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Category Archives: Internet privacy

I’ve changed browsers

Periodically I go on a tear about Internet security. I take a look at everything — the browser I’m using, the browser’s security plug-ins, my Mac’s firewall, and pretty much everything I can think of. I check to see if there’s anything new that might help. The Brave browser is pretty new. Version 1.0 of […]

Apple sticks it to Facebook and Google

For years, Facebook and Google have been running a racket for tracking people on the Internet — “Sign in with Facebook,” and “Sign in with Google.” I have never fallen for this, and I hope you haven’t either. If you use these things, you’re practically handing Facebook and Google a detailed dossier on where you […]

Why does this feel familiar?

One of the creepiest Zuckerberg photos of all time, which he himself cluelessly posted on Facebook The sound of derisive laughter from the entire civilized world almost drowned out the din of the Washington circus. Mark Zuckerberg said that Facebook will “pivot to privacy.” Yes, and pigs will pivot to flying. We veterans of the […]

Free VPN that seems to work (so far)

When I first started shopping for VPN services some years ago, there was a sleaziness involved. VPN providers seemed to be located in countries that we don’t trust, the kind of countries that Internet scammers work out of. The targeted customers for VPN service seemed to be criminal types with a great deal to hide, […]

The Equifax cyberattack: Odds are, you were affected

Update: According to the Washington Post, some security experts think there may be something fishy about Equifax requesting six, rather than four, digits of Social Security numbers. Also, Equifax may have whipped up a “terms of service” agreement that tricks you into forfeiting your right to participate in a class-action lawsuit. For now, it might […]

Conversion to SSL

The change should be transparent, but this blog has switched over to SSL, or “secure sockets layer,” protocol. You might have noticed that your URL window now says “https:” rather than “http:”. Depending on the browser you use, you may also see a padlock icon with the URL. SSL uses encryption to improve the security […]

Why I went back to Firefox

Unwanted video was the last straw. Few things are more irksome than going to a web site and having a grating and useless video start playing. It’s increasingly common. Unwanted video slows everything down. And if you’re on a cellular or satellite connection, unwanted video eats up your data faster than anything. As far as […]

The new pop-ups and how to defeat them

Remember pop-ups and how obnoxious they were? Then we all got pop-up blockers. But the war wasn’t over. Using Javascript, the anti-social brats who code web pages came up with a new way to assert domination over us: “overlays,” also called “modal windows.” With an overlay, a new window opens up, everything behind it turns […]

Everyday security and the criminal economy

Wikipedia commons Once upon a time, if a thug wanted to take your money, he pretty much had to be close enough to hold a gun on you. Not anymore. These days, somebody halfway around the world can steal from you. Estimates of the size of the global criminal economy approach $1 trillion a year, […]

New leak tells us what we already knew: Google is evil

From an NSA presentation leaked by Edward Snowden Bloggers at the Washington Post have reported on an important new leak by Edward Snowden. This one reveals that the National Security Agency uses Google cookies to identify and target computers on the Internet. This should surprise no one, but we need all the information we can […]