Get Your Guard Up! We're in the Data Surveillance Age

Get Your Guard Up! We're in the Data Surveillance Age

Remember back in the day when we were worried about Big Brother government's intrusiveness into our personal affairs? Well nothing's changed. We know this, thanks in part to Edward Snowden's heroic disclosures. It's just been made much easier to tap us because of our online lifestyles.   

In my opinion, though, as for spying and privacy violations, the average citizen has more to worry from the private sector. (Unless of course you're Muslim, affiliated with one of our enemies du jour, or cross swords with government policies.) 

Your browsing habits are now for sale
Case in point: If you've been following the news, President Trump signed a bill in April that permits ISPs (Internet service providers), like Oceanic Time Warner and Hawaiian Telcom, to sell your browsing habits to marketers. This is akin to your phone service provider listening to your phone conversations, then selling those transcriptions to telemarketers. 

Here are some tips to protect your privacy in this age of exploitation and plunder of personal data.

Use a VPN
If you don't want ISPs or others (like governments or hackers) to examine the details of your Internet usage, you can surf anonymously by using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) service. Of course, you have to trust the VPN provider. Here's one site that recently reviewed VPN services: https://goo.gl/jVqcrB. (I'm currently test-driving a VPN service called NordVPN.) 
Here 10 reasons to hide your IP with a VPN: https://goo.gl/n39uE9

Use HTTPS Everywhere
This browser extension is provided freely by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. When installed, it forces encrypted connections to https (encrypted) websites you visit, and when fully enabled, will block all unencrypted requests. You can read about this tool and get it here: https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere

Disable Third-party cookies
Be aware cookies are little pieces of data sent by a website and stored in your browser. Third-party cookies are cookies placed in your browser by a website other than the one you're visiting. This occurs when you visit a website and their advertiser(s) set a cookie, which allows that advertiser to track your visits to other websites. Here's a link explaining how to block third-party cookies. https://goo.gl/PnAXt3 

Read provider privacy and data use policies
Do this for any service you use, including Google, Facebook, travel booking services, your ISP, etc. They all BADLY want to know as much about you as possible so they and/or their partners can get you to open your wallet and spend, spend, spend! As an example, here's what Google does with their users' data: https://goo.gl/LPEHv2

Of course whatever measures we take to shield our privacy will be met with countermeasures. There's too much money at stake to expect otherwise. So if data privacy is important to you, you've got to stay current with protection measures.  

Wishing you an inconspicuous day in cyberspace!

Thanks for reading.

Sam

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Be Careful When Using Wi-Fi

Be Careful When Using Wi-Fi

What's the issue?
Whether you are connecting to Wi-Fi (wireless networking) with your laptop, tablet, or smartphone... whether at home, at work, or in public... be aware that your privacy and security are vulnerable to hackers.

To clarify, Wi-Fi is not used when connecting to your cell provider's data network. It is accessed most commonly from a wireless router at home, work, or in a public setting.

Why care?
Wi-Fi is not a secure transmission medium, even when encrypted. This means information you exchange across the wireless network is not secure--your confidential information. This includes casual websurfing, email use, and e-commerce.

To illustrate, when connecting to Wi-Fi at Starbucks (via the Google network there), you are presented with this snippet from their terms of use: "You understand that This Wi-Fi... is not inherently secure and that wireless communications may not remain private or free of interception or access by others. We will not be liable to you or any other party for any lack of security that may result from your use of This Wi-Fi..."

Google is making it crystal clear that Wi-Fi is not inherently secure and that you are responsible for your own security. This applies anywhere you are using Wi-Fi, especially outside of your home or business network, which hopefully you have already secured--that is, reduced, not eliminated, the risk of hacking by using the best encryption available. 

How to best protect yourself when using Wi-Fi?
Without getting too technical, a best practice is to only use Wi-Fi when connected via a VPN (Virtual Private Network). One program providing this type of protection is Hotspot Shield by AnchorFree. They offer free and paid versions. 

After you install their program, whenever you connect to Wi-Fi, you can run the shield to access the Internet via a secure, encrypted tunnel (VPN). 
You can obtain the Hotspot Shield software here. 

When should you do it?
Any time you connect to Wi-Fi do so via VPN. If you can't, be very careful about what you do online. For example, avoid banking, shopping, and any sites that require password login. 

Where can you learn more on this topic?
You now know what to do as a user of Wi-Fi. In addition, here are some best practices for setting up Wi-Fi at your home or office.

Who can help?
If this all seems too technical but you are concerned and want to be better protected, you may want to hire an IT consultant. This is an especially good investment if you are responsible for data security in an office environment. 

In Sum
Wi-Fi is wonderful technology. It gives us access to online resources in diverse locations worldwide. However, we must reduce the security risks when using it so we don't get taken advantage of, which is increasingly common.  

Thanks for reading. You're feedback is appreciated!

Aloha, Sam

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