3 Common Valentine’s Day scams (and how to avoid them)

3 Common Valentine’s Day scams (and how to avoid them)

It’s almost Valentine’s Day … but Cupid isn’t the only one looking for targets. Every year, hackers and scammers take advantage of people’s emotions around this holiday and do serious financial and psychological damage.

February 10, 2020 • 5 min read
The SecureMac Interview: Voatz on mobile voting

The SecureMac Interview: Voatz on mobile voting

Voatz is a privately-owned mobile voting platform backed by blockchain technology. The company began somewhat spontaneously — founder Nimit Sawhney built the prototype on a whim during a SXSW hackathon — but has since grown into a full-fledged mobile voting company, operating public and private elections around the country and attracting millions of dollars in funding from investors.

We sat down with the team at Voatz to discuss their platform, and to get their take on the larger issues surrounding technology and democracy.

Free and fair elections …

February 9, 2020 • 16 min read
8 Tips to Keep your iPhone Healthy and Safe

8 Tips to Keep your iPhone Healthy and Safe

Your iPhone is a marvel of engineering: slick, powerful, and easy to use. But it’s also a complex device, with lots of little-known features — and it’s not immune to security issues. Here are 8 tips to help you get more out of your iPhone, and to keep it running smoothly and safely for years to come.

January 31, 2020 • 8 min read
Apple Updates macOS, iOS, and more

Apple Updates macOS, iOS, and more

Apple has released updated versions of its major operating systems, with some important bug fixes and security patches. In this brief article, we’ll take you through the highlights of the release notes and let you know what they mean.

January 30, 2020 • 4 min read
Checklist 172: A Ring of Trouble

Checklist 172: A Ring of Trouble

On this week’s Checklist, we’ll revisit the issues with Amazon’s Ring, take another look at iCloud backups, and hit the highlights from Apple’s latest round of OS updates.

January 30, 2020 • 7 min read
6 Things to Know about Open Firmware Password Protection

6 Things to Know about Open Firmware Password Protection

Macs are very safe computers, but they’re not immune to attacks — or to theft. Luckily, your Mac has some hidden features that can be enabled for extra security. One of these is Open Firmware Password Protection. Here’s what you need to know about it.

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January 29, 2020 • 5 min read
Apple and the FBI

Apple and the FBI

The government wants Apple to unlock a terrorist’s iPhone. Are they asking the impossible?

In the wake of the December terrorist attack at Naval Air Station Pensacola, in which three service members lost their lives, the federal government has renewed calls for Apple to provide a “backdoor” by which authorities can bypass the encryption on iPhones.

In this brief article, we’ll look at the background to this most recent clash between Apple and the U.S. Department of Justice, and we’ll examine the issue from a technical perspective as …

January 23, 2020 • 8 min read
Checklist 171: Here, FIDO!

Checklist 171: Here, FIDO!

On this week’s Checklist, we’ll see how private your iCloud backups really are; we’ll examine the strange story of how the richest person in the world got hacked; and finally, we’ll look at a technology that promises a better way to do 2FA.

This week on the Checklist:

Considering iCloud and end-to-end encryptionA WhatsApp bromance gone badIf you’ve got an iPhone, here’s FIDO!

 
What happens in your iCloud…

We’ve known for a while that iCloud backup data isn’t protected by end-to-end encryption — meaning that encryption keys aren’t stored only on the user’s device, …

January 23, 2020 • 10 min read