Category: Everything about the Web

How To Keep Your Web Browsing Safe From Public Wi-Fi Networks?

How To Keep Your Web Browsing Safe From Public Wi-Fi Networks? by Navdeep Yadav.  Available from <http://www.mobipicker.com/keep-web-browsing-safe-public-wi-fi-networks/> [January 03, 2017]

A lot of people, including you, love shopping, posting photos and updates, and even conduct banking tasks on the internet. It is quite convenient to perform all of these tasks remotely. Isn’t it?

But, while doing so, you may forget that your information is floating around the internet. Whatever data you share on the internet bounces through different servers across the country or even across the world. That makes a good prospect for the hackers to steal your data, especially when you’re using public Wi-Fi networks. And, when you’re not using any VPN proxy to keep your web browsing safe, the prospect becomes much higher. Hackers may exploit public Wi-Fi in a number of ways

So, how would you ensure the privacy of your data that is being shared online and how would you keep your web browsing safe while using public Wi-Fi networks?

For your ease, we have listed down a few safe web browsing tips which you can adopt to keep your data secure and web browsing safe. Let’s discuss them one by one.

Using a VPN

Not all of you would be aware of this measure but it is regarded as one of the best ways to keep your web browsing safe from the risks associated with using public wi-fi networks. A VPN (virtual private network) connection cloaks the connection between your computer/electronic device and the internet, thus making your web browsing safe from the online hackers. Though hackers can still intercept the secure data, they cannot do anything harmful with it. There are a lot of VPNs available in the market such as FalcoVPN, ExpressVPN, NordVPN, etc.

Turn Off Wi-Fi AutoConnect

It is always safe to turn off the Wi-Fi auto-connect feature on your device, especially when you’re not using it. Doing this will prevent your device from getting connected to any public Wi-Fi network automatically. All you need to do is open your device’s network settings and disable the auto-connect button.

Turn Off File Sharing

When you’re using a public Wi-Fi network, make sure you have turned off file sharing. Windows 10 users can turn off file sharing simply by heading over to the Control Panel and then opening View network status and tasks. Once you’re there, click on Change advanced sharing settings and then turn off file and printer sharing. Click Save Changes at the end. If you’re using MacOS, then go to Settings, click on Sharing, and turn it off.

Enable Firewall on Your System

Having a firewall installed on your computer is necessary as it protects your system against unwanted network connections. Therefore, you need to make sure it is installed and is enabled. Windows users can use Windows Firewall. However, if you’re a Mac user, you can get help from the built-in firewall. You need to turn on Stealth Mode in advanced options to prevent hackers from accessing your network connection. To do this, just go to Settings, open Security & Privacy, and click on Firewall. It will turn on and get ready.

Install an Anti-Virus Software

An anti-virus software can help you know if any malware is residing in your device or computer system. Getting your computer or device scanned with an anti-virus software is a good practice because the software will send you an alert if there is any virus in them. This software will not only alert you but also help in quickly removing the offending bugs.

TURN OFF Wi-Fi When Not Using

To keep your mobile web browsing safe, it is better to turn off Wi-Fi on your mobile device when you’re not using it. It is the best guarantee to stay safe on the public Wi-Fi. However, during emergency situations, we suggest you to sparingly use the public Wi-Fi.

It is quite possible that you might know a couple of other measures to keep your web browsing safe but the ones we have listed will surely benefit you some way or the other. Ensuring data security should be on your to-do list, especially when you’re handling sensitive and confidential information on the public networks.

