Have you ever closed a browser tab accidentally and struggled to find your way back?
Ctrl+Shift+T on Windows or Cmd+Shift+T on Mac will re-open the last closed tab.
My brother pointed this out today, and I was stoked to learn about it, so I had to share. Hopefully you find it useful also.
Did you think that private browsing mode makes your browsing private? Think again.
Private (or incognito mode) browsing mostly makes it so it doesn't store your history on your computer. Your ISP and websites you hit, including Google, can still track you.
It can still be useful, when, for example, researching a holiday you want to be a surprise to someone who shares the same computer. But you should expect that Google knows you're the one doing it.
More details here.
If you're using Signal, there are privacy settings worth looking at. (and if you're not using Signal, listen to Super Simple Security Principles episode 20, Signal: A Safe and Private Communication App).
Under Settings –> Privacy –> Phone Number, you can choose who can see that you're using Signal. The Signal default is that only people who have your phone # can see you. You can change it so that by default, nobody can see you're on Signal except people you've contacted directly.
Does your bank send you alerts when you spend more than $100 in one charge? Or online charges? International charges? Most banks (all 4 of the ones I use) will alert you when a charge occurs above a specific amount. But you have to configure it. For most credit cards, you can also enable these kinds of alerts.
Look in settings for alerts on your bank or credit card's website (or an app if you have one).
Once upon a time, it wasn't safe to open some emails.
Thankfully, those days are long past. It is now safe to open any email.
The risk comes if you download anything in the email or click on anything in the email.
Episode 16 of Super Simple Security Principles gets into this a bit more. Check it out if you haven't already.
Do you use Venmo? I was shocked to find out that, by default, anyone on the internet can see your transactions in Venmo.
If you love to share, you can set the default to just friends. Otherwise, set it to private. You can also modify all your past transactions to hide them.
Click here for instructions on how to make these changes.
I'm laughing at myself right now because of the title. Hopefully, some of you are too.
Seriously though, screenshots are invaluable when helping figure out what has gone wrong, so share them with your support team.
If you don't have a support team, sign up for our forum, and let us be yours.
Here are some links describing how to take screenshots on different devices.
When browsing on a computer, instead of clicking to start a new search, you can use Ctrl+L on Windows or Cmd+L on Mac to select the address bar so you can type your search. Over time, little things like this can save you a lot of time.
You can receive email notifications when we produce a new Super Simple Security Principles podcast episode.
Just go to https://ihpacademy.com/podcast and fill in your name and email, and we'll let you know whenever a new episode drops.
We'll even include the episode's transcript if you prefer reading to listening.
You should pause before automatically clicking the button to make a popup disappear. They are frequently asking for permission to access personal data: your location, contacts, or photos.
Consider whether you want to allow them to proceed.