There are wolves out there. Hacks, data thefts, leaks, annoying ads, viruses and other alarming news. I see also many people are angry with the behavior of internet sites, companies, blaming them for selling their data or leaking secrets, but most people doesn’t make anything about it.

I’m not a cyber-security-expert, so please make your own research before making important decisions. But am using computers since two decades and have the impression, computers are like a tropical garden: If you don’t take care of it, don’t cultivate it, if you don’t weed out the malevolent plants and close out or kill beasts, you will have a dangerous jungle at home.

I think the methods on my list won’t protect you from the CIA, but why should you be worried about this organization? But possibly you can be protected from hobby-hackers, angry ex-boyfriends or girlfriends, data miners, some malware programs, copyright–owners or your own internet-provider.

0. Virus scanner, firewall

I put this to number zero, because on new versions of Windows these services are free and are switched on by default. But if you have other or older operating system, or you disconnected this services earlier, check it and connect/install it again. They are very important.

1. Check All your settings

People are complaining about security of Facebook or other social media sites, but often doing nothing, not even the obvious. Simply use the explications, help, FAQ of the sites and your common sense. Or, look in your search engine, like Google, which settings you can change to have more safety and privacy.
Also check your browser settings, Google privacy settings – and Windows settings. I was, for example, outrageous as Windows automatically showed a bunch of my photos at the startup screen on a conference.

2. Use secure passwords

Always, every time, on all places experts are saying: use strong passwords. And which are the most frequent ones? “Me12345”, “Pass12345” and so on.

3. Set up two factor authentication

Avoid to be hacked, or recover your account. If a password is stolen, your phone can save your… mass. But think about all possible cases, threats: what if you loose your phone, in first place. How can you recover your system? Mostly you have to use two different medium. Like your phone (SMS, Google Authenticator etc.) and your brain (strong password).

4. Clean up!

You may need regular cleaning to make your computer faster, but also to avoid data leaks, spying. A possible intruder will find less data (logs, browsing history) if you clean up. You can make many cleaning steps also manually, but special software is more comfortable and useful.
I recommend Glary Utilities, this one also searches for spyware and has other useful tools. Many people are using CCleaner.

5. Always use VPN?

Or always, if you can. VPN is a service which helps you to remain anonymous on internet. You will surf through remote servers, and the visited websites and other services can only see this remote, not your own machine. Unfortunately, free services are slowed down or limited in data, or showing ads. I myself invested about 70 USD for two years to walk in safety, and I feel much better.

A different opinion:

VPN providers control your traffic, they can inspect it, modify it, log it … The paid-for services are better for privacy than free services, which often monetize your traffic by serving you trackable ads.
If you need anonymity and privacy, your best bet is to instead use Tor -- which is free.
Zdnet

Free or partially free services I tried: Opera Browser’s build in VPN, Proton VPN, Tor Browser. Always read the FAQ or instructions, some movements, like opening certain files or programs, can reveal your real identity.
(On Android Phone, Proton VPN seems to be very useful.)

6. Encrypt the hot stuff

Do you have a lot of pirated stuff or porn on your machine? May be you made your little own home made movies? Or have some other sensible data? I have encrypted one of my disk drives with Veracrypt, so if I loose my computer, or somebody in my work touches it when I go lunch, probably no data will ever get stolen. I use this drive only when needed, in greater part of the day it is inaccessible.

7. More secure e-mails

Don’t use your work mail or family inbox to register on the sex dating site, don’t leak informations to the press from your regular mail, and don’t give your mail to possible spammers, data miners. Use secure or throwaway mails instead. Tutanota? ProtonMail?
Mostly you can register a new e-mail with an old one, so you can build a long chain of e-mail addresses, opening one with the other. I’m wondering if somebody can reveal your real identity demanding data from eight e-mail-providers in four-five different countries. (If you are using VPN, also.)

8. Switch to a secure chat system

Signal or Telegram, maybe? The difficult thing is that you need to convince your friends, family, coworkers, too.

9. Virtual machine?

If you need even more anonymity, or are regularly visiting the Dark Web for some reason, may be you need a full virtual machine (like VirtualBox from Oracle), and a separate, isolated operating system. Even better if this system was made to improve privacy, guard secrets, remain anonymous. Like Tails or Whonix. Allegedly Edward Snowden used Tails, also. I’m making my first steps with Tails now.

(Cover photo: Pixabay)