When we talk about Wi-Fi, what Kind of Wireless Networking are we actually talking about?

Wi-Fi is the industry name for wireless local area network (WLAN) communication technology related to the IEEE 802.11 family of wireless networking standards. Wi-Fi technology became popular starting with 802.11b, introduced in 1999 and the first standard in that family to enjoy mainstream adoption. For more about the name “Wi-Fi”, see: Wi-Fi - The Technology Formerly Known as Wireless Fidelity

Wi-Fi and 802.11

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) develops many technology standards for the industry, including a set of local area network (LAN) standards numbered as 802.

Among all the IEEE 802 standards, the workgroup specifically focused on WLAN technology is called 802.11.

Most people associate "Wi-Fi" with one of the five general-purpose 802.11 WLAN standards:

l  802.11a

l  802.11b

l  802.11g

l  802.11n

l  802.11ac

In addition to these base standards, various other related 802.11 standards also exist:

l  802.11 - defines the lesser known original Wi-Fi technology ratified in 1997, before 802.11a and 802.11b were created. Original Wi-Fi supported data rates of only 1 Mbps.

l  802.11e - Quality of Service (QoS) extensions to 802.11a/b.

l  802.11ad - a 60 GHz wireless protocol (not a replacement for 802.11ac)

l  802.11ah - a future Wi-Fi standard that also supports lower frequency (900 MHz) communication

l  802.11X - a security feature for Wi-Fi access points

Wi-Fi Products

Mobile devices, laptop computers, game consoles and an increasing number of consumer gadgets build Wi-Fi radio transmitters and receivers into their hardware.

These devices in turn connect to either wireless broadband routers (on home networks) or wireless access points to communicate with each other and with outside networks (including the Internet).

Consumer versions of Wi-Fi products have maintained backward compatibility over many years. For example, 802.11b, 802.11g, and 802.11n equipment all can communicate with each other, and mixed Wi-Fi networks with devices running multiple of these standards are commonly referred to as "802.11b/g/n" networks.

802.11ac equipment also communicates with each of these others. (The old 802.11a technology. used mostly in business networks, is not compatible with these others and has fallen out of mainstream usage as a result.)

The Wi-FI Alliance industry body certifies vendor equipment to ensure new Wi-Fi products entering the market follow the various 802.11 specifications.

Issues with Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi has become so popular that people in casual conversation sometimes refer to any kind of wireless network connection as "Wi-Fi" - even if they are referring to cellular, Bluetooth or other wireless technologies instead.

Wi-Fi connections often run over the 2.4 GHz signal range that is shared with other consumer radio equipment like garage door openers, microwave ovens, and some cordless home phones. Besides signal interference from these sources, the popularity of Wi-Fi sometimes also causes radio congestion in a local area. Home Wi-Fi networks can easily conflict with those of their neighbors, for example. To know the exact speed of you home Wi-Fi, you can conduct a wifi speed test with some softwares or apps.

How Fast Is a Wi-Fi Network?

The network speed of a Wi-Fi wireless connection depends on several factors. Like most kinds of computer networks, Wi-Fi supports varying levels of performance depending on which technology standards it supports.

Theoretical vs. Actual Network Speeds

Each Wi-Fi standard is rated according to its maximum theoretical network bandwidth:

l  802.11b offered up to 11 megabits per second (Mbps)

l  802.11a and 802.11g offer up to 54 Mbps

l  802.11n offers up to 300 Mbps

l  802.11ac offers up to 1 Gbps (1000 Mbps)

The performance of Wi-Fi networks practically never approach these theoretical maximums. 802.11b networks, for example, generally operate no faster than about 50 percent of theoretical peak, around 5.5 Mbps. Likewise, 802.11a and 802.11g networks generally run no faster than 20 Mbps. And even though 802.11n rates at 300 Mbps compared to wired Fast Ethernet at 100 Mbps, the Ethernet connection can often outperform 802.11n in real world usage. Wi-Fi performance continues to be improved with future generations of the technology, though.

