Discover How to Use Top Secret Level Privacy Techniques for Your PC Without Becoming a Geek - The Art of Privacy

By the way…do I look like a geek? Actually, please don’t answer that! I make a living as an Information Technology specialist and hold multiple industry credentials like the CompTIA Security+ and Network+ certifications which, naturally, makes me a certified geek. No need to rub it in! My job is to make sure you don’t ever have to be one (unless you want to).

Sometime in 2010 I realized just how easy it was becoming for virtually anyone to become an amateur computer “hacker.” There was a lot of buzz about a little program called Firesheep that made it trivially simple to hi-jack the online accounts of anyone who happened to be using the same public Wi-Fi hotspot you were.

You know, the one at the library or local Panera Bread for instance. If you could surf the web you could download Firesheep and become a “hacker.” It was that easy to use.

I realized that my laptop was wide open to this very same hi-jacking technique plus many others. In other words, when I sat down with a hot mug of coffee and activated my laptop’s Wi-Fi for some serious web surfing anyone nearby could, without much trouble, hi-jack my Facebook account, capture my various passwords or check out what I was searching for on Google and I might never know until it was too late!

As if all that weren’t bad enough I thought of all the other ways my privacy could be, in fact was being, compromised:

Here’s the embarrassing thing: I’d known all this for years but had done virtually nothing about it even though I’ve been involved in the Information Technology industry since 2001 when I got my first industry standard certification.

I’d dabbled with different PC security and privacy techniques at various times but had always stopped short of actually pulling together the knowledge I had and really making my computer safe and secure.

That changed for me when I realized that my “little” brother could with a few clicks, take over my Facebook account, not to mention any number of other accounts I use. And who was the computer expert again?! I thought about how ridiculous I’d feel if I had my Facebook or Amazon account hi-jacked when I could easily do something to prevent it.

I...