Category: Personal Security

Watch your back

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Not down wid OPP

My professional life involves constant deep dives into Other Peoples’ Problems (OPP)….taking on the same ethos in my private life is truly a different matter.

Today, getting intimate with peoples’ digital life is way too risky and a very Thankless endeavour.  Taking on any private system admin task means exposing yourself as a technician to unwarranted criticism and abuse; get it a wrong and you’re a snooping idiot IT guy, get it right and nothing is said.

Not my Problem

It’s a constant catch 22 scenario especially when you can see friends and family making familiar tactical and operation errors i.e. never ever backing up their data, never encrypting their data and never changing their passwords.

Here are 10 things that people don’t change often.

Change bank account or card
Change email address
Change passwords
Change phone device
Erase or reset phone device
Change phone number
Change social media accounts
Change inner friend circles
Change ISP or Geolocations
Change public IP address

Tactical Reconnaissance: Basics for profiling, tracking or snooping.

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Beefing up privacy and controls

The mandatory system update 5.0 for PS4 rolled out a number of new features included better user control over child accounts. It seems much easier to monitor your child’s gaming activity now.

In the meantime, Uber announce “more information about how you can control what we collect and how we use your data, including location information .”

These are all common sense issues that are now only being implemented because of mass dissatisfaction from user groups, a bit like 2-factor authentication being deployed after a breach.

It’s about time

the meantime, I added two new titles to my Games Library. The award-winning Metal Gear Solid V and a horror set named Amnesia: Collection, which contains both The Dark Descent and A Machine for Pigs. Both titles are free to PlayStation Plus subscribers and make the membership fee actually financially viable for the year.

METAL GEAR SOLID V: THE PHANTOM PAIN

I have followed many multiplayer sessions of Metal Gear Solid over the past 24 months but actually playing it was epic and jaw-dropping. Amnesia had a weird notice at the being of the game.

“Do not play this game to Win”

Amnesia Collection – Scary Stuff

What the bleep bleep?

Anyhow, the two titles will get moderate attention from me after the Star Wars Beta session this weekend.

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What da bleep, bleep…

It used to be pretty easy to manage your Apps from iTunes but now the giant vendor has stealthily taken that option away, which sucks for iPhone 4 or multiple device users.  Now you are forced to manage all Apps from the device itself.

Having to re-think mobile device management…Again.

The new App store looks and feels fantastic but it’s just a cold reminder that end users control nothing. 

At any point, your daily habits and behaviour can be manipulated with an Operating system update forcing you to act in a “crafted” way.  In the meantime, your walking, talking, driving, sleeping habit data is carefully harvested by your mobile device for later use.

How do you like dem Apples?

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So you think you’ve been hacked

As an individual, where do you turn if you think you’ve been breached and your antivirus software tells you nothing?

Your Internet Service providers? Your bank?
Your email provider?
The techie friend of a friend who can find a job in the industry?
Your insurance company?
Your IT department at work?

…or your friendly neighbourhood CISSP® – Certified Information Systems Security Professional.

Generally, though, it’s down to you and Google to figure it out.

Take your life offline if you get hacked.

In the meantime, you stumble around telling friends you’ve been hacked or that your tech is crap.

Naturally, social media is a massive help to find out if someone else has the same problem.  In my experience, the emotional pressure is one of the biggest issues.  Feelings of WTF and “why are they doing this to me” cloud your judgement and objectivity.

Don’t be a victim, be a warrior. Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice
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Re-directing the bad guys

According to key Internet players, over 90% of bad request use DNS.

Cisco recently acquired OpenDNS probably for this main reason.  Messing with DNS is not even on the radar for most end-users but OpenDNS actually makes it easy.

Problem: Your 11-year old has a brand-new Smartphone and you realise they have access to ANY content on the internet.

Most of us don’t like to turn off Data

Solution: change to DNS from Google to OpenDNS

End result: no more phone confiscation arguments

This is a typical solution that should not be explained to non-technical or tech scared parents.  Just get the most tech savvy adult in the family to configure it and forget about it, no nerd discussions or debates.

Downside: This is only a partial solution as most phones do not allow you to mess with the DNS settings for cellular.

So we can change stuff for WiFi only.  Unfortunately, most of us are using cellular networks for internet access even when we are home.

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Work it Out

A pure upbeat and optimistic rhythm. Given all the crap I’m handling, this is a perfect theme tune for the long weekend.

I’m faced with various degrees of bad and worst decisions as opposed to my normal tactical good or better choices.  I’ve allowed external influences to box me into corners with sheer cliff edges and can only blame myself.

In the meantime, I’m limping like a lame duck with crippling pain in my left lower calf muscles, a physical memory of reaching the Alpl 14, 8671 Alpl, Austria summit last week.

Try not to upset the pile

On the upside, one of my mentees just secured a full-time job.  Feels good to be part of someone’s happiness.

Come, my selector.

“We gonna work it out” Breakwater 1978