Category: Privacy
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Bulk Uninstall
There are so many apps preinstalled in Windows it feels overwhelming to delete them. But it’s easy to bulk delete many silently in the background with BCP (bcuninstaller.com). I love apps that say what they do in the title. When you run it, you can check all of the apps you want to uninstall and…
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Ads & Cameras
Ad blockers in your web browser accomplish three goals: reducing ad clutter; cutting down on malicious ads trying to inject malware; and speeding up the overall loading of many ad-heavy websites. And now, the FBI is recommending the use of ad blockers to reduce the chance of ads impersonating brands. None are perfect, but one…
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Wi-Fi Sharing
Do friends and guests ask for your Wi-Fi network and password first thing when they visit? You can make it easy for them to sign on by printing a QR code for them to scan. Two options for this are qr-code-generator.com/solutions/wifi-qr-code or qrstuff.com. I always love exploring, and now I can go to the edge…
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Tech Updates
The new mac OS system, Ventura, introduced in October, has a back-ground noise generator to play rain, stream, or ocean sounds. Go to System Settings, under the Apple logo in the upper left corner, and search for “background sounds” to choose and activate different ambient sounds. This might be enough of a reason to upgrade.…
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Router, Email & Facebook Tips
When changing to a new router, make sure to set it up with the same network name, password and encryption type. More and more routers let you do this, which means you won’t have to go around to all your other devices—printers, TVs, Alexa or Siri devices, doorbells, etc.—to teach them the new passwords. When…
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Facebook, Zelle, Snapchat
Anyone with a Facebook account who has downloaded other apps, like photo editors, VPNs, flashlight apps, 3D games, fitness trackers, horoscopes, and business or ad management apps should change their password for Facebook. Many of those apps, more than 400 according to Meta (the parent company of Facebook), have sucked up Facebook credentials. Look through…
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Safer Login Options
Logins without passwords are increasingly common, and something Microsoft has been pushing hard lately. Going “passwordless” does not mean you no longer need authentication; you just use something other than a traditional password. Think of those codes you sometimes get when logging into a website, often financial sites. Passwords suffer as an authentication method for…
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OCR, SPAM increases, Enhance Old Photos
Being able to copy text embedded in an image will soon be easy in Windows 10 and 11 as part of Microsoft PowerToys. In the next few months, with PowerOCR, you will be able to select part of an image with recognizable text to be converted and put in the Windows clipboard as text for…
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Is Windows Trusted Platform Module (TPM) Update Needed?
Windows 11 is coming. Are you ready? Or does it even matter? There has been a flurry of excitement and agony around the system requirements for Windows 11. Microsoft is insisting on a fairly recent version of a security hardware component called Trusted Platform Module (TPM), which can protect against potential malware and ransomware attacks…
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Protecting While Sharing
When loaning your smartphone to someone else, you can do a few things first to limit what they can do. On iPhones, turn on Guided Access (Settings>Accessibility, and slide on Guided Access), and use Passcode Settings to set a different code from your normal unlock code. Explore Time Limits for other options. Limit use to…
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No More Passwords?
Apple, Google, and Microsoft are working to end passwords. Before you cheer too loudly, review what they are trying to do. This does not mean that there will not be a need for some type of authentication. Have you ever tried to login to a website and had to get a one-time code sent to…
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Windows Tips, Text Mistakes
I love how Facebook researchers find the darnedest things. The latest out of their labs (actually an internal study from 2018) is that they found that using Facebook increased loneliness more than other activities its researchers surveyed, including video games and watching TV. As more people “discover” Windows 11, they find things like dark mode…