Factors Limiting Wi-Fi Connection Speeds

The disparity between theoretical and practical Wi-Fi performance comes from network protocol overhead, radio interference, physical obstructions on the line of sight between devices, and the distance between devices. In addition, as more devices communicate on the network simultaneously, its performance will also decrease.

A Wi-Fi network connection operates at the highest possible speed that both devices (endpoints) can support. An 802.11g laptop connected to an 802.11n router, for example, will network at the lower speeds of "g".

On home networks, the performance of an Internet connection is often the limiting factor in end-to-end network speed.

Even though most residential networks support sharing files within the home at speeds of 20 Mbps or more, Wi-Fi clients will still connect to the Internet at the usually lower speeds supported by Internet providers.

Can your Android pattern lock be easily exploited?

Pattern unlocks consist of a grid of dots on a device’s lock screen which users connect in a unique way to gain access to the phone. It’s popular unlocking method — it’s estimated that 40 percent of Android owners use it as opposed to a PIN or a password — but it’s also one of the less secure.

The study was carried out in a collaboration between Lancaster University, the University of Bath and Northwest University in China, who filmed smartphone users while they drew the unlock patterns onto their smartphone screens.

The researchers tested 120 unique patterns from 215 users and discovered that the tracking software was able to correctly identify the pattern within five attempts in 95 percent of the cases. The process is said to work even when the camera can’t see the device display and from up to nine meters away when recorded on a DSLR camera.

Ironically, it also seemed that the more complicated pattern, the easier it was to crack.

Most Android users are probably aware that patterns are less secure than PINs or text passwords; many Android devices make this fact known to the user when choose an unlock method. Further, the use of a camera and dedicated software may seem like a convoluted approach when you can often look at someone draw a pattern and simply memorize it.

Finding ways around Android lock security screen isn’t a new practice. Facial recognition locks can be tricked with a photograph, and fingerprint scanners can be bypassed using sticky tape. This research, in essence, is just more evidence that patterns are a lesser form of lock screen security.

If you want to help keep your device safe, you could try to ensure you unlock your phone away from prying eyes or change to a more secure unlock method like a PIN or password. The applock is perhaps the most rudimentary of security apps. The way it works is that it will lock up your other apps from prying eyes. That way you don’t have to worry about someone accessing your Facebook, gallery app, or banking app. They work best when paired with a lock screen lock to give you two layers of security.

No matter which way you look at it, lock screen security is a thing we should all be using on our smartphones. Sure, typing in a PIN or password dozens of times each day can get annoying, but using one of these methods might actually be able to help you keep all your information safe.

To help combat these small annoyances, there are a few features built into Android that should help ease the unlocking process a bit. Google’s Smart Lock feature has certainly proved itself useful over the years, allowing your phone to stay unlocked if it’s in a certain location (work, home, etc.), connected to a Bluetooth device, or when it recognizes your voice. Personally, I use my phone’s fingerprint sensor as my main form of security, and my backup method is a pattern. I also use Smart Lock to automatically unlock my phone when I’m at home and when I’m connected to my Moto 360 Sport.

The Privacy Enthusiast's Guide to Using Android（Part 3）

The Productivity Apps That Protect Your Privacy

4. Password Manager: LastPass or 1Password

 

The best way to protect a strong password is to not know what it is. Password managers can generate long, complicated passwords for you and automatically enter them into the sites you visit. Our favorite password managers are LastPass and 1Password.

LastPass is free and lets you sync your password vault across platforms, but the downside is that it uses its own servers to do it. While your data is encrypted while it’s on LastPass’s servers, it’s still possible for it to get hacked if someone targets the company, which happened once. Their encryption was strong enough to prevent the attackers from gaining access to users’ stored passwords which is encouraging, but if you need to be super careful, you might not want to risk it.

1Password, on the other hand, offers two kinds of syncing. You can pay $3/month to sync your account through 1Passwords servers, or you can just use your own Dropbox account. You can also skip syncing altogether and store all your passwords in a local vault and manually copy them from one device to another when you need to. This makes sure that no one can get access to your vault, even if they attack a third-party.

