Sadly, as so often happens, consumers are lazy, complacent, and just plain ignorant about keeping their computers protected and updated. Readers may recall there was a very nasty worm that hit Microsoft Windows PCs in 2008, for which Microsoft issued a rare "out-of-cycle" patch back in late October.

Well, folks, word in a Computerworld article on the worm attack? 1 in 3 PCs are still vulnerable.

And it's almost three full months later.

OK, so we're now well into the New Year, so by now you should have long ago put down the eggnog and gotten back to life as normal!

This means running Windows Update (Open IE, click Tools / Windows Update... it's really not that hard...) and making sure you have good, anti-virus software and firewall software.

Even if you haven't done it in ages, running Windows Update (assuming you're on a DSL or cable modem) shouldn't take more than 10-15 minutes on a reasonably fast, modern PC.

If you stay atop it, it's even faster.