Online Self Defense

When most people think of self-defense they think of prevention and physical self defense in the "real world". Not only do people want to protect themselves, their family, and friends, but also their possessions, their money, etc. These days with so much of life and work involving computers and the internet, the idea of self-defense needs to be expanded to the “virtual world”. A cyber attacker/hacker can often do more damage to you than someone who physically robs you, by stealing sensitive business information, financial information, or learning a great deal about you and using that knowledge to effectively scam you or your family and friends.

When you visit a website, everything you do is often recorded by that website, including how you got to the site. Additionally, hackers will put up dummy sites or hidden code on legitimate sites in order to install programs on your computer that will pull your web history at a minimum, give them the ability to remotely control and access anything on your computer, record all your keystrokes, etc. The best attack is one that does not disrupt your activities, one that you never even know occurred…until your bank account is drained or worse.

Not only are your online activities exploitable by common criminals, but also by companies and governments. EVERYTHING you do online is recorded by your ISP (internet service provider), not only the sites you visit and what you download, but also every email you write. Governments can often get this data from ISPs, as can hackers. There have also been instances of ISPs selling this data to companies who wish to better target you for advertising. Additionally, if you use services such as Gmail, your outgoing and incoming emails are being copied and stored even after you delete them.

Aside from online information storage, sniffing, and theft, TSA and other government officials now have the right to take your computer at random, and keep it as long as they want to examine it. This has happened numerous times as people fly in and out of the country.

Whether you live in a country that may prosecute you for being outspoken, you don't want your ISP or companies like Google copying and potentially selling your personal data, or you don't want to be the victim of identity theft, if you're reading this, online self defense is something you should practice.

What You Can Do

How You Can Do It

First, make sure you have up to date anti-virus software and a firewall that's on. Then, start using the following:

Firefox & Browser Extensions:

The first thing you should do is download the Firefox Browser. It's faster, more functional, and safer than Internet Explorer or Safari. Once you've got Firefox you can add on the extensions below. They'll help to stop people from getting into your computer, tracking you on the web, stealing your identity, etc.:

Safe Cache automatically protects your browser's stored files from being collected by websites you visit.

Safe History automatically protects your browser's history from being collected by websites you visit.

QuickJava adds two buttons to the bottom of your broswer that allow you to turn off java script operations. You can turn them on and off as neccessary. Hackers and website analytics programs very often use javascript operations to access your data or track your activities. However, it's also used for many legitimate purposes.

FlashBlock prevents Flash operations unless you click to authorize them.

*RefControl allows you to control the referral data you send to websites you visit, so they won't know where you came from. You can also make them think you came from any custom site you want, like www.KissMyAss.com, or some such fake referrer.

*TrackMeNot allows you to hide your search patterns in a fog of BS. Search engines keep a record of everything you search for. This extension will do random searches on Google, Live, and Yahoo, as many as you like per hour. The only catch is that these searches do not result in "clicks" on the results pages. In order not to have your clicked results stand out, you can simply copy the URLs of pages you want to visit in a new browser tab or window.

*Tor allows you to browse the internet from proxy servers (as if you were browsing from other computers rather than your own). This has got to be one of the best extensions ever.

Encryption Methods, Files, and Tools

Email Encryption

If you don't want your emails copied and saved, or intercepted and used against you, do the following (it's free and only takes about 10 minutes):

Thunderbird

Click Here

Enigmail

File and/or Desktop Encryption

If you want more protection against people (hackers, burglers, airport security, etc.) getting into your computer and accessing important files and information, you should encrypt your important files. This can be done with paid or free software.

PGP Corporation makes a suite that encrypts emails (but your friends/recipients must also have it) and files, and also comes with a "shredder" to totally erase and destroy files you want to delete, for about $100.

TrueCrypt is a free open source file/folder/computer encryption program that is effective and easy to use. Not only can you encrypt portions of your computer, but you can also encrypt a portion within a portion. If you were forced to give up your password, you could give up the password that opens the outer portion. It would be impossible for anyone to know that there is another password that opens another hidden portion within the outer one...an excellent feature.

Stay tuned for more to come...