What is Your Computer Hiding From You?
• The Daily BellImagine this: NSA or GCHQ implants malware on your computer that instructs it to copy certain kinds of data into empty memory separate from your hard drive or flash chips. You, the owner, may think you wiped the device clean, but you really didn't.
First, get a second computer that never connects to the Internet, or directly connects to your Internet computer.
Second, wipe the drives of both computers on a regular basis.
Third. Use encryption as necessary, encrypting info to a small flash drive, work off the drive itself when creating files. Store them on the non-Internet computer. Wipe the Flash drive when finished.
Fourth. Never create any files on the Internet computer except, possibly, what you download from the Internet. Remember, you can download directly to your flash drive.
Fifth. Download a program like Ccleaner or Wise that you can use to delete all kinds of hidden things on your computer.
Encrypt, encrypt, encrypt. Wipe, wipe, wipe.
That said, people are creatures of habit and passwords are often easy to guess at based upon common traits people pick and knowing information about the person being hacked. They also are lazy or forgetful and use the same password and short and simple ones. Or write it down.
2. This is why you use a secure password manager to keep your passwords using only a master password. Use that master password no where else. Make it a random one of ascii characters of reasonable length.
3. Cell phone security is a joke. By the time you get a good password entered the person has hung up. Also the processors are weak so then too is any encryption.
4. The easiest way to steal your password is to gain access to your PC and place a keylogger on it that records and transmits every keystroke. That is what the government prefers to do a "sneak and peak" burglary.
5. This article is a non-article typical of the Daily Bell. Windows 8.1 and especially 10 transmit much data (some would argue EVERY keystroke) home to MS. We already know that is certainly intercepted by the NSA. Lesson: Use some other OS. Preferably an open source one that can be examined by people who know what mal-intent code looks like. Don't forget popular apps (any app really) such as Office apps or browsers can surreptitiously transmit the same.
6. Recommend full drive encryption of all hard drives using the same or a different (if you can remember two) master password. This can complicate backups. But it is not too bad if your network is a home network. Again open source encryption makes more sense to me.
7. The cloud is fair game for snooping as far as the government is concerned. Whatever you put into he cloud is public domain. So it had better be encrypted. Strong encryption.
I could go on and on about securing browsers, email, Internet connections, ....