Warning: We believe your account was recently accessed from Canada (IP address).

I use a Google Apps account as my work email and the first thing I did after seeing this message was to change the password of my email account from Google Apps email management panel. The security of an email account is critical because this email address is tied with majority of my online accounts which includes Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites.

Imagine the situation when someone else gets access to your email inbox and downloads all email messages using POP /IMAP. That would mean disaster because the hacker would then be able to read all your archived email conversations and may leak out confidential data anytime.

Since this email is hosted on Google Apps, I was in a way sure that this is not the case of any human being accessing my Gmail inbox from another computer. I said “sure” because of the following reasons:

1. Google Apps users can never change their email password on their own. They must contact the domain administrator and get the email account password reset.

2. My Gmail address is not the domain administrator for this domain. I use a separate username as domain administrator and I never use that email address in any other website  – it’s just made for the purpose of managing this domain and nothing else.

3. I never use someone else’s computer for checking email and neither I remember any username or passwords in my head. I don’t even save passwords in my browser, so chances of getting hacked by a keylogger program or someone sniffing my Gmail account username and password through the network is ruled out. This is because I never type the passwords in the first place, my password manager performs an autotype which cannot be tracked by any third party malicious software.

Be A Detective – Find Who Is Accessing Your Gmail Account

Before finding out the reason of third party activity on your Gmail account, be sure to take the following measures:

1. Reset your Gmail account password immediately.

2. Open your Gmail inbox, scroll to the bottom and click the “Details” link at the bottom of the page. This will open a new browser window with a list of IP addresses and computers that have recently accessed your Gmail account. Click “Signout of all other sessions” to ensure that no one else is logged into your Gmail account from any other computer. [#]

3. Go to Gmail settings > Filters and look for any suspicious filters being added to your Gmail account. Do not ignore this step because some Gmail filters may forward email to another account or trash them without your consent.

After doing all the above steps, you are sure that no one else has access to your Gmail account and it is safe from potential hackers and data theft. But my case was a little different.

I was again shown the same notification when I logged into my Gmail account this morning. This is highly suspicious!

Find Third Party Websites That Have Access To Your Gmail Account

There is one thing I missed – third party sites whom I have authorized to access data from my Google account.

There are a lot of websites who support creating an account with them using your Google account or with another service provider that supports open ID. I prefer creating accounts with OPENID as I don’t have to receive email notifications and neither I have to create another set of username and passwords.

Now the problem is that when these companies switch hosts or they are acquired by another company – they begin a new verification system for all their users. Either the domain name of the company had changed or they have migrated hosts, which may be one of the reasons why I was continuously getting the Gmail notification –“Your account is being accessed from another computer”

To find which websites are authorized to access your Gmail account, follow these simple steps:

1. Login to your Google account and click your username  at the top right corner of the page. Then select “Account settings”

2. In the next page, click on “authorizing applications and sites” under personal settings.

3. Find the list of sites that are authorized to access your Gmail account. See whether these were the same sites whom you have authorized and if you find any site whom you haven’t authorized, click “Revoke access”

It is very much possible that the website with whom you had registered an account at an earlier point of time has been bought by another company and the new system has started account verification on all user accounts registered with them.

When you revoke the third party access, your account will be destroyed at that website so you should backup important stuff or change user account credentials at the third party site before revoking third party access from your Gmail.

Related: Gmail security checklist

Find Websites That Are Authorized to Access your Gmail Or Google Account originally published on Ampercent

Sure, you can set up a secondary email address or add a mobile number to your Google account for recovering passwords, in case you forget it. But if someone else manages to guess your Gmail account password and successfully logs into your Google account, the first thing he would be doing is replace your recovery email with one of his own email address and remove the phone number from your Google account settings.

Result: You lose your Google account. Forever !

“But how on earth will someone guess my Gmail account password ? I use a 12 digit alphanumeric password which is diffcult to remember and very complex at the same time.”

There are situations when a third party web surfer can guess your Gmail or Google account credentials. Examples:

1. You are checking email from a shared computer but don’t know that the administrator has secretly installed a keylogger script. Someone may be tracking those keystrokes from that public computer and this is one of the reasons why I never check email from any computer which I don’t own.  Some more tips on protecting yourself from Keylogger programs

2. You are surfing the web on a not no secured Wi-fi connection and someone used malicious add-ons like Firesheep to sniff your login data. Here is how to protect your online accounts from password sniffing.

