Technology Blunders You Might Be Making

Good friends tell it like it is. So that's what I'm doing. Hope it helps you!

•  No password on your laptop. Laptops are stolen and lost all the time. Read the stats on stolen laptops; it's alarming. Put a password on today! 
• Announcing you are going on vacation and leaving your house empty on your social media. Burglars scour social media to look for empty houses.
• Using an AOL address. AOL is so last century. It says to your customer that you are outdated. Make a plan to transition away from it. It makes you look a bit stodgy to your young customers. It says you don't want to change and screams out of touch.
• Gushing about your spouse on your social media. Mine is the best! He's so sweet, funny and incredibly smart. I never met anyone as wonderful as him Made my point? Annoying! Use Hallmark instead if you want to tell your spouse you love them.
• Using "just saying" seems to be a popular phrase, but you might want to leave it out of all of your electronic communications. "Just saying" is always followed by something rude so folks get the wrong impression.
• Admitting you are not tech savy. It's ok with me because I can guide you and teach you stuff. Don't do it with your customers. Real estate is tech driven these days. If you are not tech savy, you might rethink advertising it. 
• Not logging out of your email on public computers. I see this a lot. Please stop. It's dangerous for you. Run ccleaner or at least delete cookies after you use a public computer.
• Talking to dead people is creepy. They don't have Facebook. Talking to God is cool because He is omniscient, but talking to anyone else deceased is not.
• Printing emails isn't green. That's not what email is intended for. It gives the wrong impression to folks who care about the planet.

Feeling a Little Slow?

If you are wondering why your computer is slow doing whatever it is you are doing on the net, there are a number of things that can cause sluggishness.

Defragmentation is a normal result of using your computer. Files are written all over your hard disk and your computer becomes defragmented. Running disk defragmenter puts them all close together on the disk.

Run scans on your computer to make sure that you are not infected. Always click on update before you run a scan.  Many times attacks are new ones and if you don’t get the newest definitions, they you are not protected against the new infections. Don’t install anything free from the web before fully checking it out. Free is sometimes costly!

If you think that your connection is slow, you can do an internet speed test.  There are many websites that provide free internet speed tests; toast.net is an example of a free speed test site. Keep in mind that speed test results are not in megabytes; they are in megabits. 1 megabit =1024 bytes.  So a megabit is about .125 megabytes.  If you get a speed test result of 1 mbps, and you multiply .125 by 60 (because there are 60 seconds in a minute), the result is 7.5 megabytes per minute. That’s not too shabby of a network speed.  If you get anywhere around 1mbps consider that  well and look for other things.

Wireless theft can slow you down. Zamzom wireless tool will tell you if anyone is stealing your wireless.  I have my SSID (the name of my network) hidden  (in technical terms, SSID broadcasting disabled) and still I check Zamzom periodically to see if anyone is using my network. You can download Zamzom from cnet.com for free.

Website congestion can fool you into thinking your computer is slow. I recall a time when I was downloading from a site and thought my internet provider was ripping me off. After a speed test I found that it was the website I was downloading from was heavily congested. 

The most common cause of slowness is overstuffing a computer. Every month you add new files and new programs without taking the old ones off.  Luckily, this one is the easiest to rectify. Get rid of the programs and files you don’t use.  Burn files and photos you may need to CD or store them on flash or online storage.

I hope this helps!

If Firefox 5's Release 1 Month After 4 Surprised You......

Then hold onto your hat! They are planning to release a new Firefox every month. Developers are scrambling to future-proof their apps so that they don't get blind-sided again. If you are frustrated with an app that doesn't work with Firefox 5, don't abandon the ship.

Check out http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/channel/ for beta versions of upcoming releases and get an idea of what is in store for future Firefox releases.

Overall, I'm still feeling that Firefox is a good choice for your general browsing habits. It's definitely safer than using IE.

How to Avoid a Russian Phish

According to Kaspersky labs, Russia is the world  leader for spreading malware. (USA was number two). Phishing is on the rise again it was up 2.1%. How do you avoid a phish?

If you receive an email in a language you don't read, it's probably a phish.

я поздравляю вас время осел фишеров.

Notice the backwards R (Ya), the 3 (which is a z), the square with feet (a D), the circle with a line thru it (F) and the strange W (SH). All these characters are distinct to a cyrillic language. Even I read Russian and I won't open emails in Russian because they are either porn vendors or phishers. If you can remember any one of these characters or the general rule not to open foreign-language emails, it will help you.

That being said, some phishers are writing in English. Look for spelling errors, punctuation errors and grammatical mistakes. I spent more than one year over there and their English isn't polished. Even the English teachers, who I spent a lot of time with, make many mistakes. So mistakes are a clue that the email didn't originate in the US. 

A big, red flag should be raised when you are asked for your password in an email. Who does that???

 Credit card information should never be asked in an email.  


If someone asks for other personal information: social security numbers, phone numbers, addresses, or spouse names, it's probably a phish.


