Ethereum is a decentralized computing platform and crytocurrency. Ethereum uses Bitcoin’s blockchain technology to create a protocol for “smart contracts”.
Three Hardware Wallets For Storing Bitcoin and Other Cryptocurrencies
Here are three hardware wallets that can be used for the long term storage of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. These devices are separated from your computer — and thus virtually hacker proof. I recommend storing these wallets in a fireproof safe. For daily use, you can keep a small amount of bitcoins in a smartphone app like Breadwallet. I do …
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Self-Destructing Cookies — Silently Dispose Of All Those Unwanted Cookies
Self Destructing Cookies is a Firefox add-on that automatically removes cookies when they are no longer used by open browser tabs. I’ve found this to be an excellent solution that works silently in the background. Websites will only be permitted to identify you while you actually use them and can not stalk you across the entire web. This is the …
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A Guide To Avoiding Ransomware (Part 1)
Ransomware is malicious software that allows a hacker to access an individual or company computer, encrypt your data resident on it and then demand some form of payment to decrypt it. This lets hackers hold your data hostage – and hence the term “ransom”. Victims can regain access to their files only by paying the ransom, or by restoring from a backup that was hopefully not on a network that was accessible to the compromised computer.
How To: Check That Your VPN is Working
How do you make sure your VPN is actually running — and not leaking data — after you log in? Here are quick and simple steps for checking. Most people probably assume that their VPN “just works” once they launch it. But in certain cases, it may not be. Just because the client program that your VPN provider gives you …
Chinese Leader Says Government Does Not Censor Internet
Internet censors in China are defending online censorship practices — or insisting censorship does not exist — ahead of a conference where online privacy is likely to be on the minds of attendees. As Hong Kong Free Press reports, China’s main leader of online censorship, Lu Wei, is deploying euphemistic language regarding the country’s censorship activities. China “manages” the Internet, …
Microsoft Report Says China Tops List of Censorship Requests
China tops the list of governments that requested censorship of content from the Bing search engine and other Microsoft online platforms in 2015. That’s according to Microsoft’s latest Content Removal Requests Report. The report, published last Wednesday, lists requests that Microsoft received during the first half of 2015 for removing content or disabling accounts in its products. According to Microsoft, …
Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning the Internet Against Democracy
A quote from the book Digital Disconnect by Robert W. McChesney: Regardless of what a progressive group’s first issue of importance is, its second issue should be media and communication, because so long as the media is in corporate hands, the task of social change will be vastly more difficult, if not impossible, across the board. McChensney argues that the …
The Fairphone: An Ethically-Produced Smartphone
The Fairphone is a smartphone designed and produced in Amsterdam with the goal of creating “minimal harm to people and planet”. According to the company, the main goal of the Fairphone was to develop a mobile device which does not contain conflict minerals (gold, tin, tantalum and tungsten), and to ensuring fair labor conditions for the workforce along the supply …
The Major Advances In Password Cracking In The Past Five Years
Ars Technica has a fascinating article that describes the latest techniques hackers are using to crack passwords. From the article: A PC running a single AMD Radeon HD7970 GPU, for instance, can try on average an astounding 8.2 billion password combinations each second, depending on the algorithm used to scramble them. Only a decade ago, such speeds were possible only …