Big Tech is definitely listening to us

I was having a chat on Skype the other day, and much to my surprise, a topic we were discussing popped up on my very next Internet search. Purely a coincidence you might think, but I somehow doubt that. My suspicions were increased after stumbling on the following YouTube video from Mitchollow who does a live demonstration of what I experienced the other day. Which reinforces my belief that we all need to be extra careful about what we discuss or wish for, when around Internet connected devices that have microphones on them.

How to stop Windows spying on you

Yep, Windows collects data about you and sends it off to a number of external servers. Surprise, surprise. Disappointing but true. The following YouTube video from The PC Security Channel will show you how to thwart Microsoft efforts.

I’ll include a link here to the original YouTube posting, that shows the text in the description of the video, that is required to be added to your Windows Hosts file on your computer. This will enable you to simply edit, cut and paste; to both save time typing, plus eliminate any mis-typing. I have noticed however that the msn.com site accessed from the Windows Taskbar will no longer work after implementing the above (which makes me wonder just how much data Microsoft has garnered from me already!!).

Like to use your TV for FaceTiming?

The SlashGear.com guys have published an article explaining how you can use your iPhone or iPad, and your Apple TV to FaceTime using your TV screen. This will be great for when you are FaceTiming with a group or simply want to use the larger format of a TV screen. Discover more in their article here.

Want to edit and manipulate PDF documents?

Nowadays we all work with PDF documents. They are the most common way of providing detailed User Manual documentation. Now ONLYOFFICE has a built in editor that will enable you to edit and manipulate these PDF documents. ONLYOFFICE is a free MS Office alternative (see one of my earlier posts here). Read all about this PDF editor’s capabilities in an article by the MakeUseOf guys here.

Running your home network from a mobile phone

My office seems to be located in a high lightning strike area, and as a consequence we have been through 4 modems in just over 12 months. Each time this happens we spend days (or over a week as I write this) without Internet access.  I recently discovered the following YouTube video from a chap with a channel called Network Advisor, who has discovered how to tether his mobile phone to a modem, which then provides Internet access for devices in his house.  I had an old modem and I’m currently using this method with my Samsung mobile phone to provide Internet and Wi-Fi access for all the devices in my house, while I wait for a replacement modem to be delivered.  It works and I don’t know why I haven’t done this sooner!!

Travel the world with your smart phone and an eSIM

In the past we either had to pay exorbitant data roaming fees to use our mobile phone overseas, or suffer the inconvenience of purchasing a separate SIM card for each of the countries we visited.  Luckily modern smart phones now have the ability to use a virtual SIM card known as an eSIM.  I’ve posted about eSIMs before – just enter eSIM into the Search field to find those articles.  We still need to acquire an eSIM for each country that we intend to visit, however we won’t have the inconvenience of having to physically swap SIM cards, plus we can continue to use our existing SIM at the same time as the eSIM. Read more about how to use eSIM and the companies that support them in the Android Police article here. The article talks about Android phones, but is equally relevant to other phones. There are some eSIM companies that offer a single eSIM that cover multiple countries in Europe, making the process of travelling between them even easier.  You might find the following YouTube video useful as it compares many of the popular eSIMs available today.

Is your Wi-Fi running slow?

There are many things that can impact your home Wi-Fi performance, and I have previously written a self-help document in the Resources section of this web page to assist with boosting your Wi-Fi speeds and explaining why it is so important to use only the 2.4 Ghz band channels 1, 6, and 11. Then today I discovered a great article from MetaGeek that goes into far more depth about a whole raft of Wi-Fi topics. Discover more here.