Faster: 100 Ways to Improve your Digital Life
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Although MAC Address Filtering will keep most attackers away from your network, it is important to remember that a motivated cybercriminal can still use various techniques (e.g. MAC spoofing) to fool your Wi-Fi router. To prevent this, keep changing your Wi-Fi access password on a regular basis and make sure you choose strong passwords that are a combination of numbers, letters and symbols.
77. How to trace your lost or stolen mobile phone
< 180 Seconds
Losing your mobile phone can be quite a painful ordeal. Not only does it burn a hole in your pocket, but it also causes a lot of inconvenience because of the loss of all your information. Whenever someone’s phone gets lost or stolen, the first thing that comes to their mind is whether there is a way to trace it.
If you are using an Android or iOS-based smartphone, there is a wonderful app called Lookout (http://www.lookout.com) for just this purpose. It is available as a free download and, once installed on your phone, it can be of great help in case your mobile phone is stolen or lost. Just make sure that you have Lookout installed on your phone from before.
Lookout and the Lookout logo are registered trademarks of Lookout Inc., used with permission.
To start using Lookout, you need to download the app to your Android or iOS smartphone or tablet. In this example, I am going to install Lookout on my iPad. I have to create an account on the Lookout website to complete the installation process. Once I have installed Lookout on my device and created an account, my device is all set to be protected.
If this device gets lost or stolen, all you need to do is simply log in to your Lookout account from any computer. Once you log in, you will be taken to the Lookout Dashboard, which will allow you to trace your missing device with a single click of the mouse button. Typically, it doesn’t take longer than a few minutes for Lookout to be able to find your device.
It is important to note that Lookout will be able to trace the geographical location of a missing device with much more accuracy if it is connected to a mobile phone network than if it is connected only to a Wi-Fi network. Using the Lookout Dashboard, not only can you trace your missing device, but you can also remotely erase all data from your missing device. This means that, even though you may have lost your device, your data on it cannot be accessed or misused. Finally, it is also possible for you to use the Lookout Dashboard to remotely set off a loud alarm on your missing device.
Lookout and the Lookout logo are registered trademarks of Lookout Inc., used with permission.
In this example, I am going to trace my missing iPad by clicking on the Locate button in my Lookout Dashboard. As we can see, Lookout has managed to trace my missing iPad, and has displayed its location as somewhere near the M-Block Market in Greater Kailash Part 2 in New Delhi.
Lookout and the Lookout logo are registered trademarks of Lookout Inc., used with permission.
Lookout and the Lookout logo are registered trademarks of Lookout Inc., used with permission.
78. How to trace your lost or stolen laptop
< 300 Seconds
If you are worried about losing your laptop or it getting stolen, it is time that you install a tracking software on it so that you can easily trace it back if it goes missing.
Prey is an open-source app that allows you to keep track of all your electronic devices (laptop, tablet and mobile phones). Once Prey has been installed on your laptop, it will silently run in the background and wait to receive a signal through the Internet from you. In case you have lost your laptop, you can log in to the web interface of Prey from anywhere in the world and send a signal to your laptop. Once the signal is received by the Prey software on your computer, it will allow you to perform the following actions, all remotely through the Internet and without physical access to your laptop:
1. Show the location of your device on a geographical map
2. Take a photo of the person using your device using the built-in camera
3. Lock down your computer, so that it cannot be used
4. Take a screenshot of your computer screen to find out more information about who is using your laptop. For example, you may be able to capture the email account or Facebook account that the user is logged into.
5. Set off a loud alarm on your missing laptop
6. Display an alert message on your laptop screen with the text of your choice
7. Erase all saved passwords and history from the browser on your missing device
After you have recorded the necessary information using Prey, you can try to find the missing laptop yourself or share this information with the police. It is important to note that you need to have installed Prey on your laptop before it goes missing. Download Prey on your laptop from www.preyproject.com and start the installation wizard. Make sure you select the Configure Prey Settings option in the last step. This will start the Prey Configurator wizard. Select the New user option and click Next to continue.
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
Enter your contact details and click on the Create button to create your Prey account and add your devices to it. Log in to your email account to verify your identity by clicking on the link sent to you by the Prey Project.
Once you have verified your account, Prey will actively start tracking your laptop and allow you to trace it back in case it gets lost or stolen. You are now ready to log into your Web Control Panel to manage all the devices connected to your Prey account.
