I apologize! I've been AWOL for a while. I have web page from Ask Leo! that everyone should read and take seriously. It tells you how to find out what information Facebook and Google know about you. I was shocked- and I try to be careful. Here is the link: https://askleo.com/download-facebook-google-data/?awt_l=8ysdX&awt_m=Jt5ZTjvAI3dfbL&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=20180508&utm_medium=email&utm_content=featured
There is even a video on that page demonstrating the instructions.
OK, so you don't care... but remember, anyone who can get on your computer or log on to your account can dump all that information. So... teens- guess what your parents can do! Guess what your friends or your siblings can do! I apologize in advance for this warning, but couples- guess what your other half can do!
Tuesday, May 8, 2018
Sunday, March 11, 2018
Using Chrome to Block Sound from those pesky sites that start videos when you land on the page
A recent added Chrome feature is blocking the sound of sites. This is useful when a video starts when you land on a site, even though you don't want the video to play. I know this irritates me. For example, the downloads.cnet.com has this on every download page, eg, http://download.cnet.com/Malwarebytes/3000-8022_4-10804572.html.
The announcement of this feature is here: https://blog.chromium.org/2017/09/unified-autoplay.html. You can Google more about this feature, but the "bottom line" is: To permanently mute site you visit where you don't want videos to automatically play,
The announcement of this feature is here: https://blog.chromium.org/2017/09/unified-autoplay.html. You can Google more about this feature, but the "bottom line" is: To permanently mute site you visit where you don't want videos to automatically play,
- Right click the tab for that web page, at the very top of the browser window, just to the left of the x on the tab.
- (Yes there is a drop down list!) Pick "mute site" to permanently turn off the site.
- To turn the sound back on, go to the dropdown and "unmute site".
Saturday, March 10, 2018
New Ransomware Technique- ransom note plus sound
The following is a picture of a new ransomware approach. It includes this full screen display plus sound narration warning of the danger and urging action. This is done using your device's browser, so, to fix the problem, bring up your task manager and kill the browser task. Note that their may be many instances of your browser. Kill them all because the next thing you have to do is clean out your browser caches. A full instruction guide on eliminating this problem can be found at https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-removal/remove-microsoft-system-security-alert-browser-tech-support-scam. This is a very complete guide. In general, the threat is removed by cleaning out your caches (use CCleaner free version) and running Malwarebytes. Download the free trial version of Malwarebytes and keep it running for the trial period. (To purchase is up to you. Malwarebytes works in a different way than the antivirus programs and can be added to your security system as an enhancement. But, if you have the discipline of secure browsing plus manually running Malwarebytes on occasion, you can use the free version. I need another blog entry to show how to turn your trial into a free version.)
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
What Operating System Does TSA Use?
You know TSA? Airport Security! You know Window XP- not supported for a couple of years; guaranteed to be hacked by now. Look at what Operating System TSA uses:
Got a new phishing email that you should see
The following is a picture of an phishing email I received... very deceiving. This is from Kazakhstan.
Friday, February 9, 2018
Google Privacy Practices- as seen on Fox
Some random comments I have on Google privacy practices:
- Google offers more control over privacy than most. Consider Amazon! Consider Windows 10. Oh, you didn't know how much you are giving away using Cortana and the default settings of Windows itself?
- You reap what you sow: your privacy is your responsibility.
- The Fox presentation discusses how you can be tracked even with the phone in airplane mode. To fix that problem: To turn off the location tracking as reported by FOX- for Android: Settings.Google.Location.Google Location History. Turn off. Google counts on lazy users and the usefulness of the feature. This feature is no doubt responsible for the traffic reports available on Google Maps. Do you like the traffic reports?
- A local broadcaster talked about going into a Dollar Store and buying ginger ale. After that, she got ads on ginger ale. First of all, it is likely that the Dollar Store has a contract with Google or uses Google as part of its business. That is how Google gets the info on your purchases. Second, you can turn it off. See this help: https://support.google.com/ads/answer/2662922?hl=en.
- Some people say that the phone is listening to you. Well, if you use Siri, Google, etc: those applications are always on and "listening." When they "listen," the microphone input- the noise in your room, what you say- is being sent over the internet. Depending on the way the company scrubs the input, what you say could be processed for ads, etc. It could also be processed to automatically call 911... So good and bad. To turn it off, you should mute the device. Search "Mute" with the device name and follow the instructions. Yes, its an inconvenience to unmute, but you have two options: Don't care, or build your own voice recognition system.
- Some people complain about the camera turning on without their knowledge. OK, ignoring butt turn ons, either the phone is infected, you have purposely configured an app setting to turn on, or you have an app setting that is a default that you need to turn off/on to disable the camera. All of these are not the fault of Google or any app... it is your fault for not paying attention to the permissions for an app or allowing the phone to become infected.
- So here's the general rule, for Android:
- Go to settings
- Go to Apps.
