How to ensure privacy when communicating on the Internet

[Объединенное Детективное Бюро]

We are increasingly dependent on the Internet. And the situation when you are far from your computer, and you need to go online online urgently, has become quite commonplace. Usually in this case, a collective access point to the Internet, a friend's computer, or a computer at work comes to the rescue.
And all would be fine, but one day you can get the most unpleasant news: your personal correspondence or your statements in chat rooms or forums are known to those people who would better not know this.
How is this done? The reasons may be different. The actions of people who purposefully try to reveal your secrets, accidental information leaks (except for the fact that nothing accidental happens). And finally, your own carelessness.
A standard computer is generally very poorly kept secrets. Keeping your secrets from those who specifically hunt them is a kind of art. And in this article we will learn to avoid the simplest mistakes that most often lead to the disclosure of your secrets.
Communication on the Internet is remarkable in that it very often takes the form of a masquerade. You come up with a new name, put on a mask and ... do whatever you want. Allow yourself liberties in communication and open to others the most secret secrets. And do not be afraid that this will affect your future life. After all, no one will know who was under the mask!
But let's imagine for a moment that in the midst of a masquerade, when you have already fooled around enough, they tear off your mask (even if unintentionally) from you. Think about how this will turn out. Surely - embarrassment. And even the troubles in real life.
About the same thing happens when someone gets access to your account on the forum or in the postal service. We can say that this person received the key to the booth in which you change clothes, keep a fancy dress and secret notes. Now he knows who is hiding under this mask, has the opportunity to read all these notes and, putting on your mask, he will answer them on your behalf.
Let's see what you can do to prevent this. The standard way to protect your privacy on the Internet site is the authorization procedure. That is, by going to the site, you first enter the username and password, and only after that you get access to your account.
Login, as a rule, is not a secret and is known to a large number of people. The password, on the contrary, should not be known to anyone. He is the only protection, the very key to your "changing cubicle". And the same security rules apply to the password as to the key to the lock.

- The password cannot be left where others can take it.

“It cannot be passed on to anyone.”

- It should not be as primitive as the key to some Chinese locks (successfully replaced with a screwdriver). This has already been said many times, so here is just an example.

Suppose you created yourself a mailbox whose address looks like "olga86@mail.ru". You can rest assured that if someone is eager to read your letters, the first thing he will do is try to go to the mail server, sorting out passwords such as olga86, 123456, qwerty, and the like. If these attempts do not succeed, he will try the following options: "Olga", "Olya1986", "Olya", "Olya", etc. The English spelling of these words will be checked. Such a trick as the set of letters of one language in the keyboard layout for another language will be taken into account.
So, if your password can be guessed in this way - consider that anyone with a screwdriver can get into your "secret booth". Urgently hang a more secure lock on it!
Next, imagine that the lock is reliable, but when you left, you simply did not lock the door. The explanation is redundant. However, very often, having completed his activity on the site, a person simply closes (by clicking on the “X”) page of this site.
But in this case, you just stopped seeing the door. But the door itself did not become locked from this. It is good if the lock itself closes when the door is slammed. Many sites terminate a user session automatically if the user has not been active for a long time. But this does not always happen.
And then any person who sat down at the computer after you and went to the same site, directly gets into that reserved corner of the site, access to which only you had access.
Remember and follow a simple rule: when leaving, lock the door. If, when entering the site, you entered a username and password, then somewhere (usually at the top of the page) there is always a button or link with the word "Exit" or a word of similar meaning.
And the last one. The computer will often offer its help in remembering passwords. It usually looks like this: as soon as you enter the password, a small window appears offering to remember this password. Sometimes, instead of a window, a button with a similar inscription appears on the browser toolbar (a program for browsing the Internet).
Usually, the user automatically presses the “OK” button and does not understand what he agreed with. After that, the password when entering the site is no longer requested. Or it is requested, but the password input field is shown already filled with asterisks. It remains only to click on the "Login" button, and you are already authorized.
This is equivalent to leaving a key in the door lock. Very comfortably. No need to carry the key with you and you will not forget it anywhere. There is only one minus - anyone who is next to her can now open the door.
There is another side effect that is not directly related to security. A good password is usually hard to remember. And if he is not typed by a person regularly, then the memory shoves this incomprehensible set of letters and numbers into some far corner. As unnecessary. For example, after some time, the operating system was reinstalled on the computer. As a result, all passwords remembered for its owner may be lost. And then this owner often realizes that he himself does not remember passwords. Some people are crying at this moment.
Attempts to write a universal guide to reset already stored passwords are doomed to failure. Not only do various programs offer to remember the password, but these programs are still constantly updated. The instruction that is true today, tomorrow may already be erroneous.
Therefore, you yourself have to search the Internet for a way to reset the password for the current version of your program. Before that, you need to find out exactly which program helps you remember passwords. Most often it is a browser (for example, “Opera” or “Firefox”). To find out the version of the program, you need to select the “Help” item in the command menu of the program and then the “About” item of the drop-down menu.
On the site page, under the windows for entering the login and password, usually there is another small window in which you can put and uncheck the box. It is advisable to study the inscription near this window. The phrases “Remember Me” and “Alien Computer” are opposite in meaning, which means that setting / unchecking on different sites can have opposite consequences.
As a rule, the absence or presence of checkmarks only affects whether your login will be displayed when you try to log in to the site next time. But in combination with the actions for remembering the password, these checkmarks can give unexpected effects. Explore them and choose a safe option.
Well, remember about vigilance. For example, in the Mozilla Firefox browser there is a function convenient for forgetting passwords. It displays a list of usernames and passwords for all sites for which you have allowed the browser to remember the password. Moreover, the passwords are not in the form of asterisks, but in the form of those characters of which the password consists.
Having accessed a computer with such a browser for only a few minutes (for example, you left the computer and did not block it), a knowledgeable person can copy this list. And then, already from other computers, calmly enter the sites under your accounts. In addition, he will understand the system by which you come up with passwords. And knowing the system, it is much easier to guess your password for sites that were not on this list.
In fairness, it should be noted that along with the “treacherous” function, this browser has a wonderful private browsing mode. Having entered this mode, you visit any sites you like, but after exiting from it there are no traces of visiting these sites on this computer.
Enjoy your communication! And let all your secrets remain only yours!

Vladimir Volodin. School of Life.

 

[Матушкин Андрей Николаевич]

Thank.