How To Keep Your Web Browsing Safe From Public Wi-Fi Networks? by Navdeep Yadav.  Available from <http://www.mobipicker.com/keep-web-browsing-safe-public-wi-fi-networks/> [January 03, 2017]

5 TIPS FOR CHOOSING A RELIABLE WEB HOSTING SERVICE COMPANY

5 TIPS FOR CHOOSING A RELIABLE WEB HOSTING SERVICE COMPANY by @leadernewspaper.  Available from <http://www.theleader.info/2016/12/30/5-tips-for-choosing-a-reliable-web-hosting-service-company/> [Dec 30, 2016]

In the world of the internet it is important to produce attractive content and a responsive website in order to provide the biggest benefit to your audience. But more often than not, internet developers and content marketers do not spend enough time evaluating their web hosting service in order to ensure that their content remains available 24/7.

The main web hosting buying criteria is usually price with web developers and content marketers focusing on companies that provide cheap virtual web hosting and cheap domain hosting. But in addition to this, some attention should be paid to reliability. It is critical that the web host company is able to provide a reliable web hosting experience.

Your hosting company should be able to offer a high level of internet security in order to safeguard from cyber attacks and website hacking a security breaches can result in a high level of lost revenue as users choose to buy products and services from competitor websites.

So what should be considered when you are searching for a reliable web hosting service?

Know what kind of traffic you will attract

If your website is just an online CV or just a few static pages, it will not be as resource intensive as a website which is streaming or hosting large amounts of data. If your website is not resource intensive you may consider an inexpensive web hosting solution using a shared server. If your website is very resource intensive you may wish to consider a dedicated server which uses linux hosting.

Select the right hosting package

Businesses often select low cost hosting solutions which use cheap virtual hosting solutions. However, the small price tag could result on slow response times which will cause your users to click away from your products and service. Whilst a Virtual Private Server (VPS) or a dedicated linux server might be a little more expensive, they usually provide high quality web performance, faster response times, and a better overall customer experience.

Ensure you have the right bandwidth solution

Many web hosting companies offer unlimited bandwidth. It is important that you select the right bandwidth solution. A traffic analysis will give you an idea of how much bandwidth your website will need.

Test the customer service

It is important that the customer service offered by your hosting provider is knowledgeable and offers a quick and efficient solution to any problem you may encounter. Ensure that you test the customer support to confirm that it meets your technical requirements.

Use an established provider

It is important that you use an established web hosting provider. Your business has the potentially to grow very quickly and it is imperative that you have scalable resources in place to take advantage of this rapid growth.

5 TIPS FOR CHOOSING A RELIABLE WEB HOSTING SERVICE COMPANY by @leadernewspaper.  Available from <http://www.theleader.info/2016/12/30/5-tips-for-choosing-a-reliable-web-hosting-service-company/> [Dec 30, 2016]

How Video Can Increase Your Blog Traffic

How Video Can Increase Your Blog Traffic by Tom More.  Available from <http://www.business.com/media-and-communication/tom-more-increase-your-blog-traffic/> [December 23, 2016]

While an image in the past used to have quite the impact on target audiences (remember Facebook’s old news feed?), nowadays marketers are well aware of the fact that a minute of video is worth 1.8 million words. In fact, a video is more powerful than the written word or the photograph that an executive from Facebook has actually predicted the social platform will probably be “all video” in five years.

This dramatic shift means great things for businesses, big and small. It means the more videos businesses post, the more clicks, and traffic they will receive. YouTube viewers, for instance, watch more than 3 billion hours of videos a month, and more than 400 hours of videos are uploaded to the site every minute.

Businesses are realizing they need to invest their time and money in creating videos that will increase their blog traffic and revenue. Here are a few tips you should follow in order to guarantee your company is doing it right, and in order to make sure you aren’t behind in this technological race.

It’s all in the numbers

Businesses want to increase not only the amount of traffic to their pages but also the number of visits their blog posts receive. One of the ways to get noticed by Google and other search engines is by adding a video to your blog and watching as the number of organic traffic to your site increases by 157 percent. In fact, pages with videos on them are 53 times more likely to end up on page one of Google’s search results.

While showing up on a search result is critical, it’s not as important as people actually clicking to enter your site. However, videos do just that. Having a clip on your blog can generate three times as many monthly visitors to your page, and a video on your homepage can increase conversion rates by 20 percent.