5. VPN: Hideman, Tunnelbear, or NordVPN

 

Using a VPN is the most basic way to secure all of your web traffic. Once you connect to a VPN, your traffic is encrypted so no one snooping can see what you’re looking at. This is particularly useful when you’re on public networks where you might not control your internet connection.

On this front, we like Hideman, NordVPN, and TunnelBear. Each service requires a monthly fee, but you get a small allotment of data for free each month. You won’t want to watch hours of Netflix with it, but it can help cover your traffic when you’re at the airport or hotel.

6 .Notes: Notes Lock

Google Keep was a surprise hit for note takers, but you can’t lock your notes down and they’re all stored on Google’s servers to boot. In fact, you need not only an app lock but also a good app to lock your personal note to escape from spying eyes. Notes Lock, on the other hand, keeps all your notes on your device and secures them behind a passcode, PIN, or pattern lock (though for the best security, you should probably use the passcode). You can use Notes Lock to write down notes or create to-do lists in a variety of colors and fonts. Even as a generic notes app it’s pretty robust, which makes the security features the icing on the cake.

If you want to sync your notes, you can choose to save your notes vault to Dropbox to share it between devices. Like with 1Password, this gives you more control over how your data is stored, rather than passing it off to a company like Google. Of course, this means someone could find your notes vault in Dropbox, but it will still be encrypted so they shouldn’t be able to read it anyway.

7. Cloud Storage: SpiderOak

Dropbox is pretty good at protecting your data, but if you need to go one step further, SpiderOak is the best way to store data in the cloud and keep it secure and private. The company employs a “zero-knowledge” policy, using local encryption so it can’t read what’s in your files before you even upload them. SpiderOak doesn’t offer any free storage, but it offers 100GB/month for $5 which is competitive with services like Dropbox and Google Drive.

That’s all the content of the guide. This should be a good start to protecting your typical Android usage from prying eyes. Nothing in here (or anywhere, really) is 100% bulletproof, but you’ll be one step ahead of the pack, which is often enough to get your everyday attacker off your back.

End

The Privacy Enthusiast's Guide to Using Android（Part 2）

The Privacy Enthusiast's Guide to Using Android（Part 2）

Most productivity apps are designed to help you get stuff done as conveniently as possible. Protecting your privacy, however, is rarely the most convenient. Consequently, you might need to use apps that are designed to protect as much data as possible, even if they have to forego useful features like cloud syncing or complex computer analysis. Some, like a VPN, you might not need all the time, but you should almost always be using apps like a password manager.

Also keep in mind that if you received your phone from your company through the Android at Work program, your data will still be visible to them even if you use these apps. If you want to keep your information as private as possible, use your own phone and keep it as locked down as possible.

1.       Web Browser: Brave

 

While lots of browsers claim to protect your privacy, we’ve found that Brave stood out as one of the best. It uses HTTPS Everywhere to keep your traffic encrypted and it blocks scripts, cookies, phishing, pop-ups, and ads. If you find that a site doesn’t work with Brave, you can selectively re-enable each of those features to figure out what’s breaking the site and even whitelist it if you decide it’s worth it to you.

On the desktop, Brave has a weird system that lets users choose to pay publishers instead of seeing ads. However, this doesn’t appear to exist in the mobile version, so you can safely ignore it. It’s not perfect, but it gives you a lot more flexibility to block third-party data tracking than Chrome does. An app lock is suggested to use on your browser to avoid snoopers on your intimate searching and surfing content, and even to find out who try to snoop on your phone.

2.       Email: ProtonMail or Gmail

 

For the most thorough email privacy, ProtonMail is the way to go. It encrypts all of your messages by default. You can send an email to other ProtonMail users and they’ll be able to read it like normal. If you send it to anyone else, they’ll be given a link where they’ll need to enter a password in order to read your message. This is a very inconvenient way to send email, but if you need to guarantee that no one but the recipient reads your email, this is the way to go.

If you’re slightly less paranoid, Gmail is still an excellent way to keep your email private from everyone except, well, Google. Every email is sent over SSL and Google encrypts each message from a sender to receiver. Unfortunately, Google itself is still able to see and scan your emails, and it may even have to turn some data over to the government if they receive a legal request. However, Gmail will at least protect your messages from some random snooper or someone who finds your phone (as long as you have a strong password and two-factor authentication like we mentioned earlier).

