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How can you protect your anonymity online?

A famous New Yorker cartoon from the dawn of the internet age features two dogs at a computer. One says to the other: “On the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.” On the web, anonymity was virtually guaranteed.

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Those canines might not be so confident about online privacy now. With each passing month, we get more disquieting news that others are spying on our web traffic. It was governments at first. But in the last few years we have learned that Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Facebook have been tracking our web usage so they can show us targeted ads. Trolls and stalkers have learned how to find the real identities behind user names we adopt for online comments.

Does this mean we should abandon hope for online anonymity? If we want to maintain our privacy, do we have to stay off of the internet?

In truth, there is only one guarantee of absolute anonymity. We’d have to stay offline entirely.

Short of this, we’re taking on some risk. Still, there are several ways to hold our odds of exposure and I D theft to a bare minimum. I will cover two of them here:

TOR, Proxies, and VPNs

One of the most effective ways to mask identity and location is to appear to be someone else at a different location. For this, you’ll need a virtual private network (VPN) or a proxy server. Not only can they mask your identity, they can enable surfing in other countries like the natives.

VPN services are easy to find. They protect traffic between your computer and internet servers, and they will mask your IP location and address. Suppose that , while working from home, you connect through your employer’s VPN. Websites will track your activity to corporate headquarters, not to your home.

For more advanced security, you may want a proxy server, a computer that redirects your web traffic. Like a VPN, it will mask your IP address. The proxy server also caches internet requests and responses, which will speed connection for your return visits to your favorite sites.

TOR is sometimes called ‘the onion router’ for its multiple layers of protection for anonymity. It provides a network of routes for data requests and downloads.

A few years ago, Edward Snowden revealed that the NSA had been spying on web traffic, giving special attention to TOR. But the NSA was only able to monitor its ‘exit nodes’. The agency could track what TOR was being used for, but couldn’t identify users.

Browser Security

How do you know your browser isn’t informing on you? Some, most notably Google Chrome, have been especially aggressive in tracking user traffic. Usually, the purpose of vacuuming up this data is advertising. You can’t be sure, though, that your web footprint will never be used for more sinister purposes. Since Google and Facebook have been caught censoring information for political reasons, it pays to be careful.

You can block your browsers ability to store your passwords. Of course, this can be inconvenient, since you probably have a separate password for each web service you use. A password manager can cache your passwords so you don’t have to remember them. Some password managers are free.

You could also activate your browser’s anonymous surfing mode. For Microsoft’s Explorer and Edge, it’s called In Private. For Firefox, it’s called Private Browsing, and for Chrome, it’s called Incognito. Activating the anonymous mode will block the browser from keeping records of websites you visit, your downloads, cookies, passwords, and cached material. Your browser may also offer a Do Not Track option in its settings bar. If it does, you’d be wise to activate it.

Anonymity through Browser Choice

Some browsers are better than others at protecting user anonymity.

Google is notorious for vacuuming up user data for use in targeted advertising. Bing and Yahoo also are aggressive in collecting user data.

Comodo Dragon, Comodo IceDragon, and Epic use Google’s Chromium rendering engine, but they don’t share user information with Google. DuckDuckGo, Brave, and Opera do not use Google, Bing, or Yahoo search engines. They don’t track your web usage or sell your data.

Stealth modes and specialized browsers won’t provide perfect web security. But they can keep websites from sending unrequested info to your computer, info that other sites can read to discern your surfing habits.

More to Come…

There are other steps you can take to protect your anonymity online. We will spell out these additional steps in another post.

 

(For the best internet connection, talk to us. We can help.)

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SECURE BROWSING: CHROME CRACKS DOWN ON UNENCRYPTED SITES

Chrome, the most popular web browser in the world, will soon be getting rough with websites that don’t use proper encryption. Such sites can expose visitors to hacking and malware.

The next version of Google’s famous browser, Chrome 56, will be active in January 2017. The new version will warn web surfers about any sites that are still unencrypted. In a small window next to the address bar, Google will mark such sites as “Not Secure”. This warning will flag any sites using the older HTTP application protocol, rather than the more secure HTTPS. Later, these pages will also be marked with red triangles.

 

WHY CHROME IS CHANGING ITS SECURITY PROTOCOLS

Google’s current method for warning users is very different: a “neutral indicator”. Emily Schechter, an executive in the Chrome Security Team, explained why Google is changing its warning protocols. “When you load a website over HTTP”, she said, “someone else on the network can look at or modify the site before it gets to you.” Attacks via such means are not uncommon.

 

HOW YOU CAN SURF MORE SAFELY

Meanwhile, there are several steps by which you can make your Chrome browsing safer.

The easiest ways are to activate privacy extensions.

Disconnect is an extension that enables blocking of sites that would otherwise track you across the internet. Disconnect will also increase your connection speeds noticeably.

Adblock Plus and uBlock Origin will block autoplay video, pop-ups, and other annoying ads. They will not only keep advertisers from tracking your internet use, they will reduce your data consumption dramatically. If you worry about exceeding your data cap, you need an ad blocker.

Web of Trust is a worldwide community. It rates websites based on user experience. By regularly checking ratings on Web of Trust, you’ll have a better handle on which websites to avoid.

 

VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORKS

Logging in through a virtual private network (VPN) is an advanced approach to browser security. Some people call VPNs ‘the nuclear option’. They require somewhat more effort to set up than the Chrome extensions, and you’d have to pay for the best ones. The advantage of a VPN is that it encrypts your data, then routes it through secure external servers. Nobody- not even the NSA or your internet service provider- knows where you’re going on the web.

 

(For secure browsing, you need a secure internet connection. Talk to us. We can help.)

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CHROME BLOCKS FLASH

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Unless you’re a masochist, you hate the Adobe Flash Player. If Google Chrome is your browser, though, you’ve had to live with it anyway.

This is about to change. For at least a year, Google has planned to replace Flash with HTML5. Yesterday, Google publicized several details of the plan, which includes blocking any Flash content that loads ‘behind the scenes’-about 90% of the Flash content on the web- beginning in September. In December, HTML5 will be the default player for games and video, except on sites that support only Flash.

The Flash Player has been in decline for several years. Its slump has only accelerated recently, and is likely to continue. In addition to Chrome, Microsoft’s Edge and Mozilla’s Firefox browsers are planning to reduce or eliminate their use of plug-ins like Flash in favor of HTML5.

Though Flash is still incorporated into the Chrome browser by default, Google has been steadily reducing its scope. In September 2015, Chrome 45 began pausing “less important” Flash content automatically. This “less important” content is chiefly animation, ads, and anything else not “central to the webpage”.

Flash is widely reviled for slowing the loading of requested content, consuming too much data and memory, radically reducing battery life, and being dangerously insecure. New vulnerabilities seem to surface every few weeks.

Once Google makes HTML5 the default player for Chrome, Flash will be available only for the websites that run only on Flash. Visitors to such sites will be prompted to enable it, and will be given the options for it: run once, always run, or never run (see the enclosed image).

Chrome is the most popular web browser on the market. According to the federal government, it handles more than 34% of all website visits. Internet Explorer (now Edge) is in second place, with just over 28%. Apple’s Safari is in third place, with just over 20%. Firefox is fourth, with 11%.

(Regardless of what browser you use, you need a reliable internet connection. Talk to us. We can help.)