Broadband: Section 5

Virus checking alone will not help you if someone tries to access your machine remotely.

When you have an "always on" broadband connection to the Internet, you become a fixed and stable point that can be located by others.

Sometimes these contacts will be made by legitimate vendors such as Microsoft. Part of their corporate ethos is to check to see that you have up- to-date software on your machine. If not, they can then make sensible commercial recommendations to you. (Whether or not you want this to happen is an entirely separate matter)

Sometimes these contacts may be made by nefarious people wanting to damage your systems or your data. There is no justifiable reason why anyone would want to do this.

Sometimes these contacts may be made by nefarious people wanting to use your computer as a jumping off point to another service which they wish to infiltrate. They are basically using your system to cover their tracks. There is no justifiable reason why anyone would want to do this.