Free online accounts and data backup with backupify

If you are a social networking addict, the scenario of losing ones online data is comparable to a nuclear attack. Many of you may argue that you can't loose your online accounts and data because you take adequate security measures but in the cyberworld no amount of security is adequate, if somebody like a hacker wants your data he will get it no matter how much time it takes. Now the only damage control method you can use is to backup all the online data. To  do this you can use a online service called Backupify.

BetterPrivacy - Security against long term tracking cookies.

According to me, today Internet is the biggest commercial platform in the world and information like user browsing habits, user's personal info etc are much valued here. Due to which a new variety of cookies called Local Shared Objects or commonly called 'Flash cookies' are used to gather this information. Flash cookies are a type of never expiring cookie which are stored on the users computer. Originally sites having flash content used the flash cookies to store the user's preferences on the site but in recent times there have been privacy concerns about them. Some of the security issues of the flash cookies are

• They do not expire.
• They are cross-browser meaning it doesn't matter which ever browser you are using till it supports flash content.
• The cookies do not need user or browser permission to send the information to its relative server.
• They are very well hidden and it is rather difficult to be aware of them.

You can get protection against this cookies by using a popular Firefox addon called "Better Privacy"


BetterPrivacy

BetterPrivacy is a popular and one of the most recommended Firefox addon, because it is easy to use and very effective. With one click it displays all the Flash cookies stored on the computer. Using its easy to use manager you can select which cookies to delete and which to keep. You can also select the automatic clean up option where it cleans all the cookies after the browser is closed. You can protect some of the cookies which you think necessary from the automatic cleanup.
To download and know more about the addon CLICK HERE

 

Exif data - Security measures

All the professional photographers are familiar with the term "Exif data". But general public most probably must have never heard of this term. so here is bit information to get you started with.
Exif (Exchangeable image file format) is a specification used to store data in a image. This data contains very important information about the image like the model of the camera used to take the image, date and time at which the image was taken, location of where the image was taken (if the camera or smartphone is GPS enabled) etc. This can be very helpful for photographers to later study the images and find optimal camera settings for the best images.To view exif data you need a exif viewer. here is one OPanda Iexif.

But this also has a bad side. Here are security issues that can be presented due to Exif data.

• Many times people take their embarrassing images covering their face, which they post online in the spur of the moment. But it should be noted that exif data can provide information which can be used to identify the person in the image. People with bad intentions may take advantages of such situations by black mailing the person in the image.
• Many times the time and date of the image is intended to be kept secret, for many personal reason but exif data can reveal this information very easily.
• Exif information can be used wrongly to bully people on sites like 4chan.

Now you can avoid all this inconveniences due to exif data by taking some simple security measures.

• Select the option "for web" while saving the image.
• You can easily remove exif data from a image using software like Exif Tag Remover

NoScript - Security against active contents (Firefox Addon)

As the Internet is getting more popular, different types of security vulnerabilities are exploited everyday. One such security threat is presented by the active content on  the web like javascript , flash, silverlight etc. The user may not even know, when he or she fell victim to it. Now there are many security measures you can take against it and one of the best is NoScript Firefox addon.

NoScript
NoScript is a very popular Firefox addon. It is one of the most recommended security addon on the net. What it basically does is stop any active content from executing in your browser without permission. You can choose the websites you trust and allow active contents from them to execute. Some of its important features are

• It protects the user from harmful server-side active content and scripts.
• It provides client-side protection against cross site scripting attack.
• It protects the user from Clickjacking attacks.
• It can force the browser to always use HTTPS.

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Firefox addon to protect against homepage and search hijacking

Today Internet is flooded with new softwares and apps. Thousands are uploaded everyday and most of them are free. Due to this the user can't overcome the temptation to download and try the new softwares. But one should always be careful while using new software, because they can posses many security threats. One of such threats is browser homepage and search hijacking, where the software changes the configuration setting of the browser and resets your homepage and search options. There are special software to prevent this from happening but instead of using this software you can just use a Firefox addon.

 BrowserProtect


 BrowserProtect is a small Firefox addon that protects the browser against homepage and search hijacking. It monitors the browser's configuration against malwares which hijack your homepage and search configuration.
If it detects any suspicious change in the configuration it blocks it and reports it to the user.

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Facebook Video Spam

This is a warning to all Facebook users. A video spam is getting very popular and spreading like a wild fire. Basically you will receive a post from your  friends on your wall with a video player saying that you are there in the video or you are tagged in the video. But when you click on it will tell you to select the the address bar and press ctrl+v and and then enter. when you do that it will post the same post on your friends wall. So please beware of this spam and keep your shelf safe from falling for such a idiotic spam.

