Category: Security

Are your ready for your last post??

Paul

A Great post by Derek K. Miller!

I was reminded by a great post by Derek and it was yes sadly his truelly last post.    If you didn’t know Derek and kept reading blog you’d have heard nuances of his problems.   You also have grown to know about his family through his blog post and yet you’d only touched the surface of this man by reading his blog posts.   I didn’t know him personally but that last blog post made me want to know him.   It was inspiring and well written and made everyone cherish the person he once was.   I come to think each blog should have something like this to let our readers know that there will be no more blog posts from us.   This is one reason I thought about making an educational post about getting ready to die posts?

How to Get ready for Death!

We’ve all wondered how we’d have our last blog post published and who’d do it.   That part is yours to decide but I am going to talk about the fundelmentals and let you decide just how you’d it.   I personally feel there are three ways to it:

  • Family — This is the most trustworthy choice because the family members will almost always want your wishes carried out.

  • A Will — This is common in the United States and I am sure in other parts of the world but it is one way to let someone know you have a final post and to publish it.

  • A Lawyer — This is another common way to make sure your post is published by giving access to your blog through a lawyer.

As you can see these are my ideas of how to publish that last post.   All though these are just a few, I thought the list might give you an idea to publish in your own way.    I won’t say these are the only ways but these are my ways and I don’t see any other ways to do it.

How will they log in?

This problem is common for blog owners because they want to protect there blog from being used for wrong doing.   So you’d probably be one of those who has an really good password that no one has access to it.   I currently use Lastpass and would tell people even with the last problem they had, it is still the best password manager you could have.   One way to give people the access to your blog and all that information that they will need after you die is to give your families or lawyer  several one time passwords for your Lastpass password database.   Now I say that because some of us bloggers have affiliate sales and there may be a need to switch the commission to someone’s elses name for them to use the money to keep the blog going.   It just depends on what you want the money to be used for.   A way you can think of it is, it will help pay for your funeral expenses and pay the persons back in the long run.    You’ll just want to make sure they know that the domain and hosting should be paid first to keep the money coming in but is little from the money you’ll be receiving each month.

Give Admins rights to someone you trust!

This is something that people will have to decide if it is right for you.   You can give someone who you trust their own account on your blog.   Although this is something that you have discuss well in advance.  I don’t recommend this tactic because of the possibility that someone could brute force that account and no one would be the wiser.   It however is important to come up with your own way to have that last post publish that your readers can know that their won’t be any more post by you and that they can morn for your death because you were part of their lives and you could very well be missed.

Paul Sylvester

 

 

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Lastpass still the best there is!

Paul2 Replies

Lastpass had been broken!

In a recent blog post by the Lastpass team, they talked about how they saw data being sucked from one of their servers.   They hit the panic and Paranoia button because they know how important it is for our passwords to be safe.   They have inititated a password reset for some accounts.   There openness only shows me they want to be as plain as possible.   That is why I thought I should at least talk about this recent Lastpass Hack as some would say.  I have said it in the past but I will say it again.   Lastpass is the best there is and I support there efforts a 100 percent.

Lastpass has implemented a forced password on some users!

I’m not saying everyone is effected but if your one of the few who they have forced you to change your password, I would certainly do it.    The most part if your unsure, the best possible advice I could give you right now is to just hold tight.   We know that they working hard to resolve the issues and that you will probably be next in line.   Just hold off until we know more.

Are you in offline mode?

This is the other problem right now with Lastpass but don’t worry.   You can download the proper files needed to keep your self busy while they fix the problem.   I am using Linux but if your need to have access to your Lastpass passwords, go download the offline versions of Lastpass and use them until they have fixed the problems associated with the passwords.    I have installed the Pocket Password from Lastpass on my Kubuntu system without a hitch. This will be a valuable edition for when I am not able to get connected online.

Lastpass I am still a USER and I thank you for your hard work!

Paul Sylvester

 

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Security and Privacy go hand in hand! Or does it?

Paul

Brigid's Well (5 Stones to Pray the Rosary by) (7) Image by sfpanda_pix via Flickr

Privacy Really?

I’ve been commenting on Gail Garners Blog about how Google mail is putting ads in the emails.  Now I have done at least one post about Privacy and you not having it.  If you haven’t read my  post then I will give a outline of that post.

It basically boils down to some main points that I will discuss on this post:

  • No-one is Immune on the Net — Anyone and everyone has some information floating out on the internet and even celebrity information that they don’t want you find can be found if you look hard enough.

  • Know the Information before anyone else — Seriously if you want to keep track of what is being put out on the net about you.   Have Google email you when either name or some other information that you are looking for gets put out on the net.

