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Tuesday Tech Tips

by Michael Krupa on May 23, 2011

Are you a big fan of Google Maps and feel like the Maps application on your iPhone is falling behind in functionality?  Maybe you would like to access your starred locations and My Maps data stored in your Google Account. Whatever your reason, Google has enhanced Google Maps for mobile browsers on Android and iOS.  Just visit maps.google.com on your phone or tablet browser and stare in awe of what Google has accomplished in HTML instead of a dedicated app.

So my dear iPhone owners and frequent flyers…would you like a highly interactive app where “you can track your flight, recalculate your remaining flight time and flight position, and learn more about key landmarks and geographic areas you’re flying over”?  (I love it when a vendor provides tech tips copy for me).  If so, you might want to check out all the details on the iPhone WindowsSeat app and see if this one is for you. Looks like they have a paid app for $2.99 and free app that covers a limited number of cities.

Are you one of those people who have a need to print from your mobile device but don’t want to have to install software for printing?  I’m a little late notifying you about this but Google has a service called Google Cloud Print that will do just that.  Head over to the Google Mobile Blog to read all the details.

As our social network continues expanding, the ability to keep up with all the noise can become overwhelming.  Twitter already has the ability to create lists but surprisingly many people are not aware that Facebook has a similar list capability.  Lifehacker has a quick write up on creating and using Facebook lists.  It’s only a couple of paragraphs so go read it now. Scoot.

I have had terrible luck this last year with hard drives failing on me.  I wish I had come across this website on hard drive sounds earlier.  Most hard drives start to make specific sounds when they are failing and Data Cert has created a database of sounds for each brand of drive to help you understand what might be happening with your drive when you think you hear sounds that just don’t quite sound right to you.

zaa29443And finally, I leave you with one of the most interesting toilets I have seen in a long time. It’s called the Kohler Numi and this illuminated, electrified, spritzing, heated and wireless remote control device will only set you back a cool $6300. I’ll take 2.

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From Firesheep comes FireShepherd and a Facebook Bonus

by Michael Krupa on January 30, 2011

I wrote a blog post last week about the dangers of a new Firefox browser extension called Firesheep.  My good buddy Lee (aka @JustaSunGod on Twitter) immediately brought to my attention a program that was created to render Firesheep unusable by flooding the local Wi-Fi network with packets designed to turn off Firesheep.  The program was created by Gunnar Atli Sigurdsson, a 21-year old student at the University of Iceland.  Here is how he describes FireShepherd:

“FireShepherd, a small console program that floods the nearby wireless network with packets designed to turn off FireSheep, effectively shutting down nearby FireSheep programs every 0.5 sec or so, making you and the people around you secure from most people using FireSheep.”

You can read more about FireShepherd on the gigaom.com website here and on the forbes.com website here.   Please use these types of utilities with caution.  The best solution is to only use Wi-Fi hotspots that require a password for their WPA connection and/or only access websites that are secure (with a URL that starts with https://).

Fortunately one of the heaviest used websites (and the one most often exploited via Firesheep) is now rolling out secure access.  That’s right, the big daddy of Social Media known as Facebook is implementing HTTPS access to their site.  The roll-out started a few days ago and may take a couple of weeks to show up in everyone’s security settings.   Please read their blog post on the topic and learn how to turn on secure access to Facebook.   On their page you might find this little gem of a paragraph:

“There are a few things you should keep in mind before deciding to enable HTTPS. Encrypted pages take longer to load, so you may notice that Facebook is slower using HTTPS. In addition, some Facebook features, including many third-party applications, are not currently supported in HTTPS. We’ll be working hard to resolve these remaining issues. We are rolling this out slowly over the next few weeks, but you will be able to turn this feature on in your Account Settings soon. We hope to offer HTTPS as a default whenever you are using Facebook sometime in the future.”

Don’t be scared off by this. It’s not likely you will notice the performance difference accessing Facebook using HTTPS.  The benefits of using HTTPS greatly outweigh the risks so please turn on “Secure Browsing” access to Facebook.  If you run into issues with third-party applications accessed inside Facebook, you can always go back and turn it off.

Remember to always practice safe browsing.  FireShepherd and HTTPS access to Facebook can now be a part of your safe browsing toolkit.

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Firesheep: You Need To Read This

by Michael Krupa on January 23, 2011

Pay attention my fellow readers.  I know many of you travel or spend time in coffee shops and access free Wi-Fi hotspots but there is a danger lurking out there.   Developer Eric Butler has created a Firefox extension called Firesheep. This free Firefox extension collects cookies that have been broadcast over an unprotected Wi-Fi network without using SSL. Say what?  This means that Firesheep essentially eavesdrops on an unprotected (open) Wi-Fi connection and will capture cookies for sites such as Facebook and Twitter and allow the Firesheep user to sidejack the session. Yes I know this is old news from last October but it is still an important problem.

Let developer Eric Butler explain from his blog post:

“As soon as anyone on the network visits an insecure website known to Firesheep, their name and photo will be displayed.”

All you have to do is double click on their name in the Firesheep window and open sesame, you will be able to log into that user’s site with their credentials.

Open sesame.  Yikes.

Fortunately there are limitations to the extension.  It only works on an open/unsecured Wi-Fi connection. So let’s say you are sitting at Starbucks and checking your Facebook account.  Someone else at that same Starbucks starts up Firesheep and scans the network.  Firesheep sees your unprotected session, grabs the cookies that Facebook uses to store identifying information about you and lets the Firesheep user masquerade as you.  Did I mention that you will have no idea that someone else just accessed your Facebook account?

Which sites are vulnerable? Amazon.com, Basecamp, bit.ly, Cisco, CNET, Dropbox, Enom, Evernote, Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, Github, Google, Gowalla, HackerNews, Harvest, Windows Live, NY Times, Pivotal Tracker, Slicehost, tumblr, Twitter, WordPress, Yahoo, Yelp and probably many many other sites.

How do you deal with this?  Don’t use any unprotected Wi-Fi connection.  Find another coffee shop that uses a password for their WPA connection or convince your existing shop to start using a password.

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