Use Password Savvy to make hard-to-hack passwords that are easy to remember
These days, in order to have strong password protection, you have to mix capital letters with lower-case letters, throw in a handful of random numbers, and sprinkle some punctuation around. I typically sit down with a piece of paper and write down a few random words, but words that I will remember, and then make some modifications and substitutions, until I have a strong password.
It’s easy enough, just write down some words, or even a phrase: “My name is James O’Brien”
Then string them together: mynameisjameso’brien
From here, I like to substitute some letters for numbers. A becomes 4, B becomes 8, S becomes 5, and so on. mynameisjameso’brien becomes something like myn4m3i5j4m3s08r13n
Throw in a few punctuation and capitalizations, and you get a very strong password: MyN4m3i$J4m3s08R13n!
Easy right? But what if your mind doesn’t work like my mind does? Well first, count yourself lucky! It’s not easy being me! And then second, check out Password Savvy.
Password Savvy is a web-based password generating tool where you enter a few simple words, and Password Savvy kicks in and makes a strong password from your words. You can tweak the settings until you are happy with the password and are sure you can remember it.
Check out Password Savvy for yourself. It’s free and easy to use, and safe! https://www.passwordsavvy.org
Recommended Programs: CCleaner
CCleaner is a great program for cleaning out junk files on Windows-based computers. If all CCleaner did was clean out junk files, I would still recommend it, but CCleaner does much more than just delete your temporary internet files and dump your system cache. CCleaner also has an excellent registry scanner, a great disk and free space wiper, and a host of other valuable utilities to help you keep your computer tuned and running well.
CCleaner works great on Windows XP and Windows 7, and I would suspect that it will work well on Windows 8, but I cannot confirm that at this time. For more information, or to download a copy of CCleaner, visit Periform.com. You can download a free version for personal use. If you have multiple computer, you can buy the Home or Business editions, which also offer technical support for CCleaner if you need it.
Options and Settings
CCleaner is easy to configure to your specific needs.
Settings – Allows you to select your language, gives you the option to automatically run CCleaner at startup, gives you options for the Recycle Bin context menu, and gives you options for securely deleting files in one pass or up to 35 passes.
Cookies – If you subscribe to websites where you log into an account, or have configured personal settings, then you probably have a cookie for for each of those sites that store your information so that when you log back into those sites, your settings are restored. CCleaner allows you ro select those cookies and add them to a “Keep” list, so that they are not deleted when you run CCleaner.
Include and Exclude – Here you can add specific files to be included or excluded from cleaning.
Advanced – A list of options that control how CCleaner behaves.
(Click image for larger view)
Cleaner
The heart and soul of CCleaner is of course, the cleaner. When you run CCleaner from the clean menu, it scans your computer and deletes junk files like Temporary Internet Files, history, cookies, and a particular file that browser hijackers like to use, the index.dat files. This is especially useful because the index.dat file is a hidden and protected system file used by Internet Explorer and other browsers. It’s a complicated file to delete. CCleaner deletes the index.dat file with any modifications malware might have made to it, and then restores it with a fresh and proper index.dat file.
For most cases, the default options are all you really need CCleaner for, but CCleaner gives you the option to select or deselect in the cleaning process.
(Click image for larger view)
Once CCleaner has finished cleaning your computer, it produces a report of the files it deleted. As you can see in the image below, CCleaner cleaned out 1.7 Gigabytes of junk files from my computer. To put this in perspective, I run CCleaner on my computer about once a month. As you can see, I accumulate a lot of junk! Most people are really surprised by how much junk CCleaner finds on their computer the first time they run it.
(Click image for larger view)
Registry Cleaner
As you install and uninstall programs, move or delete files, open and close files, or make changes to your computer, the Windows Registry gets modified. The registry is to Windows what the nervous system is to the human body. Every process and action that happens in your computer is controlled by the registry. Over time, the registry can “bloat up” with broken or orphaned entries, and this can cause problems and performance issues with your computer.
I want to stress a couple points about the registry, so please read carefully before running the registry scanner. First, you need to be careful about modifying the registry. One wrong move, and you could render your computer unusable or unstable. Definitely make a backup of your current registry before proceeding. You can do this easily by creating a restore point on your computer before running CCleaner. Second, you should only consider running a registry cleaner only if it’s needed. If your computer is hanging or crashing, then maybe run the registry cleaner, otherwise, it’s not really necessary. Finally, all that said, I’ve used CCleaner on hundreds of computers running Windows 98, ME, XP, Vista, 2000, and Windows 7, and I have never experienced an issue with the registry cleaner. Definitely make sure that you back up your registry before running the CCleaner registry cleaner, but chances are very good that you won’t run into any problems.