  • Be Ready for Anything — There isn’t much you can do to actually be ready for Anything but it is more of a statement to yourself that “Nothing will surprise you.”.   Sometimes just taking a long hard look at your life and remembering some of this can be quite concerning, so you should be ready for someone to find out and have an answer for them.

  • Our life are infinitesimal compared to the scheme of things —  Everyday, I am constantly thinking what can I do to make someone’s else happy.   I find blogging makes me happy but I always want to make others just as happy as I am sometimes.   I sometimes like to wake up in the morning and just thank God for each day I can bring something new to my readers!

How Security is involved in Privacy

If you read the title and was a little curious why security is crucial to privacy.   It does not take a rocket scholar to figure this out.  If your are one to worry about your privacy then you should be also worrying about what information is leaking out on the internet from sources that you have no control over.   This means you have to figure out just how far you willing to go.

  • Friends —  Sometimes your privacy is left to who you decide who your friends are.   They might accidentally mention your name or some other random tidbit about you.   It all depends on who your really trust and tell them not to share your information.

  • Family — Almost the exact same people as friends but since they are your family, there may or may not be trust so you will have to deal with them in your own way.   This is why I grouped them separately!

  • Services — If your ever signed up for Facebook or other social websites than you have not truely read the Terms of Service.   Most of them, if not all, require to the user to have personal information on there server.   In turn, someone could get on there server illegally and copy all those names and information.

As with my previous post about epsilon having been hacked.   If you have a computer or the internet then your information is slowly being leaked and there is nothing you can do about it.   You can minimize it but that is about all.

I want to hear from you.   Do you think you can still be invisible on the internet?  Leave a comment or ask a question.   I’d love to hear what you have to say!

Paul Sylvester

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Why I never volunteer for bacon!

Paul

"Please Enter A Valid Email Address" Image by pjsherman via Flickr

All Dogs love bacon!

If your wondering what I am talking about.   I will explain it to you in ways that you probably never considered.    If you have ever signed up to websites and they ask you if they could share your email address and name to 3rd parties.   3rd parties are like Epsilon Marketing and they make there money by selling products to people who have volunteered to receive bacon advertisements.

Security is nothing to Epsilon!

I won’t go into detail about why because if I did you would probably agree with me just because of what happened.   Most likely Epsilon will loss a lot of customers and businesses due to the security breaches.    It just depends on how people feel about this company and why anyone should trust them after this breach.   I always tell anyone who signs up for a service to always makes sure to opt out of those emails.   I don’t know about you but I know right now Epsilon has Egg on their faces and wouldn’t mind sticking their heads in the sand.

Don’t Get Caught Spear Phishing!

Now since the hackers have your name and your Email address, you probably are wondering what can I do not to get fooled.   I thought it would be a good idea to give some good guidance for those who might want to prevent this from happening in the first place.   You don’t want them to get your sensitive information.    I don’t want anyone to know my passwords or even my credit card numbers.   They will try to fool into giving out this information because there is some kind of urgent response about some kind of problem with your account.

Some stuff to consider:

  • No Company will call you asking for personal information

  • Nothing is so important as to go to the website directly

  • If they don’t sound professional then tell them you will go visit the local bank or institution

  • Just because they know your name doesn’t mean they are real

  • Don’t click links in emails that you don’t trust, always go the sites that you trust by typing it in your browser

These are just a few ways to help prevent yourself from being phished but nothing can prevent it but yourself. So remember to think before you click and think before you give out any information to unknown emails or people.

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Achievecard in the Mail and they have my Social Socurity Number?? WTH??

Paul


As you can see Achieve Card sent my wife an unsolicited mail with this card in it.   In order to “activate it” You must your last 4 of your Social Security Number!!  Now I talked about Netspend doing this also but they didn’t keep the IP‘s of who referred them.   This seems to be the same way and I am very concerned.   I would like to stop these companies from getting my Social or my wife’s Social.

Don’t tell me you don’t have my Social, You just tell me you do!!

When I made the blog post about Netspend, There was a comment from Staff101 and he said they didn’t have my social but if that is the case with this card. Then why would they have the pin being the last 4 of my SSN(see picture above)?? Again, if you are going to comment telling me that you don’t have my social. Your gravely mistaken, and that really concerns me and others. My privacy and security is essentially something that I take seriously. I haven’t called this company because they are probably like Netspend and will tell me they don’t have the information on who gave them the information. I am not happy and would like to find the person/company doing this. This seems to be a continuing problem.

Should I Activate this Achievecard??

Well, I will tell you I am not going to activate this card because of all these problems: