Make Private Browsing More Private

Privacy features such as InPrivate browsing in Internet Explorer 8 and similar features in Chrome and Firefox promise to protect your privacy by not keeping track of page history, temporary files and cookies.
This may be enough to hide your tracks from a beginner computer user but there are still traces of what sites you visit within the local DNS cache.
An advanced user can run the ipconfig /displaydns command to view the most recent sites visited.

For example, when you start InPrivate browsing in Internet Explorer and visit Bing.com.

The DNS Cache shows where you have been.

The best way to improve the privacy of your InPrivate browsing sessions is to also clear the local DNS cache after closing the browser.
Open up an administrative level command prompt and type ipconfig /flushdns and hit Enter. 



 

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Change Remote Desktop RDP Port

Port 3389 is the home of the remote desktop protocol that powers Remote Desktop Services on all modern versions of Windows.  If your system has Remote Desktop enabled, it is listening for connections on port 3389.  Since this port is both well known and can be used to attack accounts, it is low hanging fruit for script kiddies and bots looking for an easy target.

Theoretically on a system that does not have an account lockout policy in place which by the way is not a system default, the RDP protocol can be used to get the administrator password with brute force.  Brute force is a fancy way of saying trying all possible passwords.  If the system never locks out the account then time is the only barrier to eventually getting you password and logging in.

The first defense is to implement a good account lockout policy but that does not solve the entire problem.  Any administrator of a public facing Windows web server will notice that their server is continiously attacked by bots looking for an easy target.  The bots will often lock out your accounts which can be very annoying.

To protect your system from the bots and script kiddies I always reccomend changing the default RDP port.  This will not fool an intelligent attacker but it will weed out the noise.

There are two methods you can use to change the default RDP port.  
The first is a simple registry hack:

Open up Registry Editor by running regedit.  Then navigate to 
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE| SYSTEM | CurrentControlSet | Control | Terminal Server | WinStations | RDP-Tcp.  
Right click on the PortNumber dword and select Modify.  
Change the base to Decimal and enter a new port between 1025 and 65535 that is not already in use. 
Finally click OK

The second method uses a Microsoft Fix It wizard.  
Click here to download the utility from Microsoft then click next to start the wizard.  
On the PortNumber screen enter the new port you want to use, click next and that is it. 

 

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Windows 7

| Change Remote Desktop RDP Port

| Make Private Browsing More Private

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Customize Default Programs for the Windows 8 Desktop

When I am using Windows 8 and working on the desktop I don’t like to switch between the desktop and the modern interface very frequently.  If I open a picture on the desktop I want the picture to open in the desktop image viewer. If I open a video while on the desktop I want the video to play in a window and not the full screen immersive player.

An easy way to bypass the full screen immersive viewers is to set new default programs for the file types.

Image Viewers
 
Click on the Start Button, type in Default Programs and hit Enter.

Select Set your default programs

Select Windows Photo Viewer and then click Set this program as default.

 

 



PDF Viewer
 
After you have Adobe Reader installed, click on the Start Button and type in Default Programs and hit Enter

Select Associate a file type or protocol with a program.

Select .pdf and then click Change program.

Select Adobe Reader

 

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Enable Num Lock on the Windows 8 Logon Screen

Enabling num lock on the logon screen is a simple registry tweak. 
In fact, you can just download and import this registry file and then reboot.

If you want to get your hands dirty, open up registry editor and browse to
 HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Keyboard.

Then edit the value of InitialKeyboardIndicators and set it to a value of 2

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Disable or Turn Off Windows 8’s SmartScreen Feature

Τα Windows 8 μαρτυρούν στην Microsoft κάθε νέα εγκατάσταση που κάνετε

Read more at: http://iguru.gr/2012/08/24/windows-8-tells-microsoft-about-everything-you-install/
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Τα Windows 8 μαρτυρούν στην Microsoft κάθε νέα εγκατάσταση που κάνετε

Ο γνωστός ερευνητής ασφαλείας Nadim Kobeissi δημοσίευσε κάποιες ενδιαφέρουσες πληροφορίες σχετικά με τη συμπεριφορά των Windows 8, όταν κάνετε εγκατάσταση μιας εφαρμογής. Σύμφωνα με κάποια γρήγορη έρευνα που έκανε, το χαρακτηριστικό των Windows, SmartScreen αναφέρει κάθε εφαρμογή που ο χρήστης εγκαθιστά στον υπολογιστή του κατευθείαν στη Microsoft, και το κάνει με έναν τρόπο που θα μπορούσαν να υποκλέψουν κακόβουλοι hackers. Η λειτουργία SmartScreen των Windows είναι ενεργοποιημένη από προεπιλογή και έχει σχεδιαστεί για να αναφέρει στους τελικούς χρήστες κατά πόσον η εφαρμογή που κατέβασαν από το διαδίκτυο είναι ασφαλή για να την εγκαταστήσουν στον υπολογιστή τους. Αυτό επιτυγχάνεται με τη συλλογή κάποιων πληροφορίων κατά το άνοιγμα του .exe της εγκατάστασης. Οι πληροφορίες αποστέλλονται στην Microsoft και στη συνέχεια έρχεται η απάντηση που αναφέρει εάν η εν λόγω εγκατάσταση έχει έγκυρο πιστοποιητικό. Όπως αναφέρει ο Kobeissi, αυτό σημαίνει ότι αποστέλλονται στη Microsoft πληροφορίες για κάθε πρόγραμμα που εγκαταστήσατε στον υπολογιστή σας.

If you’re security savvy and download files from reputed sites, then you can turn off or disable Windows SmartScreen, here is how.

1. Open Control Panel>System and Security>Action Center
2. Expand Security section scroll down and click Change settings for Windows SmartScreen
3. Select Turn off Windows SmartScreen and click OK to save changes.

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