In general, email is pretty hard to secure since it always relies on a third-party server to send messages. If you’ve got a good reason to wear your tinfoil hat, you can always try rolling your own email server, but keep in mind it’s really hard.

3. Messaging: Signal or WhatsApp

 

If you really need to communicate with someone securely, Signal and WhatsApp are going to be much better for your privacy than email. Both of these apps feature end-to-end encryption, they don’t store your messages after they’ve been delivered, and they can both do voice calls on top of text messages. You can also use an applock to lock your Signal and WhatsApp so that no one can snoop your personal conversation. Inconveniently, both parties will need to have the app installed to use it, but it’s fairly easy to set up an account.

For those who want the absolute most privacy possible, however, Signal offers a slight edge. It doesn’t store metadata about who you’re talking to, but WhatsApp does. Neither app knows what you’re talking about, but WhatsApp knows who you’re talking with and when. If WhatsApp receives a legal warrant, it can hand over that data. WhatsApp can also backup your messages to Google Drive, though they’re encrypted so that shouldn’t be that big of a deal. Even if law enforcement requested it from Google, they wouldn’t be able to read it. Still, it’s important to know that the backup is there.

To be continued…

Lock Apps in iPhone without other apps

Lock Apps in iPhone without other apps

If you are looking for an app to lock apps in iPhone then there is no need of that as Apple provides an inbuilt feature to lock apps in iPhone. In this article, we will explain about the same useful feature of locking Apps in iPhone which many of you might not know. After going through this post you will get to know how to lock Apps in iPhone without using any additional application from App Store and even without jailbreak. The same feature will also work if you are looking to hide apps on iPhone. Moreover, you can also control what all features are available to use for a particular application, meaning you can also lock specific functions present inside an App.

How to lock Apps in iPhone

The feature which will allow you to hide apps in iPhone is named Guided Access. In order to enable Guided Access to follow the steps given below:

1.         Go to Settings and Tap on General

2.         Under General select Accessibility.

3.         In Accessibility, if you scroll down you will find Guided Access. Select Guided Access

4.         Under Guided Access toggle Guided Access to ON

5.         Turning Guided Access On will give an option of Passcode Settings. Select it

6.         Here by selecting Set Guided Access Passcode, you can set Passcode which will be used while locking and unlocking Apps.

With this, you have successfully enabled Guided Access feature and now you can lock Apps with the procedure given below:

1.         Open the App which you want to lock. For instance, take Messages App.

2.         Now to Start Guided Access and lock Messages App triple click the home button.

3.         Triple clicking on the home button will give you options where you can restrict features within an app as shown below. This is the best part of this feature. You might have seen apps which lock other applications but to lock features within an app is quite new and different.

Guided Access Options

For example, we have taken Messages Application, tap on Options at bottom left corner as shown above and Toggle Keyboards to OFF. You may turn off other features depending on your choice. With this, you won’t be able to use Keyboard inside Messages App. Tap on Done.

Guided Access Options – Restricting Keyboard

Moreover, you can circle out areas within an app which you would like to disable. In our example let’s circle out and disable Edit so that no one is able to delete Messages.

Circling out Edit

After setting all this up Tap on Start present at top right corner of the screen. Enter the passcode which you set earlier in order to start Guided Access.

This is it! You are safe to hand over your iPhone to a kid, friend or employee with whom you are not comfortable to share other information/apps on your phone. With the settings we made above the user will not be able to use Edit feature.

Edit Disabled

and also will not have access to the keyboard so cannot type messages either. Moreover, he/she cannot navigate to other apps or even Home screen. The use will be limited to just Messages App.

To end Guided Access triple click on home button and enter Passcode. Tap on End at Top left a corner of the screen.

Guided Access feature is really useful when you to hand over your phone to a kid to make him focused only on reading a book in iBooks, or to a friend/colleague and not want him/her to see your other apps.

We hope that you loved to know about such a useful feature and now you know how to lock apps in iPhone without the use of any other app lock. We wish that you learned more than what you expected as you can now even lock features within the app apart from locking the app. Let us know if you face any problems.

