook or desktop with some hard earned cash and all you can do with it is look at a pretty screen and browse the web is quite a depressing one. Where is all the great software that allows me to do ‘things’ with this amazing piece of equipment? Well have no fear, because this issue presents a list of the ten pieces of software you may want:

1. OpenOffice – This is a great Office productivity package to rival the need to purchase a Microsoft Office license and is perfect if you need to only do light word processing and some basic number crunching on a spreadsheet.

2. Google Chrome – Chromium is my current favourite when it comes to browsing the web as it is so much faster and safer than Internet Explorer and is fully customisable. There are other options such as Mozilla Firefox or Opera Browser.

FRAUDSTERS posing as computer consultants are randomly targeting residents across Redditch telling them they can fix non-existent problems identified on their computer before stealing credit card details and other private information.

IT consultant Alex Haines, technical director with Winyates based firm Freedom IT Solutions, is now warning people to be on their guard as reports of the scam continue to grow.

The sophisticated fraud involves the tricksters cold calling people claiming they have been monitoring their machine and have spotted viruses or errors on it they can fix. They then ask the person to download remote support software - a programme which allows someone to access a computer over the internet without having to actually be in the same room as it.

It is a legitimate tool widely used by the IT industry but in this case the criminals start looking for information stored on the computer they can use such as bank account details or other personal information.

They also install supposed protective security software which actually falsely claims