Attention-grabbing is key

Once your targeted audience members have clicked on your link and entered your site, you have to convince them to stay on it. A video comes into play here as well. Website visitors spend 88 percent more time on a blog or site that has videos than those that do not. This means they are more likely to explore the site and click on its other pages. Since an average reader has a 15-second attention span, videos are more likely to catch a viewer’s attention for a longer period of time and get him or her to stay longer on a certain page.

Word of mouth still works

As we’ve mentioned before, appearing on search engines can help people discover your business’ page. However, the old-school way of word of mouth still works. If you see something really interesting on the web, will you share it with your friends? You might be surprised to know this, but 92 percent of consumers who watch videos on their mobile devices will share those videos with others. Add that to the fact that videos that are around 15 seconds long will be shared 37 percent more than longer videos that span between 30 seconds to a minute.

Create a personal connection with your audience

A video is able to create a personal experience for consumers since a personalized element snaps us out of endless scanning. We are able to recognize that a specific piece of content is for us and relevant to our needs. Marketers who use this information to their advantage and personalize their web experiences actually see on average a 19 percent lift in sales.

By posting a video on your blog, you are able to create a personal experience and relationship with your audience who will trust the information you are giving them.

Video keeps growing

Nearly 150 million Americans watch videos online. That accounts for almost half of the United States’ total population. Add that to the fact that a third of all online activity is watching videos, and an average internet user spends nearly 90 percent more time on sites with videos, and you’ll realize just how powerful video is. These numbers are expected to grow, with online video consumption by consumers expected to account for 76% of internet traffic by the year 2018.

To sum up, a video is by no means a new way of sharing information and gaining attention, but it is still expanding and becoming more popular. Videos are all around us, and as technology advances, we encounter more ways of sharing via moving images, such as the new “live” features on Facebook, and Periscope that preceded it. People like receiving their information as quickly as possible, and enjoy the personalized feeling they get from watching to which they videos they can relate. This is precisely why videos are proving to be an important step in generating traffic to our sites, and why every business owes it to themselves to use it on their blog’s site.

How Video Can Increase Your Blog Traffic by Tom More.  Available from <http://www.business.com/media-and-communication/tom-more-increase-your-blog-traffic/> [December 23, 2016]

Want to Increase Your Website’s Visibility? SEO is The Answer

Want to Increase Your Website’s Visibility? SEO is The Answer by Manli Su.  Available from <http://is4profit.com/want-to-increase-your-websites-visibility-seo-is-the-answer/> [December 22, 2016]

If your business is lingering down in the dark depths of the search results, you’ll have little hope of online sales – but you can change that

For any small business with a web presence, the goal is to rank high on a search engine results lists. If your website lands anywhere past the third page of results, people are unlikely to find it in their search.

So how can you increase the visibility of your website? The key is to design your website and its content so that search engines can find the pages easily and index them. This is a practice known as search engine optimisation (SEO), which we will take a closer look at in this article, as well as the best practices to optimise your business’s SEO strategy.

How does search engine optimisation work?

SEO is more complex than filling your website’s pages with keywords to be picked up by search engines. Search engines have their own criteria for ranking web pages, which are periodically changed and updated to prevent websites from falsely obtaining a permanent high ranking. Their intricate algorithms take into account keywords within the content, website traffic and accessibility.

For example, Google’s Penguin algorithm update, first launched in April 2012, was developed to catch websites deemed to be spamming its search results. It targeted techniques used to artificially inflate rankings, such as keyword stuffing and link spam. This meant that pages with lower quality content were considered less authoritative and therefore ranked lower.

Keyword research

Determining which keywords and phrases your website should target is an important start for good SEO. If your page targets keywords that no one is searching for, then the search engines won’t send you any traffic.

