Selling Your Car? Clear Your Personal Data First

Is a new car in your future? You might first have some unfinished business with your old one. While you’re cleaning out your personal items, think about the personal information stored in the car’s electronic system.

Your car is a computer that stores a lot of information about you — just like your smartphone or home computer. When you sell or donate your car, that personal data might be accessible to the next owner if you don’t take steps to remove it.

Some cars have a factory reset option that will return the settings and data to their original state. But even after a factory reset, you may still have work to do. For example, your old car may still be connected to subscription services like satellite radio, mobile wi-fi hotspots, and data services. You need to cancel these services or have them transferred to your new vehicle.

Here are types of data you want to remove from the electronic system before selling or donating your car:

• Phone contacts and an address book may have been downloaded when you synced your phone with your vehicle.
• Mobile apps’ log-in information, or data that’s gathered and stored on mobile apps, may be stored in the car.
• Digital content like music may be stored on a built-in hard drive.
• Location data like addresses or the routes you take to home, work, and favorite places may be stored in your navigation system.
• Garage door codes for your home or office may be on your system.

Besides the information stored on your vehicle, check to make sure you’ve cleared connections between your devices and the car as well. For example, car manufacturers may provide an app that lets you control the car’s functions or find the car — you should disconnect the app from the car when you sell it or trade it in.

For more information about resetting and removing your information, check your owner’s manual, contact your dealer, and visit your vehicle manufacturer’s website.

T-Mobile Hacked — 2 Million Customers' Personal Data Stolen

T-Mobile today confirmed that the telecom giant suffered a security breach on its US servers on August 20 that may have resulted in the leak of "some" personal information of up to 2 million T-Mobile customers.

The leaked information includes customers' name, billing zip code, phone number, email address, account number, and account type (prepaid or postpaid).

However, the good news is that no financial information like credit card numbers, social security numbers, or passwords, were compromised in the security breach.

According to a brief blog post published by the company detailing the incident, its cybersecurity team detected and shut down an "unauthorized capture of some information" on Monday, August 20.

Although the company has not revealed how the hackers managed to hack into its servers neither it disclosed the exact number of customers affected by the data breach, a T-Mobile spokesperson told Motherboard that less than 3 percent of its 77 million customers were affected.

The spokesperson also said that unknown hackers part of "an international group" managed to access T-Mobile servers through an API that "didn’t contain any financial data or other very sensitive data," adding "We found it quickly and shut it down very fast."

T-Mobile said the company informed law enforcement about the security breach and is reaching out to its affected customers directly via SMS message, letter in the mail, or a phone call to notify them as well.

"We take the security of your information very seriously and have a number of safeguards in place to protect your personal information from unauthorized access," T-Mobile said. "We truly regret that this incident occurred and are so sorry for any inconvenience this has caused you."

Want to Know How to Double Your Internet Speed for Free?

While there are several tweaks and steps you can take to test and improve your internet connection speeds, one of the easiest and quickest ways to speed up your web browsing is modifying the Domain Name System (DNS) servers. Read on to learn how Cloudflare's new 1.1.1.1 public DNS server can speed up and secure your web browsing.

What is DNS and How Does it Work?

DNS is the Internet's master phone book. It turns human-readable domain names, such as nebulanewengland.com, into Internet Protocol (IP) addresses such as 198.49.23.144. For all practical purposes, every time you go anywhere on the internet, you start by interacting with DNS.

This takes time. A complex webpage can require multiple DNS lookups -- one for the text, another for an image, another for an ad on the page, and so on -- before your page loads. Each DNS lookup takes an average of 32 milliseconds (ms). That really slows down many websites. So, when you speed up your DNS lookups, you'll get faster internet performance.

While Cloudflare's 1.1.1.1 is fast, it's biggest improvements comes with protecting your privacy. When the Federal Communications Commission gutted net neutrality, it also opened the door for ISPs to track all your internet searches. ISPs can, and are, selling your browsing data.

How to Update Your DNS Settings

Router

If you're using a router for your office network DNS settings -- and you probably are -- log in and find your DNS server settings. Once there, note down your existing DNS records and replace them with the following:

• For IPv4: 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1

That's it. The next time your computers look up a website, they'll use the 1.1.1.1 DNS services.

Windows

With Windows, click on the Start menu, then click on Control Panel, and do the following:

1. Click on Network and Internet.
2. Click on Change Adapter Settings.
3. Right click on the Wi-Fi network you are connected to, then click Properties.
4. Select Internet Protocol Version 4 (or Version 6 if desired).
5. Click Properties.
6. Write down any existing DNS server entries for future reference.
7. Click Use The Following DNS Server Addresses.
8. Replace those addresses with the 1.1.1.1 DNS addresses:

• For IPv4: 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1
• For IPv6: 2606:4700:4700::1111 and 2606:4700:4700::1001

MacOS

For macOS, open System Preferences, and then do the following:

1. Search for DNS Servers and select it from the dropdown.
2. Click the + button to add a DNS Server and enter 1.1.1.1
3. Click + again and enter 1.0.0.1
4. Click Ok, then click Apply.

iPhone

From your iPhone's home screen, open the Settings app.