3. You regularly check your email from office and one of your colleagues might get a sneak peak while you’re typing that password.

4. You use the same common passwords across all the sites, and most of the passwords are so common that they are easily guessable

The Idea Behind Google’s Two Step Authentication System

Earlier today, Google added an extra layer of security for your Google account, announcing the introduction of two factor authentication system for advanced Gmail sign in security. The new verficiatin system makes your Google account more secure by requiring two independent parameters for account authentication.

A similar authentication system can be seen for online banking accounts, where users need to type their passwrd along with a unique code sent directly to your mobile phone. The idea is simple – if someone manages to guess or crack your password, he won’t login unless he enters the second verification code sent to your mobile. The only annyance is that you will have to spend some more time with logging in and verify your identity by entering the verification code sent to your mobile.

How To Setup Google Two Step Authentication System

Here is how to setup Google’s Two factor authentication system and secure your Gmail and Google accounts: 1. Login to Your Google account and go to “Account settings page”. Then click “Using 2 step authentication” Note: You won’t see the 2 step verification link until you have added a mobile number to your Google account and verified it’s authority.

2. This will take you to a Wizard page where you have to add a mobile number to your Google account. This mobile device will be used for the second step of the two step authentication system i.e the authentication code will be sent to this device only. So use your own mobile and don’t put just anyone’s else number (not even your best friend’s).

There are three ways to let Google send the two step verification code to your mobile phone:

• Using the Google Authenticatr App for Android, BlackBerry or iPhone.
• Sending an SMS message, works with any mobile phone and not just smartphones.
• A voice call to any phone number so this is useful for those who don’t have a mobile phone yet.

I would prefer using the SMS option because it can be really time consuming to find the Authenticator app and launch it again and again, scanning the QR code and so on

Using the Google Two Step Authentication For Logging In

When you have succesfully activated Google’s two step authentication system, here is how the entire logging thing works :

You type in the username and password as always. Hitting the “Sign in” button will ask for the second step verification code, as shown below:

If you don’t remember the verification code that’s sent to your mobile or Android device, no need to panic. You can always request a fresh code using the link “Get a new verification code” and let Google send an SMS message to your phone or make a voice call to your land number.

When you have received the new verification code for login, enter it in the verification box and select the checkbox “Remember verification on this computer”. Chosing the “Remember” setting is entirely “optional” but you may want to utilize this setting on the home computer and dont want to spend too much time logging in with the two step verification code again and again.

For all other computers e.g Office computers, college or internet parlors, you should not use the “Remember” setting at all. Careful !

Can’t find the “Using two step verification” link in your Google Account settings page ? No worries, this feature is slowly being rolled out across all users and the link should appear shortly.

Facebook does not support such an enhanced security but those who always worry about their Facebook account security, should set up login alerts for Facebook and receive email notifications when any suspicious activity is recorded.

Google’s two step verification is indeed a nice step towards enhanced Gmail security. Note that this verification system also works for Google Apps accounts, apart from regular Gmail and Google accounts. The Google Apps tutorial will be covered in another upcoming article.

Setup Google’s Two Step Verification And Secure Your Gmail And Google Accounts originally published on Ampercent

It is already common knowledge that any information set to “everyone” is free for the world to see, but Facebook is taking upon themselves to share some of it with third party websites to enhance user experience.  For instance, your friends can discover on Pandora.com certain types of music you like just going by what you’ve “liked” in the past.  This sounds fine, right?  What if Facebook does this by default and never ask you?

The argument could be made that you had the information set to “everyone” so nothing has been breached.  This is true.  It should also serve as a reminder that we need to be very vigilant about our privacy settings.  Many people just don’t like the idea of Facebook making it available by default.

Anyhow, you can disable it if you’d like. It’s really easy to do and I’d like to show you how.

1. Go to the privacy settings (refer screenshot below):

2. In the lower left-hand corner you will find the link to edit the settings for apps and websites:

3. Look for the “Edit settings” button under the “Instant Personalization” section:

Watch out for the pop-up!  Facebook wants you to understand a bit about what Instant Personalization is all about.  Just close the pop-up, scroll down to the bottom, and uncheck the “Enable instant personalization on partner websites” check box:

That’s all there really is to it.  Just the one check box changes it all.  Maybe you like the idea of Instant Personalization and maybe you don’t but at least now you know how to disable it if you so choose.