There are several free keyword research tools that you can use to help you. Google’s AdWords Tool allows you to search for keyword ideas, look at historical statistics and see how a list of keywords might perform. You should build a target list of keywords for your business and re-visit it periodically. If your industry is prone to quick changes, try to check and update your keywords every three to six months.

Particularly competitive industries, such as fashion, may struggle to utilise keywords to gain more exposure and rank higher on search engines. This is when professionals can help. You can use a digital marketing company’s expertise in SEO to give you a competitive edge.

Optimised content

High quality content is still the best way for a website to rank higher on search engine results.  Your keyword research will come in handy when deciding on what content you should be writing for your audience or customer. Focusing on useful content that helps to answer the questions that people are searching for will help your website to receive traffic.

Quality content should be informative, interesting and rich in keywords, establishing your authority on the subject. If your customer feels as though they have learned something, then they are more likely to return to your website.

In addition, strong content will encourage external sites to link to your site, making you more authoritative in Google’s eyes. The ways of increasing your website traffic and gaining more external links can be helped by your social media strategy.

Social media marketing

A business’s social media strategy goes hand in hand with SEO. Both aim to attract visitors to your website and having a strong strategy for both will increase your search result rankings.

A good tactic to gain visibility on social media is by using hashtags and encouraging social sharing. Likes, shares, favourites and retweets will all contribute to your website being viewed as an authority by search engines and draw in links, traffic and positive brand awareness. There are many ways to do this, including surveys that encourage people to like your post if they agree, or competitions where users are asked to like and share your posts.

Optimising for mobiles

As internet usage is moving more towards mobile devices and smartphones, you need to ensure that your site is mobile-friendly.

Google have recently introduced an updated mobile-friendly algorithm that ranks sites higher if they are easily accessible on mobile sites. It considers how your website’s information and usability is optimised for use on mobiles, taking into account site design, structure and page speed.

Here are some tips for optimising your business’s website for mobile devices:

  • Don’t use Flash – this plugin may not be available on your user’s phone so they may miss the effects.
  • Limit your use pop-ups – it can be difficult to close these on a mobile and frustrated users may leave your site, leading to a high bounce rate.
  • Remember the importance of page speed – optimise any images and reduce redirects.

Finally, use Google Analytics to track how your SEO is performing. With this handy tool, you can see trends and how users interact with your website, and use the data to improve anything that may not be working well.

If you want to improve your business’s SEO strategy and increase your visibility on search engine rankings, then consider our five top tips. Optimising your SEO will help your website get ranked higher on search engine results, gain more followers and encourage customers and clients to return to your website.

Want to Increase Your Website’s Visibility? SEO is The Answer by Manli Su.  Available from <http://is4profit.com/want-to-increase-your-websites-visibility-seo-is-the-answer/> [December 22, 2016]

Expert Tips and Tools You Can Use to Safeguard Your Privacy Online

Expert Tips and Tools You Can Use to Safeguard Your Privacy Online  by Mike Peterson.  Available from <https://www.idropnews.com/how-to/how-to-remain-private-or-anonymous-online/28441/> [December 23, 2016]

As we’ve become more and more reliant on devices and the internet in our day-to-day lives, the more of our data and information has been uploaded to the web. Not only that, but many of us rely on the internet for work or play — and internet security is essential to that. Whether you’re worried about nefarious hackers, government spying, or nosy advertisers, you can help protect your data by following a few easy steps and using a few different (and free) tools.

Here are the cybersecurity essentials — used by everyone from security experts to journalists — to get you started.

Ground Rules

If you’re worried about privacy and protecting your information, you can follow some simple rules to make sure you have a head start against any would-be spies.

First, use a strong password. The best kind of password doesn’t contain words or fragments, but rather a random assortment of letters, numbers and special characters. You can also use a password manager like LastPass, Password Safe, or KeePass. 1Password is a popular option for iOS. Additionally, don’t use the same password across all of your accounts.