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
To manage the tracking settings related to a specific device, simply click on the device in the Prey Control Panel. This page will allow you specify what actions will be performed in case your device goes missing. Make the applicable changes and click on the Save changes button.
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
In case your device goes missing, simply log in to the Prey Control Panel from their website, select your device and change its status from OK to MISSING. After a few minutes, you will receive a detailed report about your missing device via email from the Prey Project.
This report will contain a bunch of information related to your missing device. The actions that are performed and things that are included in the report will depend upon the settings you had previously chosen in the Control Panel.
(Geographical Location of the Missing Laptop on a Map)
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
(Picture from the Webcam of the Missing Laptop)
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
Prey and the Prey logo are registered trademarks of Fork Ltd, used with permission.
Locate My Laptop (www.locatemylaptop.com) is yet another website which allows you to remotely track your lost or stolen laptop. Moreover, it also allows you to remotely wipe all data from your missing laptop, if required.
Rewarding Return (www.rewardingreturn.com) is a website that allows you to purchase labels that you can put behind your electronic devices (laptops, digital cameras and mobile phones), so that if someone returns your device, they can collect a reward for it.
Every label has a unique ID number and the contact details of the Rewarding Return company printed on it, so that anyone who finds your electronic device knows how to contact them to return it.
If someone finds your electronic device, they can go to www.rewardingreturn.com or call them, quote the unique ID number and get rewarded for doing so. You can choose the reward amount initially when you purchase the Rewarding Return labels. In case you don’t wish to give any cash reward, you can even choose to give free Rewarding Return labels to the finder. The Rewarding Return website will then arrange for your lost electronic device to be shipped back to you and will, on your behalf,
reward the person who found it.
The limitation of the Rewarding Return website service is the fact that it depends entirely upon the goodness of the person who finds your device. This becomes especially limiting, since, on most occasions, the value of your missing device will usually be much higher than the value of the reward for returning it.
Using these several laptop-tracking techniques, even if your laptop goes missing, you still have the hope that it can be tracked and be recovered.
79. How to use your mobile phone for your personal safety
< 120 Seconds
Have you ever felt unsafe while travelling alone, and wished there was an automated way to notify your friends and family in case of an emergency? StaySafe is an Android and iOS app that allows you to automatically inform your emergency contacts and send them your latest GPS location, in case you don’t check in to your app after a predefined time period. Just start the countdown on the app for a predefined amount of time, and, in case you don’t cancel the countdown before it ends, StaySafe will automatically inform your emergency contacts. Unlike other location-sharing apps, StaySafe does not require any intervention from your side—so it is perfect to send out an alarm in case you get into some danger.
To use StaySafe, download the app to your mobile phone from the Google Play App Store or the iTunes app store.
Enter your name and contact number, so that your emergency contacts know your identity when they are informed that you may be in danger.
StaySafe and the StaySafe app logo are registered trademarks of Safe Apps Ltd, used with permission.
Choose a PIN or password for your StaySafe account. After that select the people from your address book whom you want StaySafe to inform in case of an emergency.
You are now ready to use StaySafe to inform your emergency contacts in case you are in danger. Whenever you start a journey on which you want StaySafe to look out for your safety, simply press the Start Countdown button. You will be asked to enter the duration of your journey, from which the app will start counting down. If required, you can increase the duration of your journey manually later; but if you do not cancel the countdown before it ends, StaySafe will automatically send your current location and inform all your emergency contacts that something is wrong.
StaySafe and the StaySafe app logo are registered trademarks of Safe Apps Ltd, used with permission.
StaySafe and the StaySafe app logo are registered trademarks of Safe Apps Ltd, used with permission.
Your emergency contacts will receive an email with a link to a web page that shows your current location and also the entire path you took since you started the countdown. In this example, the screen indicates that I’m in Sector 15, Pune, very close to the Dr D.Y. Patil Institute of Biotechnology.
StaySafe and the StaySafe app logo are registered trademarks of Safe Apps Ltd, used with permission.
80. How to trace a lost or stolen digital camera
< 120 Seconds
Have you ever lost a digital camera while on holiday and wished there was a way to trace it back using some software or website? With the use of technology, there is greater hope and a more scientific way of tracking a lost or stolen digital camera.
