Tech Talk

How About Free VPN’s?

Remember, there is no such thing as a free lunch!

How can a free VPN service survive if it does not charge?

Many sell their user’s (your) internet usage data and information to advertisers so they can target you. It rather defeats concerns about privacy.

Others may get funds by constantly displaying annoying ads while you are using the service.

Most companies also provide paid VPN services and hope you will upgrade to a paid service from them. They use only a few of their resources to provide the free services, saving them for those that pay. So you have few server choices, if any. Sluggish speed and response. Lack of support, limited bandwidth, poor encryption, download caps, time limits, excessive buffering.

There may be security risks to you due to spyware and malware attacks from their systems. There may be major loopholes in their privacy policies and back-doors designed into their systems and software. You have to beware and be very careful to read everything they publish twice.

Personally, it is not worth the risks to me. If you really want security and privacy, you will have to pay for it.

If you still want to use a free VPN service, here is a link for some of them.

https://www.vpnanalysis.com/5-best-free-vpn-service-providers/

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VPNs In Plain English

A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is a tool used to protect your privacy and keep you safe and secure from prying eyes and ears.

Imagine someone in a helicopter was following you wherever you drove your Blue Ford SUV to, and they were reporting your every move to someone else. Further imagine the people in that helicopter spying on you also had a directional microphone aimed at your SUV, and was recording everything you said while in that SUV.

Now imagine a very busy shopping mall somewhere that had a huge parking garage underneath it. That underground garage had a special secure section reserved only for members like you. You could drive your Blue Ford SUV into that underground garage’s special section and enter it using your own special unique pass. A large number of people like you also regularly came to that mall and drove into that secure private section of the parking garage. They too did not want someone else to know what they did, what they said, who they talked to, and where they went to.

In that special secure section of the garage were a very large number of non-descript unmarked cars specially designed so they could not be seen into, or allow anyone to hear what is being said inside them. These cars are constantly randomly coming and going all day between a large network of underground parking garages all over the country. The sheer volume of the number of cars that were constantly coming and going make it impossible for the people in the helicopter following you to follow every one of those anonymous cars as they emerge from and enter those underground parking garages.

You park your Blue Ford SUV and board one of those cars. It takes you to wherever area you want to go to. During the day you may leave and depart any number of those garages in other non-descript cars, as you travel around doing as you wish in total privacy and secrecy. And when you are finished with your trip, you take another of those cars back to where you first parked you Blue Ford SUV, and you drive it home. And no one knows where you went, what you did, or what you said. All they know is just that you drove to the busy shopping mall and later returned home.

That is basically what an encrypted private tunnel VPN service allows you to do. No one is able to track what you did on the internet, the passwords you used, or what type of business transactions you made. All they know is that you went into a secure private tunnel and did your private business there.

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Windows 10 Safe From CIA Hacks

Windows 10 Safe From CIA Hacks.

According to Microsoft, PCs running the latest version of Windows 10 should be safe from security vulnerabilities to disclosed CIA hacking tools.

https://www.cnet.com/news/microsoft-systems-seem-safe-from-wikileaks-alleged-cia-hacks/

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IOS CIA Hacks Fix

IOS CIA Hacks Fix.

Are you concerned about the recently released CIA security hacks?

Apple says you should make sure you have downloaded the latest IOS versions to minimize your vulnerability.

https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-cia-wikileaks-vault-7-ios-patches-vulnerabilities/

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Timing is Everything

Email Marketing is about:

) Getting the right message.
) To the right person.
) At the right time.

Timing is everything in Email Marketing.

You may have the right message for the right person, but it has to be delivered at the right time to be relevant and effective.

Surveys show that in general the best time to deliver a message is on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. The weekends are usually not good. On Mondays people are starting out the week very busy with work tasks to perform, and on Friday people are already distracted thinking about starting the weekend. If you are promoting a weekend event that people often attend on impulse, that is an obvious Friday exception. It depends on what you are offering, and who you are offering it to.

Most Calendar Events like holidays, birthdays and anniversaries are events people plan ahead for. Major vacations are usually planned well ahead. So getting the message to them too late is always a concern. If you get the message to them too soon, they may delay long enough that they may forget about your email altogether.

