Lockdown: How to secure your PC without going crazy

October 04, 2013

Good digital security inevitably requires some hassle, but the size of that headache is really up to you. If you’re someone who wants to go all out with 64-character passwords, no Facebook account, and a second laptop that never connects to the Internet, because it houses all your deep, dark secrets, well, this guide is not for you. This is a guide for practical folks. People who want a healthy amount of PC security (perhaps motivated by ongoing revelations about the National Security Agency and its surveillance activities), but with a minimum of hassles such as dealing with key fobs for two-factor authentication, juggling complicated passwords, and setting up email encryption. We can’t promise you a completely pain-free experience, but we will show you how to get up and running with a pretty good security setup that keeps your passwords, email, hard drive and sensitive USB drives as secure as possible without going overboard. A strong password is the first, best line of defense Good computer security and privacy begins with strong passwords. Sure, there are serious criticisms about how online services use passwords, and Apple may be trying to take biometrics mainstream with TouchID on the iPhone 5s, but for now passwords are still the best solution we have for keeping third parties away from our data. KeePass is a great, free option for desktop-based password management. The problem with passwords is that they should really be random, unique, and relatively long to be of any use. That’s where password managers come in: These programs help you generate random passwords and store them securely, allowing you to remember just a handful of gnarly 10-character random passphrases instead of 15 or 20. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Link: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2051350/lockdown-how-to-secure-your-pc-without-going-crazy.html#tk.rss_howto