Articles tagged: Featured
Is OneDrive a Backup?
OneDrive is a powerful tool, but thinking of it as a backup can take you down a dangerous path.
Someone’s Sending from My Email Address! How Do I Stop Them?
Email spoofing is rampant. Spammers often send email that looks like it came from you, and there’s little that you can do about it.
Your Social Media Posts Can All Disappear
Every time you use someone else’s service, you put yourself and your content in their hands… for better or worse.
Please Set Up and Maintain Account Recovery Information
Account recovery information is an important yet often overlooked part of account security. Managed poorly, it can lead to permanent account loss.
How Do I Tell If My Hard Drive Is Too Old?
Age isn’t the most important factor when evaluating hard disk risk of failure. I’ll discuss what is, and what you should be doing to protect yourself.
How Do I Disable OneDrive in Office 365?
OneDrive can be useful, and it can be annoying. It’s on by default, but it’s not terribly difficult to decouple or turn off.
How to Back Up a Machine That Won’t Boot
The rescue or emergency disk provided by many backup programs is more useful than most people realize.
How Do I Make My C: Drive Not ‘Dirty’?
A dirty machine is the result of improper shut downs. There are ways to clean it up, but getting control of your shut-down process is important.
Why Ask Why?
It’s common to ask “Why?” when it comes to computers. It’s also common to be frustrated with the answer.
What is a Digital Fingerprint?
Digital fingerprints are another way that websites might track you, should they want to. What can you do? Should you be worried?
Coping with Gray Text
Gray text is a problem for many people. Unfortunately, there’s no simple solution, though there are some (very) ugly ones.
What Is Smishing?
Smishing is simply text-messaging spam. Learn to recognize and respond appropriately to it.
Does CPU Speed Matter Any More?
CPU speed doesn’t matter quite as much as it once did. I’ll discuss why, and what you should also be looking at.
What You Need To Do About the LastPass Hack
A portion of LastPass was breached. Here’s why it’s not a disaster, and why I’m not leaving LastPass.
Backups ARE Security
Don’t overlook backing up as part of your security. When the worst happens, it’s your backup that will save you.
Get a Windows System Report with MSINFO32
Msinfo32 is a tool to display and save an extensive report of your computer’s configuration and state. It can be very helpful for others helping you diagnose issues.
Can a Data Breach Expose Multiple Accounts?
Data breaches rarely expose multiple accounts. There are rare scenarios where multiple accounts might still be at risk, though.
6 Reasons There Are Still So Many Security Breaches
When you think about the complexity of today’s systems, it’s kind of amazing that we don’t have more breaches.
What Exactly Is a Rescue/Recovery/Repair/Emergency Disc?
Rescue, recovery, repair, and emergency discs can all mean different things.
How Not to Get Locked Out of Your Microsoft Account While Traveling
I tried to get locked out of my Microsoft account while traveling. I couldn’t. Why? I’d prepared. You can too.
Why Can’t I Get Emails From One Person?
If you’re not getting email messages sent by one particular person, there’s a list of things to check.
Using Chrome Remote Desktop in Windows
Google’s Chrome Remote Desktop is a free and convenient remote-access tool allowing you to get help from people you trust or be the person giving help.
How Do I Recover My Facebook Password?
If you’ve lost your Facebook password, there are a couple of ways to recover: use the Facebook process for account recovery, or check your browser’s remembered passwords.
Facebook Trusted Contacts is Going Away. Prepare Now.
Facebook is removing an account recovery feature, making this an important time to take stock of your own account security.
What Happens at Windows 10 End of Support?
The end of support for Windows 10 means Microsoft will no longer issue security updates. Here’s how to continue using it safely.
Why is My Wi-Fi Speed Slow?
Wi-Fi speed can be slow for many different reasons. Slow Wi-Fi can also be a symptom of speed constraints elsewhere.
What Are “Less Secure Apps” and Why is My Gmail Not Working?
Google is increasing the security requirements for accessing your Gmail accounts. I’ll review what the change means and the options you have.
If I Send to a Bad Email Address, Will Someone See It?
People often send email to the wrong address by mistake. But what happens if the email address is invalid?
I Lost My Phone With My Second Factor for Authentication. How Do I Recover?
My phoned died, and with it, all the two-factor authentication methods I’d used it for. Here’s how I recovered.
How Full Is My Hotmail Account?
Microsoft will show you how much space your Hotmail/Outlook.com/Microsoft account is using, if you know where to look.
I’m Told to Change My Password. Why?
If you’ve been told to change your password, do so, but do so in the right way. I’ll explain what that means and why it’s important.
“Default Boot Device Missing or Boot Failed” – What Now?
My laptop died. Here’s the process I went through to resurrect it.
How Do I Force the Latest Windows Feature Update?
Windows feature updates are supposed to be delivered in a somewhat timely fashion. If not, or if you’re just impatient, you can force the issue.
How Do I Downgrade Windows 11 to Windows 10?
Give Windows 11 a shot, but know that you can go back to Windows 10 if you need to.
What’s a QR Code?
QR codes are a nifty way to encode web addresses and other text in a way that’s easy for your smartphone to decode, but they are not without risk.
What Good Is an Image Backup If All I Want Is My Data?
Image backups are great ways to back up absolutely everything on a hard disk. They’re also good for retrieving most anything, including individual files.
Why Do an Image Backup If I Can Factory Reset?
Factory reset is a great option to have, but it doesn’t cover all the scenarios a full image backup does.
How Do I Create a Local Account in Windows 10?
The ability to create a local user account on Windows hasn’t been removed; it’s just not obvious where to find it.
How Do I Prevent a Repeat of Ransomware?
All malware is scary, especially ransomware due to the damage it can inflict. Here’s how to avoid a repeat performance.
Am I Safe?
There is no such thing as absolute safety. But there are definitely steps you can take to be as safe as possible.
Someone Is in My Computer, Controlling it. What Can I Do?
When things behave unexpectedly, many people assume their computer has been compromised by remote hackers. Many of those people are wrong.
How Do I Turn Off BitLocker on a Drive?
BitLocker is a fine approach to encrypting hard drives, especially the system drive. It’s easy to turn off BitLocker if you decide you no longer need it.
Why Your “Unimportant” Accounts Matter
Regardless of your initial thoughts, every account is important, and we are all targets.
How Secure Is Email?
Email is ubiquitous and convenient, yet surprisingly, not particularly secure. I’ll look at why that is and when you should worry.
Can I Move My Hard Drive to a New Computer and Have Windows Work?
Windows configures itself to the hardware it finds — but changing everything at once by moving the system disk to a different machine might be too much.
Why “Always Keep on this Device” Doesn’t
The “Always keep on this device” feature has misled people into deleting and losing important files. Here’s why, and what to do instead.
How Hackers Use Malicious Attachments to Give You Malware
Another day, another report of hackers exploiting vulnerabilities. Here’s how you stay safe.