This would also be a good time to tweak what information is public in your Facebook profile.  To do this, head back to the privacy setting page.  Pour through these setting one by one and think about what you want other people seeing and what you want the whole world seeing.  Also keep in mind who you allow as friends.  For instance, if you allow any old stranger to be your friends, you’d better be careful what type of thing you share.

Be especially careful about your contact information.  Personally, I don’t list my whole address anyhow and my mobile is listed only because of interaction I do with Facebook using it (only I can see it though).

Security and privacy is very important to you , we know.  Here are several other articles written specifically about Facebook security and privacy:

• How To Setup Facebook Login Alerts – Know When Your Facebook Account Gets Hacked
• How to Stop Facebook Photo Tagging And Facebook Video Tagging
• How to Block All Facebook Applications From Your News Feed
• How to Delete a Facebook account which is Impersonating you?

What Is Facebook’s ‘Instant Personalization’ And How To Block It? originally published on Ampercent

Firesheep Makes Us Vulnerable

In late 2010, a developer known as Codebutler released an add-on for Firefox known as Firesheep. The add-on allows users to capture the security cookies that are passed back and forth the verify logins via websites like Facebook. While this security flaw is limited to open Wi-Fi networks, it is a very important idea. Many of us use the Wi-Fi available in coffee shops or university campuses, and those are all vulnerable to Firesheep-like attacks.

It was quickly realized that the best way to fight the attacks was via SSL browsing. Twitter rolled out the more secured browsing rather quickly, tightening security by the end of November. It took a hacker cracking Mark Zuckerberg’s page on Facebook for that company to respond, but they have now released SSL through the website.

Enabling SSL In Facebook

In order to enable the new SSL setting in Facebook, first go to your Facebook page and click the Account button in the top right hand corner. Once there, click the Account Settings button.

Once you are on the Account Settings page, you will see a number of options available to you. Click on the Account Security section to expand it.

In the Account Security pane, you will see a check box under Secure Browsing (https) that says Browse Facebook on a secure connection (https) whenever possible. Click that check box and press Save to save the setting.

That’s it. You will now use SSL when logged into Facebook. This will prevent your account from being cracked by Firesheep like attacks. Facebook has not released this feature to all users yet, so if you can’t find the setting, just look again in a day or so. Everyone should have the option soon. (also read: How to secure your Facebook account by setting up login alerts )

If you have any trouble finding the setting, leave a note in the comments. Do you think that this should be a forced setting? Have you ever had a Firesheep experience? Please leave your thoughts in the comments below as well.

[Firesheep Screenshot via Codebutler]

Stay SAFELY Connected To Your Facebook Buddies With SSL Browsing originally published on Ampercent

There are so many situations when other users might get access to your Facebook account; without your consent or even without your wildest imagination. Let’s say you were browsing Facebook on a shared computer and someone managed to trace your Facebook login cookie using malicious add-ons like Firesheep. We have earlier covered a detailed guide on using an HTTPS connection to protect your login information from malicious add-ons e.g Firesheep, so you should be very careful on a public Wi-Fi connection that’s not completely secured.

The method is called “sniffing” and the person who uses malicious scripts to gain unauthorized access may sniff login data, cookies on a not so secured network connection.

Another possible scenario is when you suddenly find that someone else has updated your Facebook wall with spam messages or vulgar pictures. The reason – you forgot to log out from the public computer in which you were using Facebook and the next user using the same computer got unauthorized access to your Facebook account. He browsed through your Facebook profile and maybe deleted some of your old pictures and photo albums.

The good thing regarding Facebook account settings is that he/she won’t be able to change the password without knowing the currently active password but nevertheless, it’s a major security risk.

Setup Login Alerts In Facebook – Get Notified When Someone Else Is Using Your Facebook Account

Setting up Login alerts in Facebook is a really neat idea and takes only a minute. Go to Facebook Account settings page and find “Set Up Login alerts” under the “Settings” tab. Then choose”Send me an email” whenever anyone else is using my Facebook account.

