Newsletter Archives
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Browser security and privacy — with the right extensions
INTERNET
By Lance Whitney
Each browser offers its own settings for security and privacy, but you can often control these options better via third-party extensions.
Managing your online privacy and security is always a challenge, especially as you browse different websites where you shop, bank, invest, and sign in to accounts personal or professional.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (20.20.0, 2023-05-15).
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How to manage your browser cookies
INTERNET
By Lance Whitney
Browser cookies can be helpful or harmful, depending on how and why they’re used in your browser. The key lies in taking control of them.
You probably already know that Web browsers use cookies to save certain information. Over the years, cookies have developed a bad rep because many websites and advertisers use them to track your online activities for the purpose of sending you ads and other targeted content.
But cookies can also help you by storing key details at websites that you frequently use. The trick here is knowing which cookies are good and which are bad, and how to manage them in general.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (20.16.0, 2023-04-17).
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The best tech secrets of 2022: AirTags, TikTok, Twitter, oh my
ISSUE 19.52 • 2022-12-26 Look for our BONUS issue on January 2, 2023! PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
Amid my efforts to help you protect yourself against some rather aggressive technologies, I’m glad to report that there’s been at least some progress this year on the worst aspects of our “labor-saving” devices.
Please note: I’m not claiming that my columns by themselves caused any of the changes I describe below. I just report the problems. We can all celebrate when bad tech is improved, whoever may have developed a particular solution.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.52.0, 2022-12-26).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter. -
Be watchful for scams in the forums
FROM THE FORUMS
By Susan Bradley
Last week, there was an incident in the forums that was unexpected and of some concern.
Someone (let’s codename the person “Rogue”) signed up for a Plus membership, then used it to send direct messages (DMs) to several other members. The DM contained a solicitation.
I took immediate action.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.47.0, 2022-11-21).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter. -
Can DuckDuckGo raise enough money to give Google a scare?
ISSUE 19.44 • 2022-10-31 PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
People in a small but dedicated movement known as “degoogling” strive to avoid being tracked by the Google search giant. That’s a challenge, because Google’s parent company, Alphabet Inc., also compiles data on you through YouTube, the Play Store, and many other subsidiaries.
A major alternative is a privacy-focused search engine with the weird name of DuckDuckGo. (Founder Gabriel Weinberg, soon to become a father, chose the moniker in 2008 after the children’s game Duck, Duck, Goose.) DDG, as the search engine is sometimes known, promises not to save searches you enter nor retain any information about you.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.44.0, 2022-10-31).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter. -
Should you get a free credit report for any data breach?
PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
Samsung Electronics — the giant multinational that sells 28% of all the smartphones in the world, as well as many other consumer devices — has sent notices to some of its users that their personal information in Samsung’s database has been hacked.
In a statement, the company says the hackers didn’t obtain users’ credit-card or debit-card numbers. But the intrusion did reveal some customers’ names, addresses, birthdates, and the Samsung products they’d registered. As a result, the corporation’s notices recommend that affected users obtain a copy of their credit report from major reporting agencies.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.39.0, 2022-09-26).
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Amazon releases Ring videos without consent. Should you care?
PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
Giant retailer Amazon.com, the parent company of Ring video and audio doorbells and other devices, admits in a letter to a United States senator that it sometimes releases recorded files to law-enforcement agencies without a court-ordered warrant or the consent of the recording’s owner.
In response to a request for information from Sen. Edward Markey (Democrat of Massachusetts), Amazon vice president for public policy Brian Huseman revealed: “Ring has provided videos to law enforcement in response to an emergency request only 11 times” in the first half of 2022.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.31.0, 2022-08-01).
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Portable Text Encryption — Your super-secret decoder ring
FREEWARE SPOTLIGHT
By Deanna McElveen
Ever send an important and sensitive email to the wrong person? Wouldn’t it be great if the reply you got back was “Why did you send me gibberish?” instead of “Bob makes HOW MUCH!?”
U.S. developer Dana Booth has created an easy-to-use tool to encrypt text before pasting it into an email, chat message, or anywhere else. Portable Text Encryption uses AES, DES, Blowfish, and RC4 symmetric encryption ciphers to make sure that if the recipient of your message doesn’t have the password you provide (tell them verbally — not in an email), they aren’t gonna be reading anything but gibberish.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.31.0, 2022-08-01).
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TikTok steals your files, passwords, and more: FCC official
ISSUE 19.28 • 2022-07-11 PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
TikTok, the wildly popular short-video app owned by China’s ByteDance corporation, may be kicked out of Apple’s and Google’s download stores.
A US official boldly asserts that TikTok is “accessing users’ most sensitive data, including passwords, cryptocurrency wallet addresses, and personal messages.”
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.28.0, 2022-07-11).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter. -
What should you consider sensitive?
ON SECURITY
By Susan Bradley
What information is sensitive? What information should you never give to anyone?
The answer is, it depends. Sometimes it depends on what you are doing, sometimes it depends on the jurisdiction (i.e., country or state) you live in. But often it comes down to what you feel comfortable giving to someone else. And the answer is usually different for different people.
Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (19.24.0, 2022-06-13).
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Look who’s stalking 2: Apple responds to AirTag security threats
ISSUE 19.10 • 2022-03-07 PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
The Apple AirTag, a $29 tracker the company started selling last year, has been criticized by experts for its weak protections against criminals who use the device to stalk people and pinpoint vehicles to steal. In response, Apple posted last month a response that promises only minor upgrades to the gadgets’ software.
Meanwhile, a developer announced recently that he had built — using a few dollars’ worth of electronic parts — an AirTag-like clone that takes full advantage of Apple’s free and worldwide Find My communication network. As an illustration of the weakness of AirTags, the clone easily defeats all of Apple’s existing security and detection systems, including the new features the corporation said last month it was planning to implement in the future.
Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 19.10.0 (2022-03-07).
This story also appears in the AskWoody Newsletter 19.10.F (2022-03-07). -
Look who’s stalking: Protect yourself from Apple AirTags
PUBLIC DEFENDER
By Brian Livingston
Ever since Apple started selling $29 tracking devices called AirTags last April, criminal types have used them to tail people, pinpoint and heist their cars, and worse — but warnings of planted devices were made available only to iPhone owners. Now, people who have more common phones can find out whether they’re being tracked, too.
The AirTag is a small, plastic-encased device that’s approximately the size of three or four dollar coins stacked on top of each other. It competes with such trackers as the Bluetooth-based Tile Pro and the GPS-based Verizon Humx. But most Bluetooth devices connect only to phones within 50 meters or so, and GPS trackers require you to pay monthly fees.
Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 19.02.0 (2022-01-10).