See Also: How to manually backup your registry (For Windows XP, but the process is the same for Windows 7)
(Click image for larger view)
CCleaner’s registry scanner first givers you the option to back up your current registry, and then scan the registry looking for those broken or orphaned entries, and presents them in an easy to read list. You can then opt to remove specific entries, or have CCleaner remove them all.
(Click image for larger view)
Program Uninstaller
Honestly, I typically do not use CCleaner’s Program Uninstaller, unless the program I want to uninstall does not have a stable uninstaller or when Windows built-in uninstaller doesn’t display the program or can’t uninstall it. When that happens, CCleaner’s program uninstaller utility generally does a good job removing programs. I think it is interesting that I see programs listed in CCleaner that I don’t see in the Windows program uninstaller. That doesn’t happen often, but when it does, CCleaner to the rescue!
(Click image for larger view)
Startup Programs
You can use Windows System Configuration utility to prevent programs from automatically loading in the background when Windows starts up. But it is kind of nice to have the tool right in front of you when you are giving your computer a CCleaner tune-up.
(Click image for larger view)
System Restore
The System Restore menu in CCleaner shows you a list of current restore points on your computer. The only option available here is to remove the restore point. You might want to use this if you have just cleaned your computer and found viruses or malware on your computer, as they will most likely be stored in a restore point. It would be sad to see you get your computer all tuned up, only to restore it to a previous data and put a virus back in the system.
(Click image for larger view)
Drive and File Wiper
This is a great feature of CCleaner as it gives you a great utility to securely wipe an entire drive or just the free space. Most people don’t know that when you delete a file on your computer, it’s not really gone. The deleted file just gets a new file name and it is tagged as free space. A simple utility can restore deleted files. To get rid of a deleted file permanently, you have to overwrite the space where that file was stored. Even then, files can be recovered. So you have to overwrite them more than once. The Department of Defense states that a deleted file should be overwritten at least 7 times. CCleaner gives you the option to overwrite a drive or free space up to 35 times.
(Click image for larger view)
Official Documentation
I hope you found this guide useful. If you need more detailed documentation, the official CCleaner documentation is available here on Periform’s website. www.piriform.com/docs/ccleaner
Update: CCleaner Enhancer Add-On
After posting this guide, I found a forum that talked about a CCleaner add-on that reportedly added about 250 programs to CCleaner’s database. The forum is PCHELPFORUM, and it is a great resource for PC users.
Before I could recommend the CCleaner Enhancer add-on, I obviously had to try it out for myself. I went to CNet and installed the update, and then launched CCleaner. I looked at the Application tab and noted that there were more options available. Then I ran CCleaner again, I had run it the previous day, and CCleaner found a whopping 838 MB more junk on my system, mostly in programs that I use frequently, such as Adobe Photoshop. After running CCleaner with the Enhancer Add-On, my Adobe products and my browsers are loading rocket fast. Very cool.
I can honestly say that I recommend this add-on for CCleaner!
The Web Atom’s CCleaner Enhancer adds support for more than 270 programs to CCleaner, the popular system and Registry-cleaning tool from Piriform. CCleaner Enhancer adds rules and definitions sourced from the Piriform Support Forum and other online resources to CCleaner’s built-in WinApp2.ini system. When you run CCleaner again, the new programs are automatically included and ready to be selected for scanning.
Things Everyone Should Know About Web Browsers
Web Browsers are among the most frequently used programs in the home or business environments. We use them to access websites, check our web-based e-mail, run applications for work, and so on. Since web browsers are frequently accessing the Internet, they are great targets for hackers who seek to discover and exploit any flaw in the browser that can be used to hijack the browser and spread viruses and malware, or gain access to computers for other purposes. On the other hand, it’s not always the browser that gets exploited; it’s us, the users.
That is the reason for writing this article, to help you benefit from their web browsers without exposing their computers to security risks, or at least provide you with enough information for you to make informed decisions about the way you use your web browser.
What is a Web browser?
A web browser is a program used for viewing web pages or web-based content over the internet or intranet, or even a local computer. Web browsers, also known as just browsers, translate content written in HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) or PHP (PHP: Hypertext Processor), and us to view web pages, images, video, and use web-based applications and games.