Every photo that you take using a digital camera contains something called EXIF data that is stored with it. EXIF data, or Exchangeable Image File Format data, basically stores information like the camera manufacturer, model number, serial number, date and other details. Most modern cameras automatically store EXIF data in all photos taken with them. Every camera has a unique serial number, which is also stored in the EXIF data. All photos taken from the same camera will have the same serial number. This property can be used to track a stolen or lost digital camera.
A website called Stolen Camera Finder
(http://www.stolencamerafinder.com) allows you to search the Internet for photos that may contain the same EXIF data (serial number) as yours. If the new owner of your camera has uploaded photos online, this website gives you a good chance of tracking down the camera through this.
Open your browser, connect to the Stolen Camera Finder website and upload a photo you have clicked with the missing camera in the past. It doesn’t matter what photo it is or when you took it, as long as it was taken with the same camera as the one that is missing and has not been edited by some third-party app.
Stolen Camera Finder and the Stolen Camera Finder logo are registered trademarks of Matt Burns Ltd, used with permission.
Stolen Camera Finder does not actually store your photo, but it will extract the EXIF data from it and search the Internet for other photos with the matching EXIF data. If any match is found, it will report it to you so that you can take the action to get your camera back.
Stolen Camera Finder and the Stolen Camera Finder logo are registered trademarks of Matt Burns Ltd, used with permission.
In case you do not have any old photo taken with your missing camera, Stolen Camera Finder also allows you to manually enter the serial number of your camera, which is normally mentioned on the camera box which you received at the time of purchase. You can also click on the Report stolen camera or the Report lost camera button to file a report on this website, so that, in case someone else finds your camera, they can get in touch with you.
Stolen Camera Finder and the Stolen Camera Finder logo are registered trademarks of Matt Burns Ltd, used with permission.
This website cannot guarantee that your camera will be found; however it does a good job of maximizing your chances in an age where everyone is constantly uploading photos online.
81. How to save your passwords securely
< 180 Seconds
The number of activities that we do online has risen exponentially over time—email, social networking, banking, shopping, work, education etc. All of this requires usernames and passwords to access our information. For security reasons, it is recommended that you do not use the same password for different sites—if a malicious user figures out the password to one of your accounts, he will be able to access all your other accounts as well. The most secure way to store all your passwords to different accounts is to remember them, but, considering the large number of online accounts each of us has, this is very difficult. As a result, a lot of people end up saving all their passwords in a Notepad file or MS Word document on their computers. But, if you do that, your security comes under serious threat as soon as someone else shares your computer.
A much more secure alternative is to save your passwords in password managers. As the name suggests, password managers are tools that allow you to securely manage passwords to all your online accounts by saving them in a secure, encrypted format. All you need to remember is one master password, which will open up a virtual locker containing all your other passwords. Of the several password managers available on the Internet, my favourite is KeePass, which is available as a free download from http://www.keepass.info.
Once you launch the KeePass app for the first time, you will need to click on the New Password Database button in the toolbar on the top. This will allow you to create a new database of saved passwords for yourself, inside which you will be able to save the passwords to all your different accounts.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
KeePass will now ask you to enter a master password for all your saved passwords. The longer and more complicated your master password is, the more secure it is going to be—so choose wisely.
Once you have set a master password to the database, you can start adding password entries for your different accounts to it by clicking on the Add Entry button in the toolbar. For each new password entry you add, you will be asked to enter various details (like Title, Username, Password, URL, Expiry date and Group). Click on the OK button to add the entry to your password database.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
One of the best features of KeePass
is that, when you are adding a new password entry, it will allow you to generate strong and difficult-to-crack passwords for your different accounts. By using the complex passwords that KeePass generates, you are going to make it tough for malicious users to be able to crack into your accounts. To access the Password Generator tool, simply click on the Generate a Random Password button within the Add Entry feature of KeePass.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
The Password Generator tool allows you to choose the length, complexity and type of the random password you wish to generate. After selecting all the options of your choice, you need to simply click on the Generate button to generate a random password for your account. Once you are happy with the generated password, you can click on the Accept button to add it to the password database.
KeePass and the KeePass logo are registered trademarks of Dominik Reichl, used with permission.
Another very useful feature in KeePass is the ability to put expiry dates on your passwords, so that it forces you to adopt the good habit of changing your passwords regularly. You can choose to automatically make your passwords expire at predefined intervals, ranging from one week to several months.