Facebook detects the IP address of your computer and tries to match it with the earlier IP addresses used to login to your Facebook account. If you use Facebook from your mobile or from the office computer, Facebook records the frequently used IP addresses of the devices being used with your Facebook account.

Whenever, there is a mismatch or whenever someone else is uses your Facebook account from a different IP address, you will get the login alert directly in your email address. If you get a login alert, the first thing you should be doing is login to your Facebook account from a secured connection and change the password.

Here is how the Facebook login alert email looks like:

As you can see, Facebook will immediately send a login alert whenever it finds that another suspicious IP address or device is using your Facebook account from a different location. Prior to this, you should register your own home or office computers and your mobile device because neglecting this will send login alerts whenever you use Facebook from the office or home or on the go (mobile).

Also read: Facebook login problems – When you are unable to login to Facebook

View The Locations And Devices From Where Your Facebook Account Was last Used

To know which devices, browsers or operating systems were being used to access your Facebook account, go to the “Account security page“. Here is how the recent Facebook activity logs will look like:

The location is an approximate location, in my case, the country detected was correct but the city wasn’t. However, Facebook lets you end the activity of a specific location or device which is currently active, all you have to do is click on “End Activity” link placed just beside the last accessed location.

Hence, you should always choose to receive email and SMS alerts in your mobile, if you are really concerned about the security of Your Facebook account and want to protect it from hackers and malicious phishing attempts.

Got any recommended Facebook security tip ? Share your ideas in the comments below.

Related: How to secure a wireless network connection

How To Setup Facebook Login Alerts – Know When Your Facebook Account Gets Hacked originally published on Ampercent

Configuring GFI Vipre Antivirus:

Grab a 30 day trial copy of the anti-virus from the download page and install it on your PC. Once installed run the program to configure the tool.

1. Start by pressing Next in the database configuration window.

2. Provide a name for the site you wish to monitor using Vipre.

3. Choose a password, confirm it and press Next. Wait as the tool configures the database with the provided details. Proceed through the final steps and finish the setup.

Monitoring With Vipre:

Once the tool has successfully configured the database, go ahead and start the tool. You will now see the Dashboard window. This window shows the PC status, security, processes etc as a whole.

Install Agents: For setting up the antivirus to secure the computers under your network, go ahead and install agents on them. You can either install them directly from the admin console or you can generate MSI, MST or EXE installers and then use them to install agents on the computers. The installer packages for agents can be generated for every policy.

Once the agents are installed, the user on the agent computer can use the Vipre antivirus. The native Vipre antivirus window is shown below.

Start Manual Scan on an Agent Computer: Open Vipre console and go to Agents tab. Now right-click on any of the installed agent and choose Scanning > Deep Scan/Quick Scan. The tool will automatically invoke the scan process on the agent computer. You can also carry out a lot of tasks like waking, restarting, shutting down the agent PC. You can also choose to perform right-click scan for any file or folder on agent PC.

Editing Policies: Policies control different attributes of a scan. Right click on any policy and choose Properties to edit the policy settings. Go ahead and customize Agent properties,  scan schedule, email antivirus, remediation etc to name a few. Choose them from the left pane and make changes within the main window.

Report Viewer: To have a better and detailed look at your site go ahead and start the Report viewer from File > Report Viewer or use the dedicated Report Viewer button(see demo). You can custom generate reports for saving them to disk or send as email attachments. Check out a sample report.

Manage Sites: Go ahead and use the Site Manager to create or edit sites for Vipre monitoring.

Features:

Fast & Secure: Vipre is fast and the impact on PC is minimal. This implies that for any business, where time is key factor for growth, this antivirus program will ensure security without slowing down the computers by cutting short your RAM usage.

Easy-To-Use Console: The user-friendly interface offers a nice outlook of your system security and offers an easy-to-use console to keep your system steady and safe at the same time. The developers believe Vipre to be a tool “by admins for admins”.

New Age Threat Protection: The scanning technology approaches the problems from a new perspective, thereby making it more efficient than its older counterparts. The tool also integrates anti-rootkit technology for even better malware detection. The tool offers real time monitoring and even promises protection against zero-day threats.

Email And Web Security: The tool offers direct support for popular mail clients like Outlook, Outlook Express and Windows Mail. The tool also offers web protection from malicious URLs.

