What happens when you used a unsecured hot spot?

The risks of using a unsecured WiFi hot spot seem limited when you are desperately looking for a internet connection, but think again.    Here is a great article on what can be seen when you cruise the internet on a unsecured hot spot, 

Here's what an eavesdropper sees when you use an unsecured Wi-Fi hotspot

With this in mind, here are some quick tips when using WiFi networks.

- Use only secure WiFi networks, such as WPA or WPA 2 secured networks.

- If there is not a secure network, try using a mobile WiFi hotspot from a mobile service provider, or a tethered connection through your mobile telephone.

-  If you borrow someone's secure network, ensure that you turn off File Sharing.   In many instances you may think that you are secure, but then you fail to confirm that File Sharing is turned off and all of your files are secure.  

A quick and easy (but not free) way to transfer your email

More often than not we tend to collect different email accounts that take an increasing amount of time to monitor, for example mail@yahoo.com, mail@hotmail.com, mail@gmail.com.  Quite a bit of my work involves consolidating different email accounts for clients or setting up forwarding to a specific single account.   My preferred method of this is to choose a single account and then transfer all email to that single account, then close the other accounts.   This can be a time consuming process that can involve hours of capture and transfer.

Now it looks like there is another answer to this problem, yippiemove.com.  Yippiemove.com provides a email transfer service for a fee of around $15.00 per account. Here is some more information from their site,

"YippieMove is all about liberating your email. Email was invented to make communication faster and easier - yet there are times when it's anything but. If you have ever been in a situation where you needed to leave an email account behind, you know that migrating (or transferring) all those emails from one account to another can be a real challenge. YippieMove makes this a breeze. With YippieMove, you no longer need to be a tech-savvy engineer to figure out how to transfer your email.

Best of all, it all happens on our servers. You don't have to download anything, you don't have to sit through hours of forwarding email one by one in your email program. All you have to do is answer YippieMove's simple questions and then watch your emails fly."

http://www.yippiemove.com/

I have tried a single transfer with great success.  It is easy and a great time saver.   Weather it is effective with all email systems remains to be seen, but based on it's current compatibly list it has a very good start.

Supported Email Systems

If you try yippiemove.com, let me know how it worked for you.  

Is your web cam taking pictures when you do not want it too?

I am not usually the paranoid one when it comes to invasion of privacy via or on the internet, I am of the mind that privacy in this zone was compromised from day one.   Even so I am concerned by the increasing frequency of hacks and compromises concerning web cams and mobile cams.  

Most recently this hack appeared, 

Smile! Hackers Can Silently Access Your Webcam Right Through The Browser (Again)

Even though it is reported to have been fixed,  I am more concerned of its existence in the first place.

Further to this you have the Arron's Computer Rental spyware, 

How spyware on rental PCs captured users’ most intimate moments

and the FBI in this case, 

FBI denied permission to spy on hacker through his webcam

These instances have prompted me to to even more vigilant when it comes to who can access my computer and why, and has even made me think about taping up my web cam.  What are you thoughts?

The choice is yours Android vs. iOS 7

I get asked by a lot of people, should I buy a iPhone or a Android phone.   I usually tell people that it is user preference and that they should make the choice on the device on how it works for them.   I also point out some pros and cons for each device.   More often than not it becomes a very in depth conversation, one that is a little too in depth. Recently I stumbled upon this article that explains the differences in a very clear and concise fashion. It gets across some key points i make about both systems.    

10 Reasons Android beats iOS

from NBC News

The title appears biased, but the reality is it is a well balance article on the differences between the two operating systems.  I urge anyone that is wondering about the difference between the two systems to check out this article. 

A good article on B.Y.O.D.

As a follow up to a earlier post about Bring Your Own Device, I found this excellent article on on highly effective B.Y.O.D. from a user perspective.  All to often a technology issue is only examined from a hardware / software perspective, not addressing the user challenges.  In the case of this article I see a couple of important areas to highlight, 

- Eliminate distractions, make sure that you do everything that you can to prevent distraction.   All to often that call of personal social networks and personal emails draws us away from work.

- Prepare for disaster,  what would you do if you laptop was irreparably damaged.   Are all of you documents backed up, do you have a back up computer?

7 Habits for Highly Effective BYOD

from Forbes 

Let me know what you think in the comments.