5 Dangers to Consider When Pointing Your Home Security Cameras | Dramel Notes

Home security cameras are an important addition to any household, smart or otherwise, but they carry with them the risk of unauthorized access. You may have heard of cases in which security cameras from particular manufacturers have been hacked. These tools meant to make your life safer can be dangerous.

With this in mind, it is important to carefully consider where you position your security cameras, and what parts of your home you point them at. Keeping things secure is important, but so is maintaining your privacy.

Below we’ve compiled a list of five things you should consider regarding the privacy and safety of your household when pointing your security cameras. It’s amazing just how much information can be leaked!

Don’t Show Off Your Address

Potentially the most dangerous thing you can do is point a security camera directly at your door where a house number is displayed. All it takes is for a security cam hacker to check your IP address, identify the owner of that range (for instance, your ISP) and narrow down your location to find your home.

It’s bad enough that some stranger – who might be anywhere in the world – should be viewing your home. Giving them the information to find your full address invites a whole load of other trouble, and not just from prank deliveries. Would you like to let criminals know about all of the deliveries you’ve had from Amazon or Apple, while telling them where you live?

Avoid sharing your address on security cameras: make sure your house number is not in the shot.

“I’m Going Out Again…”

Another aspect of this is your daily routine. A casual hacker may move on from your security cam if they find that you’re home; a more seasoned criminal may spend a while observing your actions to establish your daily routine. Eventually, they may know it better than you do yourself.

Is this the sort of information you want a criminal to know? Of course not. But once you’re marked, it can be difficult to un-target yourself.

Vary your routine where possible, making it difficult for a hacker to establish your routine.

Is There Anyone Home?

Pointing a camera at your front door is a good idea to check who is at the door whether you’re home or not. But if someone else is viewing your front door camera, they’re going to know when you have gone out. And if you’ve been observed for long enough, they might even know how many people live in your home, and when the house is usually empty.

Similarly, if there’s a view of your driveway or any cars you owned, it won’t take long for a cam hacker to work out whether you’re at home or not.

So what do you do about this?

Employ light timers and other timed or remote-controlled smart home gear to create the illusion that someone is home.

Do You Have Enough Cameras?

Another problem presented by having your cameras hacked is that with too few cameras pointing at the property and not covering the perimeter, hackers may find that there is an uncovered entry route to your home.

This might come from a geographical anomaly, such as a small hill or tree or bush, or it might simply be a budgetary restriction. Either way, if a hacker can discover a “cold spot” that they can use to access your home without detection, then they will use it (or sell the information to someone closer to your location).

Ensure you have enough security cameras observing your property.

Smile, You’re On Your Own Candid Camera

The point of security cameras, Internet connected or otherwise, is to spot criminals attempting to intrude, not for them to see you at your most vulnerable. As a result, you shouldn’t be pointing external security cameras so that activity within the house is visible.

You might, for instance, find that your living room is within line of sight from a security camera, or worse still, a bedroom. It doesn’t matter if it’s your room or your child’s, it’s a very bad idea to present this visibility to criminals.

But it gets worse.

So far we’ve only looked at external cameras. Internal security cameras that get hacked could reveal all sorts of information, from catching a member of your household in the nude, to sharing personal and sexual habits that could be used by a blackmailer.

Avoid this by directing interior security cameras at doors and windows, and where possible avoiding bathrooms and bedrooms.

Keeping Your Security Cameras… Secure

It’s all very well highlighting these dangers and offering solutions, but ultimately what you need to do is ensure that your Internet security cameras are secure. Hacking security cameras is frighteningly simple for even amateur hackers.

Different options are available here, from ensuring that the camera’s firmware is fully up to date to ensuring your router is fully updated and the firewall enabled. You might even setup a hardware firewall.

Has your home security system been leaked online? Do you have any advice to add? Tell us in the comments.

Image Credits: Masked hacker by Andrey_Popov via Shutterstock, wavebreakmedia via Shutterstock.com, Photographicss via Shutterstock.com, Mrs_ya via Shutterstock.com, CREATISTA via Shutterstock.com

[Read more]

How to Invite a Household Member to Share Your Amazon Echo | Dramel Notes

The Amazon Echo is a fantastic tool for using your voice to manage everything from shopping lists to music play lists, but what if you have other people in your household? Read on as we show you how to link multiple Amazon accounts to the Echo for shared music, lists, and more.

Why Do I Want To Do This?

If you’re the only one in your household and/or the only person who does any purchasing through Amazon, then this tutorial probably isn’t for you (but you may still find that multiple profiles are useful for your family or roommates, so we’d encourage you to keep reading).

For people with multi-person households, especially where members of that household all have purchased various content on Amazon like music and audio books, it makes sense to enable shared profiles so that you can, for example, play songs and albums through the Echo system that your spouse or roommate have purchased.

In addition to sharing music you also can share shopping lists, to-dos, calendar entries, and other useful features available on the Echo/Alexa system, perfect for ensuring that whoever does the shopping has full access to everything added to the collective shopping list and other shared household tasks.

Note: There is one minor caveat worth noting: giving someone access via shared profiles also gives them access to the purchasing capacity of your Amazon Echo. You may with to turn off voice-based purchasing (or enable a PIN code) in the Settings section of the Amazon Alexa app.

Adding A Profile To Your Amazon Echo

Let’s take a look at how to add a profile to your Amazon Echo. You can perform all these actions either by using the Amazon Alexa app on your smart device or by visiting echo.amazon.com while logged into the Amazon account of the primary Echo user. For easier to read and larger screenshots we opted to use echo.amazon.com for the tutorial but the menu layout and function is identical.

To get started navigate to the menu by tapping the menu button on the Amazon Alexa app or simply loading the echo.amazon.com portal. Select “Settings” from the side menu and then select “Household Profile”.

You’ll be prompted with a summary of the Amazon Household system and asked if you want to continue. Select “Continue” once you’ve read over the summary.

Next you’ll be prompted to pass the device or computer to the other person, as seen above. Once you click “OK” they’ll need to input their Amazon login credentials to authorize their addition to your Amazon Echo.

After their credentials are verified they’ll be presented with a summary of the Amazon Echo/Alexa sharing experience that runs through everything that will be shared (music, audio books, calendars as well as joint-managed to-do and shopping lists). After reading over the summary and the information about Alexa voice processing and data collection, select “Join Household” to complete the process. You’ll see a confirmation process welcoming you to the household of the primary account holder.

Although it looks like you’re all done here, there’s one final step before the process is officially over. The user you just added to your Echo needs to either download and install the Amazon Alexa app on their smart device (a recommended step, regardless) or visit echo.amazon.com while logged into their Amazon account so that they may accept the terms and agreements of the Alexa voice assistant program. Until they agree to the user agreement their profile will not be accessible on the Echo and all profile-related commands will be met with a prompt for the user to go accept the terms of service.

Now that we’ve invited the user, set up the profile sharing, and accepted the terms of service, it’s time to take a look at how to actually use multiple profiles on the Echo.

Switching Between Profiles

Once you’ve completed all the steps in the previous section it’s easy to jump between profiles. When using commands related to the profile system you can use the word “account” or “profile” interchangeable as Alexa responds to both terms. We prefer using “profile” as it most naturally fits with the function of the profile system on the Echo.

First, if you’re not sure which profile you’re currently on you can say:

Alexa, whose profile is this?

In turn, you’ll get a response like “In Jason’s profile”. You can then switch between profiles one of two ways by saying:

Alexa, switch profiles.

Alexa, switch to [Name]’s profile.

If there are only two Amazon accounts links to the Echo then you can stick to “switch profiles”. If you have more than one account linked to the Echo then it is much faster to switch profiles by name like “switch to Steve’s profile”.

Once you’ve switched profiles you can use all the commands you would normally use when speaking with Alexa but the commands will have access to the content of the currently active profile. (Thus, if your spouse or roommate is the huge music fan who does all the music purchasing, you’d want to switch to their profile when using the Echo as a jukebox).

Removing A Profile From Your Amazon Echo

If a member leaves your household or you simply decide to remove them from the device for other reasons, doing so is easy. To remove a household member from your Amazon Echo simply open up the Amazon Alexa app or visit echo.amazon.com as we did in the first step.

There is one element to this process we want to emphasize: once you remove someone from your Amazon Household you cannot re-add them for 180 days. If you remove someone in error you’ll need to contact Amazon’s support center to get them put back onto the account as you will no longer be able to manually add them in.

With that in mind let’s take a look at removing someone (if you’re certain you wish to remove them).

When you return to the Settings section and scroll down to the location where we originally found “Household Profile” you’ll now find an entry that reads “In an Amazon household with [Name]”. Select that entry.

You’ll be prompted to reauthorize your Amazon credentials and then you’ll be presented with the screen above that allows you to select and then remove the other user.

In addition to removing users yourself the users you’ve added can also remove themselves by repeating the above steps. (So if you found this tutorial because you’re trying to remove yourself from your roommate’s Alexa-enabled device you can repeat the above steps an instead select “Leave” beside your name to initiate the removal process yourself.)

---

 

Have a pressing question about the Amazon Echo or the Alexa voice-assistant? Shoot us an email at ask@howtogeek.com and we’ll do our best to answer it.

[Read more]

Search Netflix, Hulu, Amazon & More With This One App | Dramel Notes

Those who have moved onto streaming services over cable TV are already reaping the benefits of cutting the cord, including on-demand media and reduced household expenses. It’s a great time to be alive.

However, there is one downside: when you’re subscribed to multiple services, it can be tough to know which services have which shows. Up until now, you had no choice but to open each app and search through each one individually.

All of that changes with the Yahoo Video Guide app, which is available on both Android and iOS.

The first time you launch the app, you get to pick which services you use, which Yahoo uses to list popular shows that are available to you. It’s a great way to find new shows to watch.

If you want to watch a particular show but aren’t sure if you can, just search for it. Titles from search results are tagged with the services they are available on, along with show synopses, IMDb and Rotten Tomato ratings, and episode guides.

There’s also a Mood Picker, which presents movies that you may want to watch based on your current mood. But the most impressive part is that the app supports 30+ streaming services.

Download Now: Android (Free) and iOS (Free).

Does this seem like something you’d like? Give it a try and tell us what you think of it!

Image Credit: Netflix Mobile by nevodka via Shutterstock

[Read more]

How to Block Users from Installing Software on Your Windows Computer | Dramel Notes

Whether you have a company network, or simply a computer used by various household members, it can be really annoying — or a huge security risk — if anyone is allowed to install software on the computer. All it takes is for one virus-ridden program to get onto a network-linked computer, and suddenly you will have multiple botnets chanting “Resistance is futile….prepare to be assimilated!” at anyone who tries to destroy it.

Another scenario where blocking software from being installed is essential is personal security. Imagine if somebody tried to install key-logging software on your computer to see what you have been typing, or to capture your login details for various sites? Pre-blocking new software from being installed will stop those attempts in their tracks.

Since the best treatment is prevention, we are going to take a look at some ways in which you can stop people from installing onlinesexystrippoker.exe. Trust me, you’ll thank me later.

Native Windows Solutions

The following methods look intimidating to anyone who dislikes fiddling around under the hood with their Windows setup. But quite honestly, it is really easy. Just follow along with me here. I won’t lead you astray.

Local Group Policy Editor

Go to your Start Menu and type in:

gpedit.msc

This brings up something called the Local Group Policy Editor. Now go to Computer Configurations > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Installer.

In the list in the right-hand window, scroll down until you find Turn off Windows Installer. The information window next to it will inform you that enabling this will “prevent users from installing software on their systems”. That’s the one we’re looking for.

When you double-click that option, another box will pop up, and you just have to choose Enabled, then press OK. All done. To reverse the process, just double-click the option again and choose “Disabled”.

Don’t Run Specified Windows Applications

Another way to block the Windows Installer from being used can be found in another area of the Local Group Policy Editor.