Next, make sure not to over-share information on social media. You really don’t need your phone number, email address or birth dates readily accessible to the public, do you?

Set up a Google alert for your name, so you can keep tabs on how your identity is being perceived or used without your consent. Don’t like advertisers gathering information about you? Use a non-tracking search engine like DuckDuckGo.

Lastly, try to enable two-factor authentication whenever you can. In that case, your accounts will have an extra layer of security even if your passwords become compromised.

Message Safer

There are many options when it comes to encrypted messaging services, but two of the best are WhatsApp and Signal.

WhatsApp is a popular messaging app, and it might be one that you already use. But what you might not know is that WhatsApp actually features end-to-end encryption: the messages you send are scrambled, ensuring that only you and the recipient have the key needed to read them.

Signal is another excellent choice, and is popular among journalist and security experts. Along with end-to-end encryption, it also features disappearing messages — meaning that there will be no record of the conversation after the messages expire.

Signal is arguably better encrypted, but a messaging app is only useful if you use it — and you probably have more friends on WhatsApp.

Get a Secure Email Client

If you’re worried about various entities reading your email, you should look into Proton. It’s a free, secure email client based in Switzerland — meaning that it falls under Swiss, rather than American, privacy laws. That means the U.S. government can’t force Proton to give up your data. Forbes famously called it “the only email system NSA can’t access.

All emails sent through the service are end-to-end encrypted, and the client never logs your IP address. Besides a browser-based version, the service also has an Android and iOS app so you can take your secure emails on-the-go.

Some other options are Tutanota and KolabNow. Both are open-source and free-to-use. For something a bit more feature-packed, Berlin-based Posteo.de is held in very high regard among security experts. It doesn’t ask for any information when you sign up, it features two-factor authentication, and it allows you to pay others anonymously. Unfortunately, it’s not free.

Download TOR

If you’re serious about encrypting your online activities on your computer, there’s The Onion Router, also known as the TOR project.

TOR Browser is a lightweight program, available to download for both PC and Mac, that obscures your online browsing via a proxy network. When you use TOR, your computer doesn’t directly access a site — the program sends your request through various servers spread across the world. That way, the site you’re accessing never actually sees your IP address.

Of course, this security doesn’t work if you’re accessing a site that asks for login or other personal information — like Facebook or other account-based services. While your computer and IP address might be anonymous, TOR doesn’t hide the specific, possibly compromising activities that could give your identity away.

Use a VPN

A VPN works by extending a private network over the public connections we use daily. VPNs use a series of discrete networks or computers to secure and encrypt communication when using the internet. A user logging into a VPN would typically access it via a client/browser window, log-in with special credentials (really similar to how you’d log into your email) and voila — once inside the VPN, the user is secure from any eavesdropping or spying.

Any time you’re doing something on the internet, you’re exchanging and sending data to another source. A VPN ensures that each time you do so, all the data that’s being sent from your end is encrypted, and safe from people seeking to steal it. Learn more about VPNs and some of the best VPN services available, here.

Additional Considerations

Even with using privacy services like TOR, some of your DNS traffic might still leak through, potentially compromising your anonymity. To find and plug those leaks, you can use DNSLeakTest.com.

Similarly, you can see just how much information your computer web browser is giving away by going to BrowserLeaks.com or Panopticlick. You can take notes and additional steps to plug those leaks, too — like turning off cookies and disabling site tracking.

Many apps on the iPhone use location services — while this can be great for remembering exactly where you took that iPhone picture, it also means that your data might have scarily specific locations attached to them. For example, the Exif data embedded into your bathroom selfie can potentially let attackers know exactly where you live. Paranoid? Just turn off location services for any or all apps via Settings > Privacy > Location Services.

Expert Tips and Tools You Can Use to Safeguard Your Privacy Online  by Mike Peterson.  Available from <https://www.idropnews.com/how-to/how-to-remain-private-or-anonymous-online/28441/> [December 23, 2016]