Microsoft is offering their users a piece of free magic software, called SteadyState. We have all been there late at night and our virtual guard is down. Maybe you hopped on an unsecured network and decided to browse some hardcore porn sites bit torrent trackers um er let’s just say some not so reputable sites. Either way you have exposed your machine to a potentially bad neighborhood and if your protection on your machine isn’t up to snuff then who knows what could have happened already!
“Reclaim your Privacy!”
That is the claim of Xerobank, yet another group of software developers amongst the increasingly competitive world of web browsers. Firefox is now taking on close to 20% of the browsing market, Internet Explorer has 70% or so and Opera and Safari squabble over the rest.
XeroBank browser “is the most popular anonymous web browser in the world” according to the developers, and could be true. I’m Just not sure of too many other browsers competing in that space.
XeroBank uses two anonymity networks, Tor and XeroBank, to ensure completely anonymous browsing with secure and encrypted connections.
A few months back, Aibek wrote a great post on hiding all those ‘important folders’ you might have lying around your desktop. His method is perfect if someone is snooping around your desktop looking for your things.
But what would you do if someone barges into your workspace when you are in the middle of doing ‘important things’? Would you just have to live with the embarrassment?
Luckily, I’ve discovered quite a few ways of getting yourself out of that nasty predicament.
When it comes to your security, no web browser is perfect - and no malware app is going to catch everything. I came across BufferZone Free a few weeks ago and have been running it since, and I’m pretty impressed.
BufferZone adds another layer of protection to your browser by setting up a sandbox (an isolated “virtual directory” on your hard drive). As Trustware puts it, the program “transparently redirects modifications in your PC to a virtual, isolated environment, so that unauthorized modifications cannot be applied to your actual PC.” Malicious apps can’t write changes to your actual system files or registry - only BufferZone’s virtualized versions. Anything you download - temp files, images, executables, you name it - gets sandboxed. Why is that a big deal?
No matter how good a PC you have at home, there are often times that there is no other way but to use a public computer to get the work done.
When I say public computers I refer to computers at airports, cyber cafes, libraries or even a friend’s computer. Beware the computer may be spying on you!
This guide applies to those situations where you have to use anything but your own PC. So I invite you to Make Use Of these:
Tip 1: Use portable software or LiveCD wherever possible
MakeUseOf has mentioned OpenDNS before, but until recently I had no idea what all you could accomplish with it. We mentioned how using it could speed up your internet connection by using their DNS servers instead of your ISP’s. This allows OpenDNS to do many other things that you might not be aware of. In this article, I’ll walk you through getting the most out of OpenDNS.
Lets look at OpenDNS’s feature list. It’s quite impressive. The offer a nice list of great DNS related tools to help you secure, customize, and protect your network. To start, we need to create an account. Do this by browsing to the OpenDNS website and clicking on the Create Account link at the top of the page. You’ll get access to all their features including:
Yes, it takes only 7 shortcuts, master them and you’ll defintiely be a lot faster. These 7 shortcuts are meant to make browsing and basic PC tasks easier. While couple of shortcuts are Firefox only, most should work pretty much on any browser.
Mouse Scroll Button
Anyone who spends a considerable amount of time on the web should find this shortcut absolutely invaluable. I am not sure about whether this works in IE 7, but if you use Firefox then you can use your mouse scroll button to open links in a new tab. It’s a finger-tip shortcut to the frequently used ‘right click -> Open Link in New Tab’ combination. Plus, since it’s at your finger tips it’s really easy to get used to it.
The internet has lots of benefits but on the other hand, it has its downsides that we all love to hate. The most common one is pop-up ads but if you have young kids who like to surf the net, then as a parent, you will want to protect them from porn sites and any other sites you deem undesirable for such young impressionable minds - such as the Teletubbies.
Fed up with spam? Tired of telemarketing calls? Feelin’ paranoid about identity theft? … Here you’ll find a bunch “throwaway” web tools that can help you out.
Disposable email account
Mintemail - Instant disposable email for any ‘fishy’ registration form or sign-up. Go to mintemail.com and a random email address will be automatically generated and copied to your clipboard. You can either bookmark the location of created inbox and use it on a regular basis or always use a new one.
Highlights include: Automatic eMail verification, email forwarding, option to set custom expiry times (from 1 hour to 1 month) and more.
The idea of this post is to go through a bunch of tools that add to your browsing experience. Nothing extra ordinary but a handful of simple useful apps that solve common web problems: slow website loads, 404 errors, tab overloads, never ending signups, phishing, etc. Enjoy!
(1) OpenDNS - A quick way to add to your web speed. In simple terms, OpenDNS allows you to speed-up domain detection process which is normally handled by your ISP. There is nothing to download or install, but a couple of changes to your connection settings. Among other things, also includes domain typo correction, phishing protection, and domain blocking. Demo video.
Cookies on your PC (and I don’t mean the tasty kind with chocolate chips) are a double-edged sword. On one hand, they are invaluable for remembering your information on webpages, showing you what links you have clicked on, what’s new, saving you having to log in, etc. On the other hand, cookies can also be used for nefarious purposes, such as tracking your PC activity and sending you spyware.
I have just run Ad-Aware on my computer and it picked up 347 cookies which apparently had the potential to “violate my privacy”. The last time I ran Ad-Aware was 4 days ago, so 347 tracking cookies in the space of 4 days is slightly worrying to say the least.