The Top Five Most Popular Web Browsers Today Are:
Mozilla Firefox – Firefox is a free and open source browser developed by Mozilla, and is currently the 2nd most popular browser.
Opera - Opera is a web browser and Internet suite developed by Opera Software with over 200 million users worldwide.
Safari – Safari is a feature rich browser with versions for Mac and Windows, and is considered by many to be the fastest mainstream web browser on the open market.
Google Chrome – Offers excellent security and privacy in a clean interface.
Microsoft Internet Explorer – This is the default browser that comes built into the Windows Operating System.
How Does a Web Browser Work?
Browsers work by communicating over network connections either to the Internet to the World Wide Web or an Intranet or local network or computer. I’ll save the technical details for another article, suffice it to say that communication over a network is handled through standardized communication protocols, the most common being the TCP/IP (Transmission Communication Protocol over Internet Protocol) or UDP (User Datagram Protocol) protocols.
When you type a website URL (Uniform resource Locater) address, such as www.obrienpc.net into the address bar of your browser, the address is translated from the name obrienpc.net to the numerical IP address 64.38.25.106 through a Domain Name Server (DNS), and the request is then routed through various servers until it reaches the server that stores my website, which in turn, either accepts or denies your request to access information from my website. This is done through the TCP/IP protocol, using port 80.
Encrypted or Non-Encrypted Browsing
Port 80 is the standard port used to communicate with most websites throughout the world, and it is a port that is considered unsecured and is open to virtually any network transmission. A simple way to tell if your web browser is using port 80 is by the address displayed in the address bar. If you see HTTP, then your web browser is transmitting through port 80.The point to be made about port 80 is that neither are secure. Traffic over port 80 can be sniffed out.
HTTPS uses port 443, which offers the ability to encrypt data transmissions. This is why banks, online stores, and other services where you might need to transmit sensitive data use HTTPS. If you see HTTPS in the address bar of your web browser, then you are probably using encryption to secure your data transmission over the web. The standard of encryption used today is 128 bit encryption, which is pretty darn strong, nearly impossible to crack. Most browsers also show an icon such as a padlock in the status bar to indicate that you are transmitting over a secure port. You should look for this anytime you are transmitting any financial or sensitive information over the Internet. you should also make sure that your browser is using 128 bit encryption.
Addons, Extensions, and Tool Bars
In theory, add-ons, extensions, and toolbars are supposed to enhance the functionality of our web browsers and make our browsing experience more convenient. In practice however, add-ons, extensions, and toolbars are also used to track your browsing habits, feed ads to your monitor, or allow malware to be covertly downloaded into your computer.
Now, I am not saying that add-ons, extensions, and toolbars are all bad, but you should use caution before using them. I use a few extensions in my browsers to enhance my research and browsing capabilities. I am careful to research extensions or add-ons that catch my interest before I install them. The easiest way to do that is simply to use your favorite search engine and see what other users are saying about it, and what security warnings (if any) are out there.
Myself, I don’t trust toolbars. While they may add convenient access to search engines or other enhancements, they more often track your browsing habits and report that information somewhere else. Not to mention, they chew up system resources. This is not true for all tool bars, so again, do a little research. It can save you a lot of pain.
You should also be careful about installing toolbars that are bundled in with other software. Many freeware programs that you download from other websites include these toolbars in their software packages because they are paid to do so by marketing firms, and they are often set up by default to install automatically. If you suddenly see toolbars appear in your browser that you did not intend to install, get rid of it by uninstalling it.
Some add-ons are good to have. For example, most antivirus applications will install an add-on to your browser to help prevent viruses of malware from covertly being installed on your computer. Some firewall programs do the same thing.
Keeping Your Browser Up-To-Date
As I mentioned in the beginning of this article, hackers love to exploit security flaws in web browsers. It is for this reason that you should keep your web browser up to date. Fortunately, updating your web browser is essentially an easy and straight-forward process, and takes just a couple minutes to do. In fact, some web browsers are configured by default to 
automatically look for updates and inform you when updates are available. Either way, make it part of your routine to check for updates once or twice a month. You can either go the support website for your browser, or in some cases, your web browser will have an update option in the menu options.
How do you know what version of your web browser you are using? If you go into the menu system of your web browser, say for example, Internet Explorer, you would click on the Help menu, and then click on About Internet Explorer, and then you will see what version you are currently using.
Please Support