The Privacy Enthusiast's Guide to Using Android

With everyone from local scammers to government agencies trying to get hands on your data, there’s never been a better time to beef up your privacy game. Fortunately, there are a ton of options out there to keep your messages, files, and phone safe on Android.

Before we begin, we should point this out: using a smartphone is always going to be a risk. Especially one running services from Google. You can use these tips and apps to protect some of your communication, but you’re never going to be totally off the grid as long as you’re using an Android phone. That doesn’t mean you have to make it easy on an attacker, though.

Change These System Settings to Protect Your Privacy

When you first get your phone, it’s a good time to start protecting yourself. During the setup, make sure you disable any options asking to track your data. After that (or if you’ve already set up your phone), there are a number of precautions you can and should take. We recommend everything on the following list, but they all come with some convenience sacrifice, so decide for yourself which ones you need:

Setup Timeout Error: Setup took longer than 30 seconds to complete.

• Set a strong alphanumeric password. Android gives you the option to use a pattern or PIN to lock your phone, but to be safe, you should use a strong alphanumeric password. Open the Settings app and head to Security > Screen Lock. Set a password that includes numbers and letters.
• Don’t use your fingerprint to sign in. Fingerprint sensors are convenient, but the law around them is complicated. While it’s still being hashed out in the courts, currently police can compel you to use your fingerprint to unlock your phone. It’s better to just not use it at all. On Nexus and Pixel devices, head to Settings > Security > Pixel Imprint and delete any fingerprints you’ve saved.
• Encrypt your phone (if it isn’t already). Some manufacturers don’t encrypt your phone by default. If you have to enter a PIN before the phone boots up, it’s probably encrypted already. Just to be sure, head to Settings > Security. Under Encryption, you should see “Encrypt phone.” If it says “Encrypted” below that, you’re good. Otherwise, tap it and follow the instructions to encrypt your phone. This may take a while and it may slow down some older phones, but it’s worth it to protect your data.

• Hide notification information from the lock screen. Android will show notifications even when your phone is locked, but you can hide sensitive information if you don’t want prying eyes to see. Head to Settings > Notifications then tap the gear icon at the top. Finally, tap “On the lock screen.” You can either choose “Hide sensitive notification content” to conceal things like messages and email contents, or “Don’t show notifications at all” to ensure no one sees anything.
• Disable Google’s tracking activity. Google is the biggest glutton for data around, so disabling their tracking is almost a Sisyphean task, but you can at least turn off as much as you can. Head to this link, click the menu button at the top, and choose “Activity Controls.” Here, you can disable location tracking, search tracking, voice tracking, and even your YouTube history. Note, Google may still keep some anonymized info about you, but this can minimize how much they have.
• Turn off Google backup. Google backs up a ton of information about your device, including call history, apps, and even what Wi-Fi network you’re connected to. If you’d rather Google not have that info, head to Settings > Backup & reset > Backup. You can either disable backups entirely (or make your own) or selectively disable the data you don’t want to store.

• Turn off any unnecessary app permissions. As of Android 6.0 (Marshmallow), Google finally lets you pick which permissions to give to apps. For starters, that means you should probably get an Android phone running Marshmallow if you’re concerned for your privacy. Then, head to Settings > Apps and tap the gear icon at the top. Then tap “App permissions.” Here you’ll be able to see permissions for things like Calendar, Contacts, Location, and Microphone. Tap each one and disable any apps you don’t trust. Keep in mind, this may break some apps if you’re not sure why they need that permission. If you’re really not sure you can trust an app, you might be better off uninstalling it.
• Turn on two-factor authentication. Your account is only as safe as your password (which isn’t very safe) unless you enable two-factor authentication. You can turn it on for your Google account here, and then for any of your other accounts on this list. It’s also a good idea to use an app like Authy to manage your authentication tokens, since it lets you lock apps with a PIN. This protects your tokens in the event someone steals and unlocks your phone.
• Enable Android Device Manager. ADM can find your phone remotely, so it might be a bit of a toss-up from a privacy standpoint. On the one hand, it means Google will have information about where you are. However, you can also use it to locate or wipe your phone remotely. If you want that nuclear option in case you lose your device, this might be a good tool to have.