Overwrite data to make it unrecoverable

After reading the title many reader will think why take so much trouble to overwrite data to delete it permanently and will suggest that just empty the recycle bin after deleting the file. But permanently deleting the file does not actually delete the file permanently, the data is till there on the hard-drive and will remain there till other files are not overwritten on them, so if somebody gets access to your hard-drive he can easily recover the data using data recovery softwares. This problem can be easily solved by using data overwriting softwares, this softwares overwrite the data and then delete it which makes the file useless even if it is recovered. Here is one such free software.

Protect Your Files From Getting Deleted

We see lots of computer users who delete their important files and then cry over it and if the file was job related or some project or assignment then god save them. This problem mostly occurs where there are more then one users on a single computer like in colleges or work places, one of the user may not know the particular file is very important to the other user and he may casually delete it. Many will futilely try to get it back by using data-recovery software but chances of getting back the file are very slim. This all unnecessary trouble can be easily avoided by anti-delete protecting your important files. Here is one such software to protect the files

Know The Latest Scams And Rumors On The Internet.

The number of Internet users has been increasing exponentially and due to this the fraudsters are seeing a whole new playground to play their tricks. Thousands of new scams are created everyday, most of them are foolish and very less people may fall prey to it but some are very complicated and well constructed. Even a very precautious and well informed Internet user may fall prey to it. So every netizen should have some knowledge of the latest scams and rumours even if it doesn't concern them. Here is a site which informs the people of the latest threats and scams.

WWW.SNOPES.COM

Snopes is a very popular site for knowing the latest threats and scams making rounds of the cyberspace. Every scam and rumor is studied and checked for authenticity. The users can also suggest or inform about the scams and rumors.

QUICKLY LOCKING THE COMPUTER SCREEN

Today life has become very busy and hectic and in this rush people always make silly mistakes for which they later have to face many problems and criticism. One of such mistake is to leave the computer screen "on" while you are gone somewhere else. This may be not a huge problem for home users but in offices this can lead to severe problems, like

• Some person having a grudge on you may try to misuse your computer.
• Some important documents or some classified contents on the computer can robbed. 
• Somebody may install backdoors or trojans on the computer bypassing the anti-virus and use this privileges to later do some bigger harm.

BLOCK ADS IN FIREFOX USING ADBLOCK (Firefox Addon)

Now-a-days the web experience is truly degrading due to heavy advertisements on websites. Due to this ads the overall browsing speed also decreases. In this context the  Firefox addon  Adblock can be very useful.
ADBLOCK is one of the most useful addon for Firefox. So much that many of the users are still using Firefox just for Adblock. I would say the first addon you should be adding in Firefox should be Adblock. It's main features are

• More than 40 filter subscriptions provided by users in many different language can be used, to automatically configure Firefox to block ads and keep the user's safe from known malware domains.
• Adblock Plus also allows you to customize your filters with the assistance of a variety of useful features, including a context option for images, a block tab for Flash and Java objects, and a list of blockable items to remove scripts and stylesheets.

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WI - FI HOTSPOT SECURITY

Now-a-days mostly every public places like restaurants, airports, college campus have WI-FI Hotspots, to which people connect without giving a second thought to their security. Some wi-fi hotspots are well protected, but mostly all of them provide very feeble security to the user. Such unprotected hotspots are open treat to the hackers and Script kiddies. They can easily sniff or capture packets travelling to and fro from your laptop. But the most dangerous thing the hacker can do is steal the target's authenticating cookies using Http session hijacking attack. The recent popular firefox addon Firesheep has made this attack very easy, so much easy that even a first grader would be able to use it to compromise your Facebook, twitter and othe social networking accounts. so here are some software useful to save one self from such attacks.

PROTECTING COMPUTER FROM INFECTED USB DEVICES

Now a days one of the main devices used for data exchange are usb devices, but they are very vulnerable. more than 70% of the malwares and spyware are spread through usb drives like pen drive. they can cause great harm to big computer networks like those of colleges and institutes as they spread rapidly from one computer to another. Here are some software useful to protect your computer and networks from this malicious usb devices.


USB VIRUS SCAN

when a usb drive is inserted it automatically scans the drive and blocks any malicious program trying to breach your system.its light and very easy to use.

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USB FIREWALL

usb firewall protects the computer from viruses, malwares,trojans,adware and spybots which try to spread in your computer when the usb device is inserted. it alerts you if something one the usb drive tries intrusion in your computer.

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PRIVACY ERASER PRO (erase your internet activity logs)

Your computer tracks logs of your online and computer application activities like your surfing habits, your favorite sites etc. this logs are stored in the hard drive which can be misused by spyware and spybots, so these logs should be deleted in order to protect your privacy.


