Can you wipe yourself off the web?

In a word, no.

Consumer reports released a report about personal removal services. They note ” Manual opt-outs were more effective than people-search removal services but
were also far from perfect.”

I will ocassionally get automatic data scrubbing requests and while I comply, I realize the futility in such requests. As while I can (and do) remove the person’s name, I can’t force archiving web sites to reindex and lose content.

What about you? Have you tried using these services?

MS-DEFCON 2: Microsoft and Apple betas near finish line

By Susan Bradley

Hold off on updates from both companies until they are fully vetted.

With so much activity around forthcoming Windows updates, continued caution is recommended. That’s why I’m raising the MS-DEFCON level to 2.

I realize that the window between today and last week’s Alert has been brief. It’s just a matter of the calendar — more testing time was needed last month, and Patch Tuesday is next week.

Anyone can read the full MS-DEFCON Alert (21.32.1, 2024-08-08).

August 2024 Office non-Security updates are now available

Office non-Security updates have been released Tuesday, August 6, 2024. They are not included in the DEFCON-3 approval for the July 2024 patches. Unless you have a specific need to install them, you should wait until Susan Bradley (Patch Lady) approves them and any problems have been reported.

Remember, Susan’s patching sequence and recommendations are based on a business environment that has IT support and may have time constraints on the updating process. Consumer patching should be more cautious due to limited technical and mechanical resources. The latter is the reason for the AskWoody DEFCON system.

Office 2016
Update for Microsoft Access 2016 (KB5002589)
Update for Microsoft Visio 2016 (KB5002582)

Office 2016 reached  End of Mainstream Support on October 13, 2020. EOS for Office 2016 is October 14, 2025.

Updates are for the .msi version (perpetual). Office 365 and C2R are not included.

Security updates for all supported versions of Microsoft Office are released on the second Tuesday of the month (Patch Tuesday).

How I learned to use my PC with a broken wrist

WINDOWS

By Lance Whitney

After fracturing my wrist in a recent fall, I had to figure out how to use the accessibility features built into Windows to work and write.

Despite my writing about the Windows accessibility features in a host of articles over the years, it wasn’t until this accident that I actually had to use them every day.

Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.32.0, 2024-08-05).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

Forum Top Ten lists!

FROM THE FORUMS

The forums are a centerpiece of AskWoody, allowing our community to engage with one another to solve problems, share insights, offer feedback, and add to our collective knowledge. (Not to mention keeping us in line.)

We appreciate both the questions and the ongoing willingness of forum members to participate.

Here’s a quick summary of posts from the first half of this year. We look forward to seeing what happens in the second half.

Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.32.0, 2024-08-05).
This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

Can we align human interests with robots, so they don’t turn on us?

PUBLIC DEFENDER

By Brian Livingston

Robots in human-like forms are already starting to assume jobs that have been performed for centuries by ordinary workers in manufacturing, logistics, and other industries.

This is my second column in a two-part series. The first installment described humanoid bots that are faster than humans at certain tasks, much stronger in moving heavy objects, and far lower in cost than the labor force in most industrialized nations. Employers are currently paying only $10 to $12 per hour for bots when averaged over the useful lives of the mechanical workers.

The outlay is expected to fall into the $2 to $3 per hour range, plus software costs, as soon as mass-production scale is achieved, which is projected to occur as early as 2025.

Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.32.0, 2024-08-05).

Email authentication and older clients don’t mix

ON SECURITY

By Susan Bradley

For many years, email was the standard way to communicate.

I still remember a business study from long ago about how plain old email was used on a car manufacturer’s shop floor to keep track of the inventory. It was fast, it was immediate, and everyone used it.

What happened to that “just works” platform?

Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.32.0, 2024-08-05).

Use Chrome and Ublock Origin?

You may have seen the news about Chrome not supporting uBlock Origin in the future. As this post indicates, “Starting with Google Chrome 127, there will be a warning for uBlock Origin (uBO) in your chrome://extensions/ page:”

The reason is that Chrome is phasing out support for Manifest v2 in favor of Manifest v3.

Firefox will continue to support it, so if you rely on it and are a fan, plan accordingly.  You can move to uBlock lite as another option.

So, do you use uBlock Origin? Will you be impacted?