Don't reply to phishes. Resist the urge to reply with "you *&^%%$ phisher I'm not giving you anything!!!" If you reply, the phisher knows he has reached a maintained email address and will try again, but probably from a different email address and with a different angle. Replying is like painting a target on your back.

Surviving a Bootkit Infection

Infections on your computer are bad, but some infections are worse than others. A rogue antivirus may seem impossible to you, but to a technician it's a cold whereas a bootkit infection is more like a malignant tumor. Microsoft recommends reinstalling Windows after you've had a bootkit infection and so do I.  There's no fudge factor here. Even a really savy tech probably won't get all of the infection.

When a virus gets into your boot sector, it's so difficult to remove. It's a time consuming and tedious process to find infected files and you can never be sure that you got them all. That's why it's so important to have everything backed up on a daily basis. That way if you do get infected you lose only one day's work and not months' worth of work.

Make sure all of your photos, music and documents are backed up. Set up Windows backup if you don't want to do it yourself. http://www.microsoft.com/athome/setup/backupdata.aspx That link will help you with Windows backup. Make sure your contacts are backed up too. Not much is worse than losing all your precious business contacts.

Having an external hard drive is a great way to add a little insurance that you won't lose your data, HOWEVER most folks don't take the proper care to insure that their data on their external hard drive will be safe.

• You must scan external hard drives on a regular basis.
• Disconnect the power and USB data cable from the external hard drive when not in use and, especially, during a thunderstorm. 
• Do not store the eternal hard drive on the carpeting. (You want to keep it in a drawer and out of the way of vacuum cleaners.)
• Don't leave an external hard drive in your automobile. (Greenhouse effects can destroy your hard drive.)

Ok, well I hope this helps you get prepared and scares you into being a safe surfer. If you're not scared of getting an infection, you should be. You carry a spare tire in your trunk so why not a spare drive for your computer? There's lots of sales going on; right now you can pick one up for not much money.

Be prepared..... or be prepared to cry! ;)

Are You Using the Same Password for Everything?

Using the same password for everything is rather dangerous.... especially if it's your name. I'm not talking the nickname your spouse calls you. If your spouse calls you smoogly bear probably no one knows about it. I'm talking the name your mama gave you. All someone has to do is find out your name and email address (piece of cake) and they have access to your personal account information. If your name is Jane and your email address is janesmith@anything.com... it's real easy to hack your account if your name is Jane.  That can put you in a financial pickle real fast.

Using your spouse's name is not a good idea either. That's public record material. I wouldn't advise using your children's names for everything either. That's also public record. Your pet's name isn't public record (unless you've blogged about the pet). 

Instead of using the same password for everything, come up with a password scheme. Here's an example
Google: googly2011
Amazon: amazony2011
Yahoo: yahooey2011

Notice they all contain numbers. They don't have your name. They are different. They are at least 10 characters long for added security.  Nowadays security experts are recommending passwords be 10-12 characters long and 12 is better. With 8 characters, your password can be cracked in a matter of hours. With 10 characters a matter of months. It would take centuries to crack your 12 character long password.

 Ok, it's not fun to change passwords and remember new passwords, but if you come up with a scheme it won't be too hard. You can alter the year in the above scheme so that your password changes every year. Just an example.  


I used to have the same 9 character password for everything. I switched to a scheme of more than 10 characters long so that my passwords are easy to remember and are more secure. If I can do it, so can you. You'll be safer!

You Need a Trim

Ok, your computer can do lots of amazing things, but don't expect your computer to do everything all at the same time. If you do your computer will get sluggish from the excess weight it's carrying. Trim down what you expect your computer to do.

Imagine your computer is a big, hunky guy and each application is a shopping bag. You go to the first store and pick up something: the Tom Tom application. You hand it over to the big, hunky guy to carry and he has no problem carrying it..... because that's all he is carrying. You go to the next store: the Blackberry store and you pick up the blackberry app. The big hunky guy takes the blackberry app from you and says no problem. I'm only carrying two things... this is a piece of cake for him! Next you go to the iTunes store and pick up the iTunes app and Quicktime. You ask the big hunky guy to carry them as well. Still he's having no problem juggling these four things around isn't that difficult. Then you pick up two more apps and hand them over. A few more and hand those over as well. Then you go the next store and as you walk in he gives you a dirty look. Really you need more???? Don't you think you have enough, he says?  He can feel the weight of all those apps and he's not running as fast as he used to. It's kind of a struggle.

The next day you are fresh and ready to get some more apps---but he isn't! He's still feeling it from the day before. When you go to check out another app, he mutters under his breath. His obvious displeasure with your decision to add yet another app to him is rather annoying to you, but HE is the one doing all the work. You are just having fun.

The next week when you suggest going and getting more for your computer, he says no. No way under the sun. Forget it. If you want the app so bad you carry it!

Ok, you get it? Just because the big hunky guy is strong and can carry many things, it might not be in your best interest to overload him with things that you really don't need all that much. If you think that you are starting to load up your computer, start trimming away at the unnecessary fat you have on it.

If you are sensible with what you expect your computer to carry, he will serve you long and well. If you get unreasonable, you can be sure that the days ahead will be full of grumbling!