User Profile: You can create user profiles and define controls based on their roles. This is a neat feature for any multi-level team.

Threat Definition Update: Vipre gets threat definition updates from a vast library of malwares that are being processed everyday.

Compatibility: The tool works on Windows 2000, XP, Server 2003, Vista, Server 2008, Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7, 32- and 64-bit. However, you can also avail a MAC client too for computers running on Mac OS X versions 10.5 and 10.6.

Pricing:

Try Vipre free for a 30 day trial period. Once you decide to buy the tool place a quote on this page. If you are looking for an antivirus solution for your home PC you can try Vipre for home.

To put down some final words about GFI Vipre its necessary to mention about the robustness of the tool and the security it offers and that also in a quite easily manageable way. While testing it on my home network I was very satisfied looking at the results and the reporting provides a complete peek at your system health.

GFI Vipre: A New Approach To Networking And Security originally published on Ampercent

How Firesheep Works

The username and password is sent unprotected to the Facebook servers ( for example) and then back to your computer, so if you are connected through a public Wi-fi connection, anyone else using the same connection can use add-ons like Firesheep to retrieve or sniff your login information.

Protect Your Login Information From Firesheep

One of the trusted ways to protect your login information from Firesheep is to use the https protocol while browsing or logging in to websites like Twitter or Facebook. The https protocol creates a secured channel over an open or unsecured wi-fi network. Your login information is sent encrypted to the website’s server which ensures reasonable protection from man in the middle attacks.

In short, using the https protocol encrypts user data, so if a script like Firesheep’s like tries to pull it, it can’t be read.

The Https everywhere add-on for Firefox makes it easy to always use the https connection of a website (if available). After the add-on is installed, major websites e.g Google, Twitter, Facebook, Wikipedia, Paypal etc will by default use the HTTPS protocol and you don’t have to type the https address manually.

There is another Firefox add-in called Force TLS, which allows web sites to tell Firefox that they should be served via HTTPS in the future. This helps secure you from accidentally negotiating an insecure session with certain sites. Google Chrome users can use the KB SSL Enforcer extension to achieve automatic http to https redirection for Facebook, Twitter, Gmail and majority of other sites.

While this isn’t a guaranteed way to protect your Facebook and Twitter account’s from Firesheep or similar sniffing attacks, it would be wise not to use a public connection at all for logging in to Gmail, Facebook, Twitter or other sites.

Related: Secure your wireless network from hackers – prevent bandwidth theft.

Use HTTPS Everywhere to Protect Your Login Information From Firesheep Threats originally published on Ampercent

Safe URL Shortener

McAfee, the PC security giant, has finally rolled out a URL shortening service mcaf.ee, that ensures that anybody clicking the shortened links does not get redirected to any malicious site. The URL shortening service works very much in the same way like others of its kind. Only there are some restrictions about which URLs you can shorten.

1. URLs from other shortening services are not allowed.

2. URLs to private IP space not allowed.

3. Badly formed domain names are not allowed.

If you use Google Chrome, there is an extension for the McAfee URL Shortener.

Safe URL Checker

Now, the point arises that what if you are bound to open a link that is not shortened using the McAf.ee shortening service? McAfee has got another tool SiteAdvisor, which is a browser plugin. Download and install it and whenever you try to open any malicious URL you will be warned and blocked by this add-on.

McAfee Safe URL Checker And Shortener originally published on Ampercent

The security checklist is nothing but a 5 step procedure which shows the various steps that needs to be done for ensuring maximum security of your Gmail account. It starts with securing your computer first, then installing the latest software updates, plugin checks and slowly moves on to your Google account settings, filters.

Here is a complete run down of the things you need to know in order to secure your Gmail account from unauthorized access:

1. Secure Your Computer First

No application can be 100 % secure but it makes sense to use a reliable and efficient Antivirus program and routinely scan your system for malware or trojans. There may be suspicious executable files silently kept somewhere on your hard drive (which may be dangerous). If the antivirus program detects an harmful file, delete it from your system.

It is again advised to install the latest software upgrades for maximum security. Always download and install important windows updates and don’t forget to set up restrictions in your Firewall as well.

2. Securing the Browser

The next important thing is securing the browser you use to login to your Gmail inbox. Always run a routine check for outdated plugins or extensions and remove those which you never use.

