Tag Archives: Ethernet

(Hopefully) Helpful Hint: Gear to Go

Sure, the overloaded computer case can drag you