Bob is correct. The issue you are expressing concern about is keyloggers. They piggyback unto a user's system normally on some trite item for example free smiley faces or free fonts. Once embedded they can note and transmit any key stroke a user makes. As far as credit card safety: I have had my Chase Visas hijacked three times. This will be old news to longtime members, I have two Chase Visa accounts, not cards but rather accounts. I carry one account in my wallet, and the other is used only on the Internet and never leaves the house. Three years ago both were hijacked within 10 days. Fortunately everything was cleaned up in ten days. Just several months ago the one in my wallet was hijacked. I hadn't used it in months. This time Chase contacted me and the issue was resolved in four days. Based on the both circumstances and the readiness of Chase to resolve in a timely manner without question, I believe Chase got cracked by hackers both times. So if I am correct, if card issuers can't protect themselves how are we suppose to? Finally, it is my regular recommendation never to store specific financial information on a user's system. No account numbers, user names or passwords. The little time it takes to type this information in pays off in much added security. DA

Randy, Thanks for your reply...really appreciate your taking the time to do that. I do have Firefox set to clear all private data upon closing the browser, and am glad to hear you have confidence that it does so. I have an older version of Window Washer and it does the job on IE, but it doesn't contain the option to add Firefox. I understand that newer versions do. I hadn't heard of CCleaner, but you have me curious now so I may check it out. Thanks again for your help Hal

I found the following very interesting article written by 'imdoody' here:- It really does not matter what antivirus is used, but have it. Even more importantly, be smart when using the web and internet. Here are some very good steps that will prevent almost all Maleware/viruses (The crazy thing is, it's not a program; Its You, the end user!) 1. Don't look at Adult Material (aka Pr0n) on the internet. 2. Don't download kazaa, bear share, limewire, etc, etc.... buy your music for real. You end up spending more money paying "geekpatrol" (trying not to use real names) to fix all the viruses you received because your 13 yr old daughter was trying to download the latest Avril Lavreign song on limewire. 3. Stay away from anything free (i.e. "try this free for 2 weeks, cancel anytime, free acie berry diet pills... the list goes on..." some free stuff is good, like MS security essentials....) 4. Don't click on untrusted "Sponsored adds" or download email attachments from untrusted senders. (UPS, facebook, or ebay will not send an attachment to update your password, or track a package.... EVER!) 5. Facebook is great for catching up with old friends, or staying in touch with new ones. But stay away from all the ads and BS games. 6. Don't click on pop ups or windows that say things like "1200 viruses found click here to clean!" (Wait, how did they find 1200 viruses and when did I start a scan? OH I don't remember installing AntiVirus 2010!!!! ("alt+F4" is your friend it will close fake pop ups like these.) you may loose what you are looking at but it is worth it. 7. DO google search companies that you are unsure about followed by "Consumer reports" or "BBB" (Better Business Bureau) 8. DO use intra site searching when using google. Example: you are searching for Microsoft security essentials, if you put "site: microsoft.com" after your search keywords it will search through Microsofts site first and display those results before any other sites. 9. DO right click and select "Copy shortcut" for any unusual looking links and paste it into notepad, the displayed text for a link can be deceiving... http://www.ebay.com is much different from http://www.ebay.oedl.eds.something.com, websites are ready backwards starting with the .com then the primary domain, this example would be ebay. and.. 10. DO WATCH your kids internet and computer use.... No you are not snooping, or creeping, or invading privacy... you are being a good parent. I cannot stress this enough! The internet can be a dangerous place; I know, I've been there.... Look into http://www.opendns.com for keyword filtering, restricting websites, and many other free options. I hope this helps a bit, as I have been in the IT field for quite a few years I have seen all the different types of users, and one thing they all have in common is that they don't understand the technology. But with a couple easy to remember tips it is easy to stay away from viruses and maleware. one more, search: "uninstall software site: microsoft.com" and "removed Tool bars site: microsoft.com" get rid of un-needed programs and excessive toolbar addins.... if you have more than one tool bar in your internet explorer, you should get rid of them (and watch when installing apps, like yahoo messager, Adobe Reader, java, etc. They all have a prechecked checkbox to install a toolbar. just uncheck it.... ) O and Run an antivirus/antimaleware.... doesn't matter which just make sure some popup said if you buy this now it will fix your problems. Trust the trusted providers,

angeldog- You are correct. The outside siren control when away from the house is a challenge. A simple switch between the indoor unit and the outside siren would make enabling the outside siren easy when leaving the house, but then turning it off would be a problem which is where the off timer would come into play. I'm using the onboard sensor relay to manually turn on an outside siren from inside the house by pressing a button on the indoor unit. Automating the outside siren while away would certainly be more complex as you have learned. However, since the system is wireless, we leave the indoor unit with a neighbor so they can monitor our outdoor sensors when we leave our house for vacation. Not an elegant solution by any means, but it make us feel more comfortable when away from the house/pool for extended periods of time. For an outdoor siren and monitoring while you are away, I think the only option is to link a wireless motion detector to your existing security system. You mentioned a home security system in your previous post and hopefully it has the flexibility to accept a wireless motion detector than can be integrated into your existing system for monitoring while you are away. We have a house security system with monitoring service that calls the police and us if triggered while we are away. One of our indoor motion sensors is wireless due to problems running the wire during install, so I know this is possible. We thought about adding an outside motion sensor but eventually decided against it. We didn't want the police coming to the house and calling us whenever a squirrel/deer/dog triggered one of the outdoor sensors, which seems to happen almost daily while we are home and probably countless times while we are away! That was our thought process and hope some of this helps!