- For each App, tap the App symbol
- There will be a strip for Permissions
- On the strip itself will be a summary of what access is being given to the app.
- If you don't like what it has access to, tap Permissions and turn off the access you don't want it to have. The App might respond that doing so will disable function and make the App unstable. You've got a choice: go ahead and disable and see what happens, or delete the App. Oh, there are three more choices:
- Write your own app
- Have someone write an app to your specifications (Got an enterprising grandkid?)
- Purchase an app that has the privacy features you want.
Sunday, October 8, 2017
A Lesson in Personal and Professional Phone Security Responsibility
10/8/2017 from Wired. {abridged and removed overtly political jabs by DGL}
John Kelly's Hacked Phone Could Be a Major National Security Issue | WIRED
Politico reports that former Department of Homeland Security head and current chief of staff John Kelly used a personal smartphone, possibly for months, that was compromised. That is bad. Don't do that. The breach was apparently discovered over the summer, when Kelly gave the smartphone to White House tech support after having problems with it and struggling to successfully run software updates. Several questions remain unanswered, as to what type of phone Kelly was using, and what sort of access hackers may have had. The possibilities run the gamut—and have potentially serious consequences. "Having a phone compromised for several months definitely is not good," says David Kennedy, the CEO of TrustedSec, who formerly worked at the NSA and with the Marine Corps' signal intelligence unit. "To what extent and who compromised it is important. If it was just [run of the mill] malware it's probably not a big deal, but if it was a nation state, monitoring phone communications, emails, and other data is all possible."
How Kelly's phone was compromised matters a lot. There are myriad ways it could have happened, and some are relatively benign. If Kelly had an Android phone he may have gotten tricked into downloading a malicious app. Phishing links and attachments also pose a constant threat no matter what device you're on. From there, a petty criminal might have done something small, like secretly charging Kelly in-app fees or mining some relatively innocuous data. Nothing too alarming there. 'If he's in classified meetings and the phone is in his pocket, hackers could eavesdrop and listen to planning.' David Kennedy, Former NSA Analyst But there's also a whole gray market of security firms, like Zerodium and NSO Group, that sell mobile operating system exploits and espionage tools to governments around the world. Any attacker with awareness about their target—and deep pockets—could have used more sophisticated exploits to burrow deep into the device and start reconnaissance and data-gathering, even potentially masquerading as Kelly on his accounts, or taking them over to mislead his associates.
It's also hard to tell exactly how often and how long Kelly used the phone in question. Reports indicate that Kelly did primarily use his hardened, government-issued smartphone, even while he still had his apparently compromised personal phone around, but it's unclear how often he carried the extra device with him, and what he still relied on it for. A White House spokesman told POLITICO that Kelly "hadn’t used the personal phone often since joining the administration." It would be helpful to know how hard that "often" is working.
The incident was apparently considered serious enough to warrant a memo about the situation in September. A White House spokesman told WIRED, “Last December, General Kelly’s personal phone stopped working and he discontinued its use,” a statement that still leaves the exact timeline open for interpretation. Those details matter, because in a totally owned phone, hackers could have tracked his every move. Regardless of the method {used}, Kelly's data would have definitely been at risk. Attackers could have used a keylogger to follow his every input. They would also potentially had access to his physical location through GPS and cell ID data. If he stored any sensitive files on the device, needless to say, they would have been exposed. But even assuming that Kelly did no confidential or nationally important work on the personal phone, even if he simply used it to play Candy Crush, it still would have posed a major threat. Attackers can surreptitiously take over a smartphone's microphone and camera, a particular concern given that Kelly takes meetings at the highest levels of national security. "If he's in classified meetings and the phone is in his pocket, hackers could eavesdrop and listen to planning," Kennedy notes.
{DGL: here is a scenario that is relevant to the "average" citizen. You give your phone to someone you know because they want to make a call or they want to play a game. They download a "kid monitor" program without your knowledge. They enter their phone number as the recipient and turn the program on in the background, and in the settings they set the program to autostart. Now your phone is set up to do everything talked about above! Though national security was the topic above, your security, your home's security, the security of your kids and grandkids, etc is relevant to you.}
There are some protections against that sort of snooping, like device lockers in the West Wing where staffers are encouraged to leave their phones, and Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities, where officials shed all their devices before discussing truly secret issues of national security. But human error is a problem. People don't always comply with SCIF protocols. "Most people, even though data breaches and surveillance are in the news every day, they still don’t really understand that they could be targeted—they always think that it will never happen to them," says Larry Johnson, the CEO of security firm CyberSponse who was a special agent in the Secret Service for 24 years and worked on cybersecurity in the White House. "It’s like everything in security, it’s not convenient to be secure, but once you walk into the White House you have to be cognizant of all of the things around you and anything that isn't quite right." Experts say that it's surprising that Kelly in particular used a potentially compromised phone, given his past military and command service. Still, it's possible that Kelly was lucky, and whatever malware was on his phone just served him malicious ads and tried to trick him out of some money. If it really was the worst case scenario, though, one or a handful of nation states may have gained valuable intelligence that could haunt the United States for years. Without more information—and none seems forthcoming—we'll never know just how worried we should be.
