Airing date: 07/11/2018

30 Second Free Security For Your Computer and Incognito Mode

Craig Peterson: [00:00:00] Hi everybody. Good morning Craig Peterson here this morning I was talking with Ken and Matt about a couple of different things but primarily this morning we went over a 30-second change you can make to your computer. Why is it important to have the right DNS settings. The bad guys they’ve got a lot of nasty software out there. They’re being very successful getting that nasty software onto your computers my computers. Well, not so much, actually knock on wood. But, here, here, we talked about what you can do a very quick and easy change. I have some software that costs me money that I charge for my clients. But this-this is free and it gets you about 90 percent towards safety. So, here we go.

[00:00:52] I’ve had an iPhone phone since the first phone, when you had the iPhone one, and I had the first I thought I skipped every other. I mean I wouldn’t get the thee and the five and the seven sure. Yeah and I think great Craig Peterson would have to agree with me that the iPhone is the greatest invention ever in the history of humankind. Would you not agree with me, Craig

[00:01:15] Well I may put fire, maybe the first maybe wheel and then maybe the iPhone. Yeah, so you know it’s a funny joke the other day on Facebook somebody said you know my teacher told me in high school that you know you guys have to do this in your head. You know the math in your head because you’re not going to have calculators everywhere you walk.

[00:01:34] Yeah, sure sure sure showed them. Because Craig because Matt’s wife asked me what photo I have with I like an iPhone, 10 of course because why would anybody not have the iPhone 10. But, I still think the iPhone is still I think the best you can take a mortgage out for that phone. No, I’m out there. Do you pay fifty dollars a month forever for the rest with the rest life contract? But, you could upgrade. Know it doesn’t. It doesn’t matter what you pay because the person who dies with the most toys wins.

[00:02:07] So, it doesn’t make that’s true. I did not get the iPhone 10, Ken. I’m stuck with the 8 which by the way looks like are killing off next year the gonna to change the iPhone line. They released this is like the first time I think they’ve ever done this. Apple decided they would give mock copies of next year’s models to the press. So, it looks like the 8 will be dead as of next year. And the reason I didn’t do it is I don’t know. I love tech. And obviously comes this way Matt I think you might be but I’m cautious with that right. Yes. Like when we’re talking about the iPhone 10 you’ve got that whole new sensor.

[00:02:50] And, I don’t know with facial recognition of the facial recognition it recognizes me no matter what you do but I’m sure the NSA also loves that because they’ve got it stored in a database to find me no matter what. Are you kidding me?

[00:03:05] That’s a lot of people are confused about that Matt. When you’re talking about whats stored where Apple is way different thing Google is with Android. None of that information like your thumbprint if you use the thumbprint scanner on your iPhone or the facial information none of that ever leaves the phone, right.

[00:03:25] See it’s encrypted.

[00:03:27] Yeah. It’s sort of encrypted on the phone and what’s called the secure enclave. And, in fact, I don’t know if you’ve heard about who’s who you have had there.

[00:03:37] There are two paths replaced on their iPhone because they cracked it and then there are some leaders stopped working and they had to take it into Apple and that’s because bottom line Apple doesn’t want anybody messing with that secure enclaves stuff. And if you change the screen and you got that from the reader there is a potential that you might damage it, slightly because it’s packed in elephants snot which is kind of a technical term so, that if anybody did come up with a less gross a technical term, perhaps I just believe that.

[00:04:15] I mean what’s that movie with Will Smith. And you’re thinking of Enemy of the State, that they could fight back with everything they need to find out about you.

[00:04:24] That movie really good movie. So, why Chapman why hide anything.

[00:04:30] Just a total mind you bought the building because you made a phone call. Right, exactly.

[00:04:36] He was the guy who going to watch the watchers. Who’s going Yeah?

[00:04:40] So, many great guys who watch the watchers of the watches and the watchers and watchers. So, that’s the most serious things hacking. Now you’ve got 30-second change your computer setting. The easiest way to stop hackers.

[00:04:56] Well, this is really, really, kind of cool it’s up on my website but if you’re going to have to find out more because there are instructions, right. But, here’s the bottom line. Cybercrime has become huge, right now and it’s expected to cost us worldwide here, more than two trillion dollars next year very, very, big deal.

[00:05:21] Ok. And it’s hurting little businesses, its hurting big businesses it’s hurting you and me just regular consumers as well.

