Tag Archives: Privacy

How to fill storage space on an iPhone or iPad with little effort

Posted on December 3, 2020 by steveshomelab

Before I sell-on my old gadgets, I always try to do a factory reset and erase all data. I want to make it as difficult as I can for future owners to recover my personal data. As an additional step, … Continue reading →

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Deactivating Facebook Messenger

Posted on April 12, 2018 by steveshomelab

Today I deactivated my Facebook account, including Messenger. According to Facebook’s instructions, I needed to first deactivate my Facebook account, then deactivate Messenger. Deactivating Facebook was easy, but then I tried to follow the instructions to deactivate Messenger: Unfortunately, there … Continue reading →

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IOS Speed Dial – .tel.qlnk.net – avoid!

Posted on December 21, 2016 by steveshomelab

Last night I was looking into how one might go about adding a ‘speed dial’ contact shortcut to the home screen on an iPhone. According to my Googling efforts, a commonly-proposed solution is to browse to 1111111111111.tel.qlnk.net in safari and … Continue reading →

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NordVPN – HM Customs and Excise HQ network???

Posted on February 14, 2016 by steveshomelab

I live in the UK, and I’ve just connected to one of NordVPN‘s OpenVPN servers in France. The NordVPN site (see screenshot above) is supposed to show me that I am connecting via an ISP used by the VPN server I’m … Continue reading →

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Patreon hack email

Posted on November 21, 2015 by steveshomelab

I was wondering when I was going to see fallout from the Patreon hack. Just received this email – thanks Patreon! Unfortunately your data was leaked in the recent hacking of the Patreon web site and I now have your … Continue reading →

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Selling on a games console without selling on your data – Xbox 360 & DBAN

Posted on November 18, 2015 by steveshomelab

After reading an article highlighting that personal data may be recoverable on console hard disk drives even after a factory reset, I took the precaution of running DBAN on my Xbox 360 drive before selling the console, as per the recommendation on various … Continue reading →

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Selling your OpenPeak O2 Joggler?

Posted on May 5, 2015 by steveshomelab

I’ve had a lot of fun with my Joggler, but it was time time to move on so I decided to sell it. I followed standard procedure and did a factory reset to clear all my personal data, but just … Continue reading →

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Selling a networked device without selling your data

Posted on January 19, 2014 by steveshomelab

I recently wrote about repairing an internet radio that had a corrupted configuration, and managed to wipe the config and get it working again like new. During my investigations, I noticed something of interest to the security-conscious. Even after a … Continue reading →

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Stalking and social engineering with last.fm

Posted on April 27, 2013 by steveshomelab

I’ve been logging my music listening habits (or scrobbling, as it’s called) to last.fm for many years, and enjoy the value that this service brings in the form of suggestions for new music to check out. My friends can also … Continue reading →

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Why do so many sites ignore basic security (Jamendo)?

Posted on September 18, 2012 by steveshomelab

I did a bit of research recently to find a site to make some of my own music easily available under a Creative Commons license. Jamendo seemed to be an excellent choice, so I went ahead with the signing-up process. … Continue reading →

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