1. Tap Wi-Fi, then tap your preferred network in the list.
2. Tap Configure DNS, then tap Manual.
3. If there are any existing entries, tap the - button, and Delete next to each one.
4. Tap the + Add Server button, then type 1.1.1.1
5. Tap the + Add Server button again, then type 1.0.0.1. This is for redundancy.
6. Tap the Save button on the top right.

Android

On Android, it's far harder to set up DNS than with other operating systems.

The easiest way, which works across most Android devices, is to install DNS Changer. This works by creating a local VPN work on your device. This VPN only exists within your device and your mobile or Wi-Fi connection. To use it, you place 1.1.1.1 and 1.0.0.1 in as your DNS entries.

Flaws in Pre-Installed Apps Expose Millions of Android Devices to Hackers

Nearly all Android phones come with useless applications pre-installed by manufacturers or carriers, usually called bloatware, and there's nothing you can do if any of them has a backdoor built-in—even if you're careful about avoiding sketchy apps.

Researchers disclosed details of 47 different vulnerabilities deep inside the firmware and default apps (pre-installed and mostly non-removable) of 25 Android handsets that could allow hackers to spy on users and factory reset their devices, putting millions of Android devices at risk of hacking.

Some vulnerabilities discovered by researchers could even allow hackers to execute arbitrary commands as the system user, wipe all user data from a device, lock users out of their devices, access device's microphone and other functions, access all their data, including their emails and messages, read and modify text messages, sending text messages, and more—all without the users' knowledge.

"All of these are vulnerabilities that are prepositioned. They come as you get the phone out the box," Kryptowire CEO Angelos Stavrou said in a statement. "That's important because consumers think they're only exposed if they download something that's bad."

For example, vulnerabilities in Asus ZenFone V Live could allow an entire system takeover, allowing attackers to take screenshots and record user’s screen, make phone calls, spying on text messages, and more.

Kryptowire has responsibly reported the vulnerabilities to Google and the respective affected Android partners, some of which have patched the issues while others are working diligently and swiftly to address these issues with a patch.

However, it should be noted that since the Android operating system itself is not vulnerable to any of the disclosed issues, Google can't do much about this, as it has no control over the third apps pre-installed by manufacturers and carriers.

How to Stay Safe From Phishing Scams

phishing attacks have been around for years, but today’s cybercriminals are adept at using them in an ever-increasing variety of ways to get what they want. According to the most recent FBI figures, phishing and its variants was the third most popular cybercrime type in 2017, representing nearly $30m in victim losses.

The bad guys want your personal information to commit ID theft, or else they need you to click on a malicious link/open a malware-laden attachment to hijack your bank account, lock your PC with ransomware, bombard your screen with ads and more.  So how do you fight back?

The answer lies with a combination of technology and user awareness. There are tools you can use to filter a great volume of phishing attempts, but a few will always sneak through, and it only takes one misplaced click to land yourself in trouble. That’s why the frontline in the war on phishing messages ultimately lies with improved user awareness.

Don’t get caught out

So, what should users look out for? Phishing messages come in a variety of flavors, but here’s a typical email scam purporting to come from the IRS:

Tell-tale signs of a scam:

• From field: is the ‘sender’s’ email address familiar? Does it look made up? Is it consistent with the purported sender of the email? Does it appear different if you hover over it with your cursor? All of these could indicate a phishing attempt. To field: If the sender addresses you generically as ‘user’ or ‘customer’ or ‘recipients,’ in this case, this should be a warning sign.
• Date and time: Was it sent at an unusual time; that is, not during normal ‘business’ hours?
• Subject line: Phishing emails often try to create a sense of urgency to hurry you into making a rash decision. Words like “urgent,” “immediate” and “important” are not uncommon.
• Body: The content of the message often contains spelling and grammatical mistakes and continues with the sense of urgency to get you to click without thinking.
• Link/attachment: Phishing emails will try to trick you into clicking on one of these, as with ‘Update Now,’ either to begin a covert malware download or to take you to a legitimate-looking phishing site to fill-in your details.

How do I stay safe?

• Learn to recognize all the tell-tale signs of a phishing message. Avoid clicking on any links or opening attachments from unsolicited emails.
• If you need to double-check, contact the company that supposedly ‘sent’ you the email to see if it’s genuine or not, or go directly to the website (e.g., online banking) to log-in. Again, do not use the links provided to go there.
• Your default attitude when you’re online should be “suspicious.”
• To learn more about phishing, you can also go to org. The site provides a wealth of more information on the types of phishing you may encounter, what you can do to prevent being taken-in, and includes further resources for study.

We’re all exposed to phishing attacks on a near daily basis, whether at work, out and about, or at home. But armed with an understanding of what to look out for and the right tools in place, you can keep your data under lock and key, and your identity and finances safe from harm.