[00:05:29] So, I have a product that I use and it’s from Cisco it’s called umbrella. And I’ve been using that with my clients for a long time. And what umbrella does is, if your computer tries to go someplace on the Internet. The first thing that has to do is change the name, into an address, right. You guys know that you put into a web browser something like tune-in for instance Somby go to tune-in radio to listen to the show while you’re on the road for that. That doesn’t mean anything to the Internet, that name. So, there’s something called domain name service but it takes that name it converts it to an Internet address and then it goes to the address, it’s just like if, I dropped a piece of mail in the post office and I said deliver this to Matt Gagnon, they wouldn’t know where you live right.

[00:06:22] Well, probably not. We may not but you never know.

[00:06:28] He is. Well the NSA was supposed to try. So.

[00:06:33] So, the question is and if that’s the case, how does this really interfere with hackers, Right?

[00:06:41] Because if you could stop the hackers from sending their post office stuff home right if you could stop them from mailing all of the stuff they stole home. That’s half the battle and that’s what this is all about. That’s what umbrella is all about. It’s not an expensive service, but I found a really great article on Marketwatch. So anybody who wants to can read this can go through the steps and what it does is, it showing you some free services that are kind of like Umbrella.

[00:07:16] They’re not as good, but they’re quite good. It’s 90 percent effective at stopping some of these pieces of ransomware is 90 percent effective at stopping all of the malware. Because, one of the things that these pieces of malware do when they get onto your computer, one of the first things is they call home and say hey I got somebody, what do you want to do now.

[00:07:41] And, so they call home. They now can get the command and control information. OK. We’re getting encrypted and it actually has to have a key so that they can now extort money out of you, if that doesn’t happen they can’t do any of this. So what this does and this is it really is a 30 second changes as Ken mentioned. What it does is it stops any software on your computer, legitimate or otherwise from going directly onto the Internet, and all it does is say, Hey listen before you go anywhere we are trying to figure out what the address is of the place you’re trying to go to. Ask me, don’t ask somebody else. So it asks that software and my customers cases it just you know umbrella and then umbrella’s Whoa. Wait a minute. That is. Known Chinese or Russian or wherever it may be hacking group. We don’t want you to go there. So it will now change and it will pop up a little screen that says this is dangerous, you can’t go there if you’re going on our web browser. But, if it’s software that’s trying to track your machine, 90 percent plus of the time is trying to phone home and it will be stopped. So, Ken I think this is one of the most important things people can do. It’s very, very, simple. There are some free services out there that do a very good job at it and it’s going to help to stop you from becoming a victim.

[00:09:12] We’re talking to Craig Peterson on our tech guru joins us for some tech updates every Wednesday at this time. Craig final question for me before we let you go here today the Incognito browser. What does it exactly do if people have never used that particular feature on their web browser what is it you you’re actually accomplishing.

[00:09:29] Well that’s a great question. But, here’s the bottom line on Incognito mode. All major browsers have a method they might call it private mode that might call it incognito which is what it is called over on Google’s Chrome. But, the idea is it gives you some, Anonimity, a lot of people have been thinking the wrong way about all of this. There was a survey that was just done a little bit of a study. Most people got it wrong. So I’m glad you brought it up here’s the bottom line. When you go into incognito mode on your browser it really doesn’t hide much. It’ll clear your cookies, when you’re done. But, let me tell you when you’d want to use Incognito mode and when you wouldn’t if you are trying to do something that you really, really, really, don’t want anyone to know it’s a new business deal or maybe you’re trying to collude with Russia. Do not use Incognito mode, because it doesn’t protect against anything where it comes in very handy. Let’s say you share a computer you right there in the studio you Matt and Ken you share a computer.

[00:10:40] Danny uses that computer from time to time. If you go online and you start searching for a great present for a well for Ken lets say and now can use his computer what he thinks going to happen advertisements and so can begin to see that you were searching for a new table saw for him at his house and these you say, oh I know what I’m getting from my birthday. Right. That’s when it comes in handy because those cookies don’t get set, the advertisers don’t know what you’ve been searching for. And you can safely browse online for your spouse or friend or whomever and not worry about getting all of those ads popping up on your computer, incognito mode does not protect you in reality 100 percent from advertisers it certainly does not protect you from bad guys. It’s just a handy little feature to have. Firefox is the best at incognito mode, among all of the major browsers and the epic browser E-P-I-C is absolutely the best if you want to maintain some online privacy.

[00:11:49] I’m kind of sad that you told him what he is buying me for my birthday. It’s kind of sad sad that on our tech guru joins us every Wednesday 738 go to his website Craig Peterson dot com. Thanks Craig we’ll talk to you next week.

[00:12:04] Hey gentlemen take care. Have a great day.

[00:12:05] Thanks a lot Craig, I’m going to take a quick break here.

[00:12:07] You think you’re getting me a chainsaw instead of a tablesaw. Just curious. You know you seem like the kind of guy I like to work with Sand’s builds on this stuff. You see these hands these hands.