Newsletter Archives

• You clicked on that phish?

  Posted on November 11, 2024 at 02:42 CST by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  It happens. You fell for it. You clicked on something you shouldn’t have. You followed a link. You entered your password on a site that wasn’t legitimate.

  In these instances, you didn’t suffer an intrusion to your computer. Instead, your login credentials were impacted. What should you do?

  First, don’t panic. In the case of many attacks these days, your operating system is still intact — not impacted in any way. The once standard reaction “I got hacked, so I’ll restore my computer from a clean backup or reinstall from scratch” probably isn’t necessary. In fact, it may be irrelevant to your response.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.46.0, 2024-11-11).

  On Security Adversary-in-the-middle, CISA, Credentials, Exchange, Microsoft Compliance Portal, Microsoft Purview portal, Multifactor Authentication, Newsletters, Passwords, Patch Lady Posts, phishing, Security, Trusted Devices, Two-factor authentication

• Are they attacking that?

  Posted on October 28, 2024 at 02:45 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  

  ISSUE 21.44 • 2024-10-28

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  When you use technology, one challenge is determining whether a vulnerability is actually being exploited.

  This is especially important if you are holding back, delaying patches and updates until you can determine whether a bug has been fixed. This is one of my strategies in determining which update recommendations I will make.

  I use many sources of information to help me make those decisions.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.44.0, 2024-10-28).
  This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

  On Security CVE-2024-30088, Intel Explorer, Microsoft Defender, Microsoft Digital Defense Report, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Threat Intelligence, Windows LAPS

• So your identity has been stolen? Again?

  Posted on September 30, 2024 at 02:45 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  

  ISSUE 21.40 • 2024-09-30

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  Not a day goes by that I don’t receive some sort of notification that my name, address, email address, social-security number, credit card, or — well, you get the idea — has been stolen.

  So what, if anything, should you do to ensure your identity is safe? Should you subscribe to a dark Web monitoring service? Sign up for credit monitoring, which is typically offered when such an event occurs?

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.40.0, 2024-09-30).
  This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

  On Security Credit Monitoring, Credit Reports, Dark Web, Identity Theft, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Title Monitoring

• How my Internet outage caused security problems

  Posted on September 23, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  I live in a city with electricity, high-speed Internet, and all the other customary modern conveniences.

  In that same city dwell squirrels, birds (including beautiful hummingbirds), possums, kit foxes, bees, and too many others to mention. Although they’re lovely to have around, they are not necessarily the best of neighbors. Interaction with them doesn’t always work out, and sometimes that affects my technology — and even my security.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.39.0, 2024-09-23).

  On Security Insects, Internet, Internet connectivity, ISPs, Multifactor Authentication, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Performance, Security, Squirrels, Wiring, Xfinity

• Log files are useful but annoying

  Posted on September 9, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  Laboring over the Labor Day weekend, I spent a few hours rebuilding a computer at the office. It had suddenly stopped responding.

  I attempted to reboot it, to no avail — its SSD hard drive had failed.

  The major disadvantage of solid-state drives (SSDs) is that when they fail, they fail suddenly. But mea culpa: I missed a big hint that failure might be imminent. For several days before the failure, it was throwing off Volume Shadow Copy errors that were logged by my backup software. I didn’t notice those errors.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.37.0, 2024-09-09).

  On Security Activity logs, Apple, DCOM, Error logs, macOS, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, SSDs

• Safe remote access — from anything to anything

  Posted on September 2, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  One of the most used technologies in the Windows world is more than likely the most abused.

  Remote Desktop is one of the oldest ways to get from one machine to another, but it’s also one that relies on older technologies that Microsoft is trying to phase out. Add to that the interaction of Entra ID accounts (in the case of cloud technologies) and Microsoft accounts and firewalls, and it can be a bit confusing to set up.

  In spite of all that, the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) is a technology that many of us use and rely upon.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.36.0, 2024-09-02).

  On Security Chrome Remote Desktop, Newsletters, Port 3389, Quick Assist, RDP, Remote Desktop, Remote Desktop Connection, Shodan, Splashtop, TeamViewer

• Dealing with regulated security

  Posted on August 26, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  Being in charge of the technology and security at my office means providing the best security that does not interfere with our people’s ability to do their jobs effectively.

  Sometimes that can be difficult because of the regulations that control my line of work, most of which come from taxing authorities. I’ll be US-centric in my comments here, knowing little about regulations in other countries. But I’ll bet most are similar. So hopefully, my suggestions will help you choose better security while accommodating the realities of your business, the systems you use, and the online resources you require.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.35.0, 2024-08-26).

  On Security Authenticator Apps, Cisco Duo, ID.me, IRS, Login.gov, Multifactor Authentication, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, SSA, Two-factor authentication

• Is virtualization right for you?

  Posted on August 12, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  With any major change from one OS version to another, such as the leap from Windows 10 to 11, I determine whether to keep the old version around, just to run an application that hasn’t yet made the leap.

  I could keep an old PC on hand with the older OS and app. That might be useful if the older app has a more useful feature than the new version. It’s probably easier to do this in a business setting, where holding on to an old PC is less disruptive, but even home users can keep older technology if they’ve got the space.

  The alternative is to create a virtual machine (VM) on the new PC — one that runs the old OS and thus the older app.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.33.0, 2024-08-12).

  On Security Disk2vhd, Hyper-V, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Virtual Machines, Virtual PC, VirtualBox, VMWare, Windows Sandbox
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