You need to learn about your individual recipient, save that information in the email database, and determine the right time for the email to be sent.

There is a time and season for everything. A successful e-mailer chooses his time and season carefully.

Email Automation allows you to set up your campaign with the right information to send emails based on calendar events at the right time without having to monitor everyone’s individual information constantly. You automatically send the email to individuals according to your preset parameters.

Transactional Based Email campaigns interact with your email list based on when they last came into the salon, purchased something, etc. If you sell a product or service like oil changes or instance, you can send a notice based on the last time you performed that service for them. Membership renewals can be easily automated. Reminders to replace the batteries in their smoke detector. If you record visits or purchases, you can send emails to motivate them to visit again if it has been a while since their last visit.

Calendar Event, Fixed date or Transactional Based campaigns all can be automated to send the right message, to the right person, at the right time.

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Segmenting Your Email List

Email Marketing is all about:

) Getting the right message.
) To the right person.
) At the right time.

It is about RELEVANCE.

Segmenting is about getting the right message to the right person without irritating people by sending them messages which are not relevant to them. If you send too many messages to people on your email list that are not relevant to them, they will tune you out, or worse yet “Unsubcribe”. Think of the story of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”.

Instead of just one large single list of recipients that you send every message to, you take the time and make the effort to learn more about each of your recipients. You segment your list into smaller “Interest Groups”. Then you tailor your messages to only go to those that are most likely to find the message relevant to them.

The more information you know about the individual recipients of your email list, the better you can segment your list. The more you can learn about their likes and dislikes, the better you can target them with only messages that they feel are relevant, and of interest to them. Beyond learning their likes and dislikes, it is often also helpful to learn about special dates and events in their life like Birthdays & Anniversaries.

Transactional based segmentation also can be highly effective, but requires a lot of attention and thought when setting up. This often involves automatic emails in response to a specific action by the recipient. Re: Date of last visit, purchase, contact, when they joined, Etc.

Remember, even though your purpose of sending the email is to get them to perform some action that benefits you, you have to design that message so that they feel the information or offer you present to them benefits THEM. They usually could care less what benefits you, they care what benefits THEM. It is always about ME. “What is in it for ME?”

Segmenting helps you do that, while not fatiguing your recipients with messages that they are not interested in. Your message should always answer their question, “What is in it for ME?”

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Google Chrome Alert!

Beware Google Chrome scam that could inject malware into your computer.

http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2017/02/22/beware-google-chrome-scam-that-could-inject-malware-into-your-computer.html

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Is Your Yahoo Mail Safe?

Yet another major security problem with Yahoo mail. How much is too much?

https://www.cnet.com/news/yahoo-tells-more-users-they-were-hit-with-cookie-attack/

Learn more about protecting yourself:

http://www.helpmeus.com/computersecurity.htm

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How to Remove Ransomware

How to Remove Ransomware.

This is an excellent blog about what to do if you get infected with ransomware. You should read it BEFORE you are infected so you know what to do if it happens.

http://blog.emsisoft.com/2017/02/16/how-to-remove-ransomware-the-right-way-a-step-by-step-guide

Learn more about protecting yourself:

http://www.helpmeus.com/computersecurity.htm

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Free Smartphone Privacy

If you would like full privacy when using your smartphone, take the time to download Signal for your I-phone or your Android phone. It is free, and it is the most secure way to make sure your conversations are private. Whether the snoopers are individuals, businesses, your Internet provider, your phone provider, or even governments.

After you install the software, your texts and voice conversations are fully encrypted between everyone else who also installs this software on their smartphones. There is an easy invite button to allow your contacts to add Signal to their I-phone or Android phone.

After installation your text messages and voice calls are secure from outsiders. Voice calls and texts between Signal users do not use up text or voice minutes. Only data is used. And if your phone is set up to use an existing home or public Wi-fi network, no network minutes are used at all.

Texting and voice with users who have not yet installed Signal are done the same way as before you installed Signal, except you use the improved interface that Signal provides.

Signal can be downloaded free through either the Google or Apple App Stores.

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