When I was a kid, my dad had a large outdoor vacuum. A small business owner, he used it to remove leaves and other stuff from the parking lot behind the business. One day we were in the garage after he’d swept the lot. Curious if the engine would be Read more
New is fun. It’s exciting to install a new app, to start using a new service. But they all come with a checkbox. And all those little checkboxes come with terms, conditions, and policies which control how the app or service can use your information. When was the last time Read more
Picture this: It’s Sunday afternoon. You’re in the kitchen meal planning for the week and thinking about dinner. The phone rings. It’s your bank calling about a problem with your account. A Fraud Prevention team member asks if you authorized a transfer to a foreign account? No, of course not. Read more
Don’t use Comet, Perplexity’s web browser which it just released as a free install. Protecting your personal data is difficult enough. Scams are becoming more sophisticated and more prevalent. In the ever escalating battle to protect your information, your online safety, and your hard-earned money, do not willingly surrender access Read more
I recently drove to Cleveland for a content creator expo. It’s an easy five hour drive. A simple trip. Usually. Outside of Pittsburgh, approaching an exit, I did a double take. I couldn’t believe what I saw. A small black two-door sedan was heading TOWARDS ME. In the passing lane. Read more
You get to decide what you will accept an unknowable number of times every day. Will you wait in line at the grocery store or will you use the self checkout? Will you stay in your lane or switch to the open one beside you? Should you accept seeing ads Read more
My lawn looks like it has rained every day for the last three months. I may have cut more weeds today than grass, and the fungi in the mulched flowerbeds are as abundant as the attacks in my messaging apps. In this spam season phishing surge, if you have a Read more
Have you ever tried to access your bank account then sat and waited for a verification text message which never arrived? You’re not alone. I just dealt with this multiple times this week. And you’re not the problem. Come along as I explain why this happens, how you can avoid Read more
I met a friend for coffee a few months ago. They mentioned some of my earlier posts about online safety, then said something which has stuck with me like a poppyseed lodged in my gums: I don’t worry about my data. I just assume the bad guys have all my Read more
Google effectively just handed preteens the keys to a digital Ford F-150 and told parents it’s their responsibility to keep their kids safe. In an email to parents last week, as reported in The New York Times and The Verge, Google informed parents that children under the age of 13 Read more