The Tor Browser

The book I read to research this post was Online Privacy An Introduction by William Rowley which is an excellent e-book that I read at Kindle Unlimited. This book is mostly about The Tor Browser and accessing the darknet. The darknet is a rather seedy version of the internet I think only accessible with Tor that isn’t indexed by the major search engines. Domain names are random series of letters and numbers and sites are things like drug dealing e-commerce ones, guns for hire and some unregulated polical ones. It is like a version of the internet rather like the wild west depicted in westerns. The Tor Browser developed by the US Navy and described as like as like a series of onion rings with many layers of encryption and security does the job it is meant to do extremely well. It can’t have it cover of many voluntarily IP addressed of which there are hundreds and the route to your computer is routed through these penetrated in any way other than susceptible software on your computer that can maybe expose your identity. Tor is based on Firefox another more commonly used browser and Tor has other layers of securiy like the ability to use multiple identities. If you go on many many mainstream sites like Twitter and Facebook they are sometimes able to interogate it and despite it not being used to access those sites find out all sorts of information. I don’t think I personally would have any need for Tor as it is very clandestine but this remains an interesting book. The book is only short at around 35 pages. I did enjoy reading it and do recommend it.

Amazon Kindle Fire TV Stick

The book I read to research this post was Amazon Fire TV Stick User Guide by Tom Edwards et al which is a very good book that I read at Kindle Unlimited. The Fire TV Stick is a TV streaming stick that competes directly with the Roku and Chromecast in doing a simlar job on a wireless network. They stream television via a router and go in the HDMI connection. There are quite a lot of websites like for example Hula that stream video and audio content that is then streamed to the Fire Stick. There is also a souped up larger device called the Amazon Fire and both devices take apps that can be downloaded and run on them. These devices are in that respect almost like game consoles. I think this book is on a fascinating topic and there are other good books about it too. I did buy a Fire TV Stick at one stage and then upgraded to a Fire TV at a later date. I think the Fire TV although more expensive is better value for money and has much geater capabilities.  This book is around 65 pages so is fairly short. I enjoyed reading it and do recommend it. This book is part of a series on similar products also like the Apple TV. It does do a decent job of covering the features on this device.

Scrivener

The book I read to research this post was Scrivener Essentials by Karen Prince which is a very good book that I read at kindle unlimited. This book is a low cost desktop publishing software available over the internet. You can publish kindle e-books as well as adobe digital edition ones. To do kindle ones in epub format you need to download kindle keygen and kindle preview. The former lets you create e-books in that format and the latter lets you preview them prior to uploading them to the kindle site. There is also a plug in you can download to publish in digital editions. Bear in mind Amazon likes you to publish e-books exclusively to their site. There is a corkboard feature to brainstorm ideas for your novel. It has several pages displayed on what looks like a virtual board hence the name. There is a novel feature for actually working on your book. Scrivener is around 40 pounds but comes with a 30 day evaluation version that actually has the days spread out actually spend working on your novel. The text to this book is somewhat small and it is only a basic guide. I enjoyed reading the e-book nonetheless and do recommend it.

Transferring Video

The book I read to research this post was Video Transfer by Jean Culler which is a very good book that I downloaded for free from kindle. This book is only around 25 pages so is quite short. It looks at the different formats and mediums of video and how to transfer it to a medium like DVD-R via a computer. For something like Blu-ray or DVD you simply a compatible writer and a computer with special writing software. On a medium like any kind of celluliod like 8 or 16 mm you need a compatible scanning device. In the case of 35 mm film you often get a scanner with an adaptor that is compatible with these. At one time a lot of film scanners unless you purchased a high end product used to give blurred results but they have come along in leaps and bounds. If you are using celluloid you need a commutated hard drive and ideally for any kind of video transfer it needs a substantial spare capacity available. Normally when transferring video you will convert it to either MPEG-2 or AVI. You also have to watch the file sizes usually if it is going to DVD-R it is upto 4.7 GB and if it is Blu-ray upto 25 GB. I did quite enjoy this book and although I think it could have done with being a bit longer do recommend it.

 

Computer Scams, Shams and Spam

The book I read to research this post was Computer Scams, Shams & Spam by Pam Hogan which is an excellent book that I read at kindle unlimited. This book is about the various online hoaxes and frauds tricksters use to get money from you. One thing you should watch is if someoe asks you to wire money or send cash as these aren’t secure methods of payment. One type of fraud is someone phones or e-mails you and supposedly verifies some of your information which they have got from dumpster diving or going through your litter. They may quote information like your account number which they saw on your bank statement and claim they are from the bank or some official agency. They then ask for the security code off the back of your credit card. This information of course lets them take money from your bank account and isn’t displayed on your bank statement. No one official would ever ask for this information and this does happen it is best to contact your bank and law enforcement. Another scheme called the Nigerian letter is someone asks if they can launder money in your bank account and will give you a share of the proceeds. Sometimes someone doing this will give a hard luck story and claim to be in trouble. This invariably continues with them asking you for your bank details so they can pilfer your account and they will often try to get you to wire them a certain fee. They may even ask you to travel to an African country to meet them. Laundering money in itself is highly illegal. If you get an e-mail like this don’t even answer it as it will verify your e-mail address. This book looks at a variety of scams like this and is a reasonable length at around 120 pages. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. It’s a real eye openner and do recommend it.

