Today we’re kicking off a two part series on securing your digital life.  In this first part we’ll touch on passwords, PC security, and smartphone security.  Consider this the warm up for part two in which we’ll hit the nitty-gritty of securing your information online and in the cloud – where it is most vulnerable to NSA snooping. First off, this guide is not comprehensive.  In it, I will assume that you have some knowledge of the Internet, computers and smartphones.  Also, I will not be held liable for how you use this information. Following these tips does not guarantee that your online presence will be untraceable or completely secure.  As with many things, your results may vary. Second, security is a trade-off.  Generally, the more security layers you enable (and you do want layers) the less user friendly and convenient your environment will become.  That’s just the way it is.  You will have to find the balance between the two on your own.  If you are the only person using your network and you don’t mind the extra time and effort, by all means, build yourself a virtual vault inside a virtual bunker surrounded by a virtual wall and […]

Coming at the heels of Wednesday’s news that the NSA was secretly obtaining hundreds of millions of phone records belonging to American citizens, we have new reports from the Washington Post of yet another Top Secret program targeting Internet data.  Operation code-name PRISM refers to a Top Secret partnership between the NSA and 9 of the top Internet firms in the United States including Facebook, Google, Yahoo! and Apple.  Since the news broke on Thursday officials from the companies involved have been coming forward with denials that they had any knowledge of the program or that the government has direct access to their servers, as alleged by the leaked information on PRISM. Slides released by the Washington Post that outline the program detail the types of data collected which include email, photos, video, chat with voice and video, Voice of IP (VoIP), stored data, file transfers, social networking details, and “special requests”.  Essentially your entire online life is available to the government.  Anything you post to Facebook (regardless of your privacy settings), your emails, your Google Drive files, your photos, and any phone calls or “Hangouts” you are involved in over the Internet are possibly being collected by the government. This is a […]