Do not install extensions from sources you don’t trust and never ever store your Gmail password in the browser’s password manager. There are some programs which can copy the password list from your Firefox or Chrome installation, so some of the shared users of the same computer may get access to your Gmail account;s information.

Instead, use a desktop password manager program like Keepass which stores passwords in a database and can work in any computer without installation. Keepass is available for all platforms -Windows, Linux and MAC.

3. Google Account Settings

• Regularly change your password and pick a relatively long and complex password mixing up letters, numbers and symbols.
• Check for applications who have access to your Google Account settings. (Settings > My Account).
• Check the list of third party websites that are authorized to access your Google Account data.
• Update password recovery options – add a secondary email address and a phone number so that you can recover your Google account using an SMS message.

For all the details on securing your Gmail account, read the official checklist by Gmail here

Gmail Security Checklist: Steps to Secure Your Gmail Account originally published on Ampercent

In essence a key-logger monitors your keyboard events, logs them and sends that log to a server where they look for your user accounts and passwords to banks, games and to access your computer.

Keyloggers are very small applications and hackers go to great efforts to keep them from your awareness. While there are many places you can find best practices for reducing your risk to keyloggers (you can certainly start by reviewing Prevent Email Keyloggers), I want to point out a nice free-for-personal-use version called KeyScrambler by QFX Software.

It should be noted that the free edition only protects you while using Internet Explorer and Firefox.

How it Works

By using their own proprietary keyboard driver they are able to encrypt keystroke events before they get to the software application layers where keyloggers typically reside. The keystrokes are decrypted when they are passed to your browser.

Installation

1. Go to QFX Software and download Keyscrambler Personal Edition.
2. Open Keyscrambler from the location where you saved it and press Next to begin the installation. You will be asked if you wish to check for updates (Choose Yes).
3. When you are told “This is the installer for the latest version, please continue.” , click Ok to continue.
4. Click on “I Agree” if you agree to the terms of the license agreement.
5. Select the components to install. If you use Firefox and Internet Explorer, make sure they are both selected. There is also an option for Flock.

6. Choose the path to install, just click Next to use the default.
7. Choose the Start Menu folder if you wish, it is recommended to just click Install.

If you have Firefox, follow these steps. Otherwise continue to step 13.
8. Firefox should open with an add-on for keyscrambler.xpi, click on Install Now.
9. You can choose to restart Firefox.
10. If you restart Firefox before a reboot you will get a message telling you that you will receive errors until you reboot your computer. This is okay.

11. Close Firefox.
12. You should see a message verifying that the Firefox add-in was installed. Just click OK.
13. You should choose if you want to reboot now or later and click on Finish.

Checking If Keyscrambler is Working

Now that you have rebooted after installing KeyScrambler, you should verify that your keystrokes are being encrypted. Also, you should take note of the default behavior of this program in order to be able to identify if it has been tampered with.

Check Internet Explorer:
1) Open Internet Explorer and notice the message at the top of the screen.
2) Start typing inside of Internet Explorer and notice your keys. This is what a keylogger will see. The values in the Encrypted Keystrokes area should never be readable.

Check Firefox:
1) Open Firefox and notice the message at the top of the screen.
2) Start typing inside of Firefox and notice your keys. This is what a keylogger will see. The values in the Encrypted Keystrokes area should never be readable.

Weaknesses

It is important to know the limits of your protection. Like most software applications, there are ways for hackers to get around this application using ring0 exploits. However, the great advantage to this application is that it shows you your encrypted characters as you type. If a hacker does disable this encryption it is obvious that you are no longer protected.

Why should I use it?

While anti-virus and anti-malware software companies do their best, it takes time to identify, counter and update your protection from keyloggers. There are many more keyloggers than there are anti-virus solutions. According to some estimates anti-virus solutions only detect 20-30% of new malware. Hackers spend a significant amount of time trying to steal your data, and by the time updates are applied to your protection software there is a high chance that your information has already been compromised. Why not spend five minutes to make their lives much more difficult to get your banking credentials and credit card numbers?

Now that you are all set enjoy a safer surfing experience.

Keyscrambler: Prevent Keyloggers To Log Your Keystrokes originally published on Ampercent