Go back to the main menu in the Policy Editor window, and now go to User Configuration > Administrative Templates > System. In the right-hand window which now appears with options, scroll down until you find Don’t Run Specified Windows Applications. As the title implies, this is used for blocking certain programs from being run, but we can also use it to block the Windows Installer.

Double-click that and another window appears. When you click Enabled, a new option appears called List of Disallowed Applications. Click Show and a third window appears where you type in the path of the program to be blocked.

Now note I said “path”. That means it is not sufficient to just say “Windows Installer”. You have to lay out the route to the location of the Windows Installer, so the Policy Editor can find it. The Windows Installer Program is called msiexec.exe and is located at:

C:WindowsSystem32msiexec.exe

Copy/paste that into the space provided in the box and click OK. The Windows Installer should now be blocked.

Restrict via the Registry Editor

Aaggh! The Registry! The one Windows word which is guaranteed to send shivers down peoples spines. Nobody likes going in here, as it’s got things going on that I can’t rightly explain. Things that go bump in the night, and all that.

But we need to embrace our fears, so hang on. We’ll get through this together.

The first step (after arming ourselves with crucifixes and garlic cloves) is to do the key combination Windows key + R. In the Run box, type:

regedit

This will bring up the Registry Editor. Calm down and stop screaming. It won’t bite you.

Now use your mouse to navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareClassesMsi.PackageDefaultIcon

In the right-hand window which now appears, you’ll see the path to the Windows Installer, with a zero on the end. That zero implies that the Installer is allowed. To disable the Installer, just click on that line, and in the box that now pops up, change that 0 to a 1. Save and close. Installer blocked.

Well done. You survived the Registry!

Software Options

I know there are other Windows options, such as elevated privileges or using the Local Security Policy. But I decided I would focus on the 3 easiest options instead, and not overload you. But if you still don’t feel comfortable messing around with your Windows settings, then another option would be to install software that gets the job done for you. Maybe it’s just me, but I find it ironic that you need to install software to block software!

Here are three options which I tried – one free and two paid (with free trial periods) – and which lock your system down tighter than a baby’s bottom.

WinGuard Pro

Plan: Paid, 30 Days Free Trial

From what I can see, WinGuard Pro is more geared towards locking down areas of the computer to other users. So for example, if you are the system administrator at work, you may want to block access to the Registry Editor by other users in the network. Or blocking “Programs & Features” would stop people from getting into the list of installed apps and uninstalling anything.

To block something, you would bring it up on the screen, then click Lock Program. A list of open apps will then appear in a box and you would choose the one you want locked. Obviously “Unlock Program” reverses that.

Install-Block

Plan: Paid, Free Trial Period

This stops anything from being installed by looking out for certain keywords in apps running on your system. So if someone tries to install something, and a keyword is noticed, Install-Block automatically blocks it from going any further.

So as you can see in the screenshot, keywords can include “install”, “setup” or “license agreement”. What other words could we add? “Terms & Conditions”, maybe? “Freeware”?

InstallGuard

Plan: Free

InstallGuard does its job really well — to the point where I couldn’t figure out how to shut it down and uninstall it afterwards! I finally figured out that you have to sign into the app with the administrator password, then click File >Exit. That shuts it down and you can then uninstall it if you want.

If you are looking for somethingreally effective that works right out of the box, this is the one. For me, it blocked EVERYTHING from being installed — and I was logged in as the administrator! You can’t argue with the price, either.

Deep Freeze

One final intriguing option is one proposed by Joe back in January, i.e. “deep freezing” your computer, which resets your system back to a previous state every time you reboot it. This way, any changes made to your computer will be wiped out when rebooted. So if someone dares to install something, it will be deleted when you switch the computer off.

The only downside to this of course is that it will also wipe out your changes. So it is not perfect.

Which Option Do You Prefer?

Let’s not forget that a Standard User account cannot install software without providing an administrator password. Hence the above options are best used to restrict your administrator account from accidents.

Which option would you prefer to use? Have you ever had to deal with someone installing something on your system without your permission?

[Read more]