John Kelly's Hacked Phone Could Be a Major National Security Issue | WIRED
Politico reports that former Department of Homeland Security head and current chief of staff John Kelly used a personal smartphone, possibly for months, that was compromised. That is bad. Don't do that. The breach was apparently discovered over the summer, when Kelly gave the smartphone to White House tech support after having problems with it and struggling to successfully run software updates. Several questions remain unanswered, as to what type of phone Kelly was using, and what sort of access hackers may have had. The possibilities run the gamut—and have potentially serious consequences. "Having a phone compromised for several months definitely is not good," says David Kennedy, the CEO of TrustedSec, who formerly worked at the NSA and with the Marine Corps' signal intelligence unit. "To what extent and who compromised it is important. If it was just [run of the mill] malware it's probably not a big deal, but if it was a nation state, monitoring phone communications, emails, and other data is all possible."
How Kelly's phone was compromised matters a lot. There are myriad ways it could have happened, and some are relatively benign. If Kelly had an Android phone he may have gotten tricked into downloading a malicious app. Phishing links and attachments also pose a constant threat no matter what device you're on. From there, a petty criminal might have done something small, like secretly charging Kelly in-app fees or mining some relatively innocuous data. Nothing too alarming there. 'If he's in classified meetings and the phone is in his pocket, hackers could eavesdrop and listen to planning.' David Kennedy, Former NSA Analyst But there's also a whole gray market of security firms, like Zerodium and NSO Group, that sell mobile operating system exploits and espionage tools to governments around the world. Any attacker with awareness about their target—and deep pockets—could have used more sophisticated exploits to burrow deep into the device and start reconnaissance and data-gathering, even potentially masquerading as Kelly on his accounts, or taking them over to mislead his associates.
It's also hard to tell exactly how often and how long Kelly used the phone in question. Reports indicate that Kelly did primarily use his hardened, government-issued smartphone, even while he still had his apparently compromised personal phone around, but it's unclear how often he carried the extra device with him, and what he still relied on it for. A White House spokesman told POLITICO that Kelly "hadn’t used the personal phone often since joining the administration." It would be helpful to know how hard that "often" is working.
The incident was apparently considered serious enough to warrant a memo about the situation in September. A White House spokesman told WIRED, “Last December, General Kelly’s personal phone stopped working and he discontinued its use,” a statement that still leaves the exact timeline open for interpretation. Those details matter, because in a totally owned phone, hackers could have tracked his every move. Regardless of the method {used}, Kelly's data would have definitely been at risk. Attackers could have used a keylogger to follow his every input. They would also potentially had access to his physical location through GPS and cell ID data. If he stored any sensitive files on the device, needless to say, they would have been exposed. But even assuming that Kelly did no confidential or nationally important work on the personal phone, even if he simply used it to play Candy Crush, it still would have posed a major threat. Attackers can surreptitiously take over a smartphone's microphone and camera, a particular concern given that Kelly takes meetings at the highest levels of national security. "If he's in classified meetings and the phone is in his pocket, hackers could eavesdrop and listen to planning," Kennedy notes.
{DGL: here is a scenario that is relevant to the "average" citizen. You give your phone to someone you know because they want to make a call or they want to play a game. They download a "kid monitor" program without your knowledge. They enter their phone number as the recipient and turn the program on in the background, and in the settings they set the program to autostart. Now your phone is set up to do everything talked about above! Though national security was the topic above, your security, your home's security, the security of your kids and grandkids, etc is relevant to you.}
There are some protections against that sort of snooping, like device lockers in the West Wing where staffers are encouraged to leave their phones, and Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities, where officials shed all their devices before discussing truly secret issues of national security. But human error is a problem. People don't always comply with SCIF protocols. "Most people, even though data breaches and surveillance are in the news every day, they still don’t really understand that they could be targeted—they always think that it will never happen to them," says Larry Johnson, the CEO of security firm CyberSponse who was a special agent in the Secret Service for 24 years and worked on cybersecurity in the White House. "It’s like everything in security, it’s not convenient to be secure, but once you walk into the White House you have to be cognizant of all of the things around you and anything that isn't quite right." Experts say that it's surprising that Kelly in particular used a potentially compromised phone, given his past military and command service. Still, it's possible that Kelly was lucky, and whatever malware was on his phone just served him malicious ads and tried to trick him out of some money. If it really was the worst case scenario, though, one or a handful of nation states may have gained valuable intelligence that could haunt the United States for years. Without more information—and none seems forthcoming—we'll never know just how worried we should be.
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