Internet Security Practices

The book I read to research this post was Internet Security Practices To Secure Yourself by Wycliffe Maina which is a very good book that I downloaded for free from kindle. This book is a bit of an eye opener about how others can gain access to your passwords and potentially your internet accounts. One thing you should do if others use the same machine have separate user accounts. One thing someone can do is go into the internet browser, right click and choose inspect elements. This then lists everything you have typed including log in names and passwords. If you have Windows 8 use the onscreen keyboard at least for confidential information like passwords as another thing someone can do is put a key logger on your computer which can be software or a device that records every key stroke on the keyboard. With any kind of computing device including smartphones and tablets you should regularly download updates and should have the latest version of the operating system. With Android that is version 5 with iOS it is version 8. In many of these operating systems there are errors not sorted out at they are released and things that can be exploited that hackers prey on. This book is only short around 15 pages. I enjoyed reading it and I would recommend perhaps as long as it is free though.

 

Technology Assisted Research

The book I read to research this post was Insider’s Guide To Technology Assisted Research by Ernst & Young which is a very good book that I bought from kindle. This book is mainly reviewing the many messages and e-mails on various devices for legal purposes. It is mainly done from the American legal system point of view. It is around 100 pages so is reasonably short. I think this book is written by a company that specializes in this field. In another book I read that the potential use and number of devices needing to be checked is hugely overstretching the resources available. In many items which might disprove or prove a case or even lead to other prosecutions go unchecked. If you just think of the number of e-mails which are on a typical account and the potential cost of checking which if it is only a minor offence someone is accused of it isn’t worth it. In many cases keyword searches are done to keep costs down which as both agree is a good compromise. The methods used in retrieving data unless the defense think something is wrong often aren’t examined in a lot of detail in court. There is also the hassle especially in corporate cases that things like e-mail might need to be translated. If it say french or german the cost of getting a legal person who is fluent in this is relatively low and they are relatively plentiful. A problem comes say if the language is Japanese which is fairly commonly used but a legal translator is harder to find hence more expensive. This is an interesting book and I do recommend. I find digital forensics in general quite interesting although I know a lot of people would find it boring.

 

Writing About Food

The book I read to research this post was How To Write About Food by SJ Sebellin-Ross which is a very good book that I bought from kindle. This book is written by a published food writer and critic and covers the whole gamut of food writing from blogging to writing articles for food publications. One thing SJ stresses is you should always be paid for any writing you do after all they pay the janitor. People in the know are aware that when writing for a publication you sell the idea to the editor then write the article not the other way around. For all you know the editor might have certain requirements and ideas for the article which you might have to follow. Especially for a larger article you must plan what you are going to write which means jotting down some notes. You should also summarize in one sentence what the article is about. If you need experts to interview there is http://expertclick.com where they have a database of experts in any given field. Alternatively you can do a search in Google. This book is around 100 pages so is fairly short. If you have a blog you should look for an angle like local restaurant reviews or indian cuisine that you are going to write about. This will help attract people to your blog as they will hopefully see you as an expert in a niche field although don’t pick so narrow a niche you have trouble finding what to write. Ideally if you are doing any writing on food you are best off finding a niche you can become an expert in. I did thoroughly enjoy reading this book and would recommend it.

Hacking Basics

The book I read to research this post was The Hacker’s Underground Handbook which is a very good book that I read at kindle unlimited. This is a kind of general guide to hacking and I think is mainly aimed at people like pen testers or white hat crackers. It does detail how to get started in the field of hacking. You should aspire to become an elite hacker with programming knowledge and maybe even write your own hacking tools. The first programming language you should learn and it is one of the easier ones is HTML. Then you should move on to learning C which is what most tools are written in. You should aim to master the latest version of Windows and he recommends Ubuntu Linux as a good entry level version of Linux. It is user friendly and the vast majority of linux programs work quite happily with it. Often you will run Linux from a live cd which is what we call it when it isn’t installed on the hard drive and computer runs it directly from a cd in a virtual environment. Note you may have to change the boot order in your set up program to make this work. Many hacking programs are Linux only. You should also choose a program from each potential use you will have in hacking and focus on mastering it. You might use Wireshark for checking security on your wireless network. John the Ripper for testing the security of passwords etc. I did quite enjoy this book and do recommend it.

 

3D Printing

The book I read to research this post was 3d Printing For Dummies by Kalani Kirk Hausman which is a very good book that I bought from kindle. This is the best book I have read about 3d printing although a lot of the information is very technical. Many of these devices have proprietary cartridges which makes the 3d printer cheaper initially but limits what materials you can use to manufacture something. Also often the cartridges are more expensive. An example of these proprietary printers is the Cubify sold in Staples stores. Better devices are the Reprap standard where you can often buy part of it in kit form particularly the circuit board and parts can be printed on a 3d printer. These are an open standard giving a wide range of materials that can potentially be used. There is even glow in the dark plastic and silver. Many companies are offering products that can be manufactured. There is even detailed models scaled to less than a millimetre across. Having items you can manufacture yourself makes a lot of sense because if a company manufactures something thereself they can always end up with a surplus they can’t sell or if they bring out a new model often the spare parts to the old models become out of date. In this way you are just printing what you use. They can also charge you a commision for them for printing it out. The costume Robert Downey Jr wore in Iron Man was manufactured on a 3d printer. It is set to trigger a revolution of which we are still in the early stages of which will displace most manufacturing. There are open source programs like TinkerCAD  that can be used to design something. That program is particularly popular because it’s free and easy to use. If you are interested in building a Reprap 3d printer Rambo make the one type of circuit board and were foremerly called Ramp Electronics. This book is around 390 pages so is a decent length. I very much enjoyed reading it and would definitely recommend it.