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Saturday, February 19, 2011 - Bosque Birdwatchers RV Park, San Antonio NM

Thank You Thank You, iPhone, iPod touch, iPad Lockscreen, February 19, 2011
Thank You Thank You, iPhone, iPod touch, iPad Lockscreen, February 19, 2011

Address book security

Last week I took a ride up to Albuquerque to pick up a Verizon iPhone (a whole 'nother story) and while playing with it and searching the net for tips and tricks I came across mention of a rather serious security issue losing an unlocked smart phone presents. One's entire address book is usually synced to these devices making the whole shebang available to whoever steals or finds the phone. We've all been trained by now to be alert to Pfishing scams but I'd wager if you get an email from me you'll open it without giving it a second thought & bingo! A nice fat address book is worth stealing.

It was suggested that a phone access passcode be set to at least slow the scammers down and give one time to do a remote wipe via MobileMe (in the case of the iPhone). But that leaves the good samaritan who finds the phone no way to get in to identify the owner and return it. It was suggested that a lockscreen photo with simple contact info would offer a way around this problem.

It dawned on me that my address book is on my iPod touch and iPad as well and I've never passcode locked them. They are locked now. Plus I use 1Password apps to securely store my passwords.

I wonder how many devices out there have MY contact info on them....

Night camp

Site 10 - Bosque Bird Watcher's RV Park, San Antonio NM

Beware of Hypnotic Media

To live sanely in Los Angeles (or, I suppose, in any other large American city) you have to cultivate the art of staying awake. You must learn to resist (firmly but not tensely) the unceasing hypnotic suggestions of the radio, the billboards, the movies and the newspapers; those demon voices which are forever whispering in your ear what you should desire, what you should fear, what you should wear and eat and drink and enjoy, what you should think and do and be. They have planned a life for you — from the cradle to the grave and beyond — which it would be easy, fatally easy!, to accept. The least wandering of the attention, the least relaxation of your awareness, and already the eyelids begin to droop, the eyes grow vacant, the body starts to move in obedience to the hypnotist’s command. Wake up, wake up — before you sign that seven-year contract, buy that house you don’t really want, marry that girl you secretly despise. Don’t reach for the whiskey, that won’t help you. You’ve got to think, to discriminate, to exercise your own free will and judgment. And you must do this, I repeat, without tension, quite rationally and calmly. For if you give way to fury against the hypnotists, if you smash the radio and tear the newspapers to shreds, you will only rush to the other extreme and fossilize into defiant eccentricity.

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