PRIVACY ERASER PRO
 

It is a Internet eraser which erases all tracks of your online and computer activities.With simply one click, Privacy Eraser Pro allows you to erase Internet history, erase browser history, erase address bar history, erase cookies, erase internet cache, autocomplete memory, saved password, index.dat files of your browser, and Window's swap file, temp folders, run history, search history, open/save history, recent documents and more. With Privacy Eraser Pro you can schedule cleaning tasks run at a time that is most convenient for you.it supports all major browsers like Mozilla firefox, google chrome, AOL, Apple Safari and Opera etc.

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Google’s Safe Browsing Website Diagnostic Tool

The Internet has not remained as clean as earlier. loads of site try to install harmful stuff on the viewers computer like Trojans and harmful scripts but the viewer has no way to distinguish between a clean and infected site so here is a way to check whether a site is harmful with google's safe browsing website diagnostic tool.   ENJOY !!!!!

Check The Current Status Of The Site With Google’s Safe Browsing Website Diagnostic Tool
Website URL :-

KEEPASS -- open source password manager.

This is the age of multi-tasking where you have hundreds of accounts on all possible sites on the net and for this you have hundreds of ID and hundreds of passwords and only a person with extraordinary brain may remember them all.but what about the not so Einstein people like us. here is the right solution.

KEEPASS  is a free open source password manager which stores all your passwords in a single database which is then locked with master key so you have to just remember this single master key to unlock the whole database and carry on with your daily work. the databases are encrypted using AES and Twofish the most secure encryption algorithms around.

for further information and downloads visit the site KEEPASS

PERSONAL NOTE :- many people may hesitate to use it because it is open source but there is no need to worry its ISO certified and has got many positive reviews from tech gurus, i personally use it, as i am a great fan of open source and its gets a thumbs up from me. definitely worth trying.

SECURITY MEASURE AGAINST USB HACKING

Now-a-days usb hacking has become very popular because its easy and quick. computers in institution and other public asses computers are very vulnerable to it.so here is the software to protect the computer against it.


USB LOCK
usb lock is one of the best software to restrict the unauthorized use USB storage removable devices, cd-rom and floppy. without blocking other important usb devices like printer, mouse, camera etc

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USB Thumb Drive Tricks

Encrypt and Set Your Drive to Self-Destruct in Emergencies

Not physically self-destruct, as cool as that would be. But with USB Safeguard, you can make it so that either your entire drive requires an encryption drive, or just select files do. In more unique fashion, USB Safeguard can be set to wipe your files entirely if someone tries to access them without your password too many times. Losing a cheap thumb drive is much better than losing the keys to your checking account.

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DISPOSABLE EMAIL ID (10 Minute Mail)

In this chaotic cyberworld its very necessary to take care of your email accounts. Today mostly all the online services and other softwares need you to provide them with you email id to prove your authenticity. But you may not be comfortable providing your regular email id to the service which you do not trust currently or you may want to use the service just once and don't see the need to provide them with your real email id. Disposable email id are very useful in this matter. Some of the other reasons to use disposable email id are

• Sending anonymous email .
• Sending emails for which you don't want replies.
• Avoiding spam to your genuine email id.
• or just want a temporary email id to accept, sign up authenticating emails.

here is one of the online service that provides a disposable id.

10 MINUTES MAIL

10 Minute Mail provides you with a disposable email id for the duration of 10 minutes. When you visit the site you will be instantly provided with a email id, you can use it to do your required work. If you are accepting a reply wait on the same page any received email will be shown on the same page in the lower section. You will be shown in realtime how much time is left for the id to expire. If you need some extra time click on the "Give me 10 more minutes" option under the email id to receive more 10 minutes.
To know more about the service and use it CLICK HERE

WARNING FOR ORKUT USERS AGAINST THE LATEST JAVASCRIPT ATTACK

From time to time you may see new threads being created in the forum of communities with subjects "Free cell phone recharge" or "Orkut themes new version" and in the body a javascript will be posted asking you to run it to get your phone recharged. This is FAKE/SCAM and a dangerous script.
What it does when you run it is that the same thread will be created by you without you knowledge in all your joined communities, your entire profile About Me and profile status changes to that script. The script will be sent by you to all your friends in their scrapbooks, photo comment section, etc. Also your password and email ID gets stolen and sent to the script creator.

No one in the world would have the slightest interest in recharging a stranger's mobile for free. Be practical and don't get tricked into these foolish messages.

The moment you see a javascript ignore it - it is against the Terms of Service of Orkut to even run a javascript. You will only suffer and community owners may think you're spamming and ban you.

So for your own safety - do NOT run those scripts which claims to recharge your cell. The moment you see it report to mods and they will take further action.