Your home electronics are attacked multiple times on a daily basis by invisible threats. While we often warn about viruses and malware, an even more universal danger is electrical surging. Most of us recognize that lightning produces tremendous electrical discharges. The power of lightning is so great that even the best surge protectors simply fail to withstand the forces of nature. During a lightning storm, the only way to be absolutely sure that your devices won’t be damaged is to unplug them.
Need a New Router?
Once you have a wireless electronic gadget, you definitely need a wireless router. It lets your devices communicate with each other and connects your home network (a local area network or LAN) to the internet (a wide area network or WAN). In brief, it is the control center for your home network. Beginners initially rank setting up and configuring a wireless router as somewhere between a necessary evil and an arcane, mysterious exercise. With a little practice, it is possible to be successfully up and running in just a half hour.
The Hazards of Being First in Line
Apple computer fans have become accustomed to frequent free revisions of the operating systems for their electronic companions. In fact, OS X El Capitan is expected to arrive this October. Android, Chromebook and Linux variations periodically produce free continuing revisions. The free upgrade to Windows 10 for current home users of Windows 7 and 8.1 has come as a welcome but puzzling surprise.
Out With the Old, In With the New
If you have recently become the proud possessor of a new computer, sooner or later you’ll have to figure out something to do with your old computer. You did remember to copy all the useful information from that old computer, didn’t you? Did you also remember to withdraw that same computer from limited installation programs or online services – like Adobe Photoshop Elements, iTunes, Office 365 and others?
By this time, we’ve all learned that older doesn’t mean useless. If the aging computer is less than 5 years old, it may make sense to repurpose rather than recycle it. If you are one of the owners of the remaining 650,000,000 Windows XP computers, please note that your PC is at least 6 years old! XP was first sold in 2001. Refurbishers will usually reject computers more than 5 years old.
Ready or Not, Here comes Windows 10
Microsoft has finally officially announced that the release date for Windows 10 will be July 29th. This is a few months earlier than the previous vaguely stated “before the end of summer” announcement, but months later than a flurry of rumors had wistfully predicted. Over a billion Windows 7 and 8.1 owners will soon be able to claim their free upgrade. For those not eligible for the free upgrade, new retail copies of Windows 10 and new computers with Windows 10 will also be available on July 29th.
Windows 10: Hail Mary or Hallelujah?
“We are focused on making Windows 10 the most loved version of Windows ever,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has repeatedly stated over the past year. “Within two to three years of Windows 10’s release, there will be 1 billion devices running Windows 10,” Microsoft VP Terry Myerson said on April 29, 2015 during the Microsoft Build conference keynote address.
These are ambitious goals for a product expected to launch this summer, especially following the painfully disappointing introduction of Windows 8 in 2012. Windows 10 will be a free upgrade for current individual users of Windows 7, Windows 8 and 8.1 for the first 12 months of availability. Microsoft will support upgraded computers with security and system updates for the lifetime of those devices. Corporate computer systems and older versions of Windows are not eligible for this offer.
A Matter of Life Or Death
Lest you get too excited about possible implications of the title, I’m only addressing the batteries in your latest portable electronic toys. Since many devices no longer have user replaceable batteries, a failed battery is no longer a trivial expense. Replacement may mean bringing or mailing the failed unit to the manufacturer’s repair depot, which replaces the entire device with a factory refurbished litter mate – at costs ranging from $99 (iPad) to $470 (Surface Pro) and delays of up to 6 weeks. Many dejected owners opt to discard the entire unit and replace it with a newer model.
These PUPs Are Not Cute!
Lenovo, the largest PC vendor in the world, found itself melting under a spotlight recently. In September 2014, Lenovo accepted approximately $250,000 to bundle Superfish Inc VisualDiscovery on its computers. The software inserts advertisements into Google search results that will “add to the user experience”.
Unfortunately, Superfish used inadequately protected encryption certificates constructed by Kommodia; this enables cyberattacks to readily intercept passwords and sensitive data. On February 20, 2015, the Department of Homeland Security advised uninstalling Superfish and any of its associated root certificates from about 16 million Lenovo computers built between September 2014 and January 2015. Go to https://filippo.io/Badfish/ to see if you are infected. Search for “remove Superfish” in your browser for useful cleanup software.
Purloined Password Problems
Multiple news agencies reported the theft of nearly two million user names and passwords for accounts at Facebook, Google, Twitter, Yahoo, ADP and others in November 2013. Sadly, most reports entirely missed the real story – 2 million compromised accounts are but a drop in the bucket. At least 154,000,000 user accounts have been compromised in the last few years. Thousands of these have been published on the internet for all to see. Will yours be next?
Who Knows What Evil Lurks in the Hearts of Men?
Scareware & Ransomware
Some of the scariest things I read are trend analysis and predictions from experts in the computer security business. One of the most rapidly growing threats is generically termed “ransomware”, a diabolical twist on “scareware” schemes seen over the last few years.