I have written many times about preparedness for emergencies, having a plan that your loved ones understand for various scenarios.
I have written many times about situational awareness and having gamed our in your head various possibilities in the case of an active shooter, etc.
I have written many times about having good supplies in a secure and accessible place.
I have written many times about steps to take to protect yourself and family.
In light of recent allegations about a priest having illegal material on a computer, I am reminded of incidents with priests who were accused of doing bad things with computers and internet only to be found innocent because their wifi security was bad and someone had hacked it.
Everyone has to be careful.
It’s always someone else… until it’s you.
Just today a weird thing happened. Someone parked in what is essentially a no-parking area on the street next to where I live. I haven’t seen this before. I had an optical gadget handy, so I took a closer look and saw what I thought was the driver moving his hand with a device around in the manner of one trying to get more bars or perhaps wifi. That’s when I shut everything down, went out the side, and took a photo of the vehicle. He sat there for a while longer and then left. Distinctive vehicle. I’ll keep my eyes open.
If you watch videos from a source like Hak5 you learn really fast the various ways to crack passwords, enter networks with half-handshake attacks, etc. You can even get into a network through a wifi enabled appliance. Hostiles can plant things on your cars or on your property.
Say you are out and about and find a USB drive. Curious, you plug it into your computer to see what is on it. You are now toast. The drive had hostile scripts. The drive was planted to get some sucker. They can unlock your computer, copy your files, get your passwords in the blink of an eye and send it to someone.
Say you just left your laptop for a moment at the coffee shop or airport lounge. It would take a few seconds for someone to insert the drive and, bammo, your stuff is his stuff. You are now toast.
Say you are out and about and your phone’s power is low. You ask if you can use someone’s power cable. You are now toast. The power cable, indistinguishable from good ones, actually has “Rubber Ducky” scripts that can do amazing things to your phone and data that you won’t like.
Analogy. I broke into my garage with a wedge and coat hanger in 15 seconds. These scripts are a hell of a lot faster than that. Access to your house through your garage makes you and yours vulnerable. Access to your network, laptop, phone through USB drives, cables, half-handshakes, etc. makes you and yours vulnerable.
I once plugged by phone into the usb port on an airplane and got a message on my screen: Trust this network?” HELL NO! I now have these for all travel. HERE
Changes have been made to the garage. Changes have been made to cables.
Everyone… be careful out there.
Change passwords. Make them strong. Don’t use the same one over and over.
Keep your security tight, and use two-step identification. Yes, take the extra annoying two seconds.
Treat view devices in the hands of nearby strangers as being filled with the CCP virus.
Leaving your mobile phone at home if you can.
Use signal blocking bags.


From a reader…


























