Getting Non-Chinese Made Tech
These past few months have been hard on all of us and we are all looking forward to finally being able to get out of our homes and getting back to work. We hope that you have all made your way through this with your health and your sanity still in good order. As the […]
Why Did Yahoo Fail?
There was a time when Yahoo was the king of the Internet. Users flocked there to begin their journey on the Internet and used their other services religiously. And they had a catchy jingle to boot. You might even know someone who still has a yahoo.com email address. At one point they were the most […]
Google Is Coming Under Fire
Google has had somewhat of a sterling reputation as a corporation. They have done that by maintaining an impressive security repertoire, which has shielded them from many of the ills that have plagued other businesses and corporations and they have for the most part stayed away from scandal. That has changed in recent months as […]
Could End-To-End Encryption Be Banned?
When you send a message to someone you intend it for only yourself and those on the receiving end to be able to read that message. While you are not breaking any laws and have nothing to worry about it is something that is only intended for you and the recipient. It is privacy in […]
Could your laptop’s power charger allow you to be hacked?
There are so many ways that a computer can be hacked. It’s almost too many but over the summer a new method was discovered. With this new discovery a laptop can be compromised just by charging its batteries. While you may not need to unplug your power cable right this second this is something that […]
GDPR and some new privacy policies
You may have noticed that you received a lot of email notifications that companies were changing their privacy policies or terms of service. If you have paid attention to the tech world you know that this is in response to the GDPR regulations enacted by the EU on May 25. It may have seemed like […]
Is buying refurbished tech worth it?
There is a certain stigma that comes with the phrase refurbished item. I can tell you as a former tech support agent for Apple that there was a lot of resistance when someone was told that they would get a refurbished product when they sent it in. Some of it got downright heated. But here’s […]
Getting to know Siri
Our digital assistants like Alexa and Siri are becoming ever more complex, capable of finding us a good place to have a cup of coffee or where the nearest gas station is. There are a few hidden gems that you can ask them so if you are bored and need something to do here are […]
Meltdown and Spectre
We have rung in the new year with a major security issue being announced. Two security flaws dubbed Meltdown and Spectre have been discovered that allow processor exploits to steal sensitive information like passwords and financial information from nearly any device (computer, laptop or smartphone etc.) made in the past 20 years. Scary indeed. The […]
The government is watching you
The CIA is an organization shrouded in secrecy. People either like them or hate them. They have been the subject of movies, TV shows, novels and video games and yet no one is really sure what their capabilities are. They are masters at lying and manipulation while at the same time are making an attempt […]
Hot tech items for the holidays
The holidays are nearly upon us and as always tech items are in demand. So if you are not sure what is hot and what is not here are some ideas to help you out. Some of what is popular should be no surprise. Assistants like Alexa and the Amazon Echo are in demand. Gaming […]
Tales from Tech Support: Why do I need to call my OEM?
With Halloween coming next week and everyone needing a good fright, we bring you Tales from Tech Support. I spent five years working over the phone tech support, most of it with Comcast in Baltimore. Oh, the stories I can tell… I took a lot of calls during my time at Comcast, probably around 40,000 […]