That should handle a lot of the data and vulnerabilities that come with having an Android phone (though you should still assume there’s some kind of data being tracked from your account). However, that’s only part of the equation. Next, you’ll need to take a look at the apps you use every day.

Use Smart Lock in Android 5.0 and Never Unlock Your Phone at Home Again

Don’t you hate it whenever you’re safely at home, and there’s no one else around to access your phone, and yet you still have to unlock it whenever you want to use it? Android 5.0 Lollipop’s Smart Lock solves that.

Many of you probably know the frustration, you’re listening to something like Pandora or Spotify, and you want to change the station, or give something thumbs down, or bookmark a song — whatever the case, anytime you want to do that, you have to unlock your device. Or, you just want to look something up (OK Google?) or tap out a quick text, or any number of things you do a hundred times a day.

It’s even worse if you’re jogging or otherwise engaged in some vigorous activity. Have you ever tried unlocking your phone when it is in one of those protective exercise cases?

Smart Lock mitigate much of that frustration by letting you set trusted places, where as long as you’re within a certain range, you phone or tablet won’t lock; trusted devices, which will let you assign a Smart Lock to paired Bluetooth or NFC devices; and finally, you can enable trusted face unlocking, which means you can simply turn your device on, look at it and it will unlock, as long as your front-facing camera isn’t obscured.

Turning on Smart Lock

Smart Lock can be set up by accessing the settings. Pull down from the top edge of your device as if you’re going to check your notifications and tap on the gray time/date bar, and then tap the “Settings” gear.

If you don’t already have a phone lock on your device, you should do that before you set up Smart Lock. We use a pattern to unlock our device, but you can use the PIN or password option too.

Regardless, in the settings, tap the “Security” options and then “Smart Lock.”

In the Smart Lock settings, we have three options; trusted devices trusted face, and trusted places. You can have one, or the others, or all at the same time. Smart Lock will allow you to have as many trusted devices as you want, but you can only set up one trusted face.

Home is Where You Don’t Have to Unlock Your Phone

You can also have unlimited trusted places, which is really convenient, and what we want to focus on first.

When you tap on “Trusted places,” you can turn on your Home and Work locations assigned in Google Maps or add a custom place.

When you add a custom place, it will open to your current location, which you can immediately add, or you can search for a location or address and add that. It’s important to understand that this relies heavily on the Google Location service, so if you’ve got your GPS enabled, then custom places will obviously be more precise.

In the following screenshot, we can apparently choose the entire San Antonio metro area as a trusted place by simply tapping the blue bar below the map. Obviously, the idea is to add smaller areas that don’t compromise your device’s overall security, such as a specific business or address.

Here, we’ve elected to add our default home location, which we’ve labeled as such.

As you can see, you can quickly add a variety of custom trusted places that you frequent regularly. As soon as you are in range of a trusted place, the Smart Lock will engage automatically.

Remember, you can also add your Home and Work Google Maps locations? To do that, you must first configure them in Maps by swiping right from the left screen edge and tapping “Settings.”

On the settings pane, tap “Edit home or work.”

Now you can enter your home and work addresses.

You should now be able to turn your work and home address on and off in Smart Lock by tapping the little green button next to each.

Setting up and Using Device Smart Lock

If you want to add a trusted device, such as via Bluetooth, you first need to pair them in the Android Bluetooth settings.

If you already have other devices paired, you can tap “add trusted device.”

On the next screen, tap “Bluetooth” to add a previously paired device.

In this screenshot, we already have several other devices paired, so we can add any of them, and anytime we connect to them, our Smart Lock will activate.

Note, as you pair to Bluetooth devices, a notification will inform you that you can add it as a Smart Lock trusted device.

If you want to set up a Smart Lock using NFC, you simply tap another NFC-enabled device or tag.

Finally, although Smart Lock doesn't have an app lock to lock singles apps, it gives Lollipop users one last nifty feature, which is actually a more refined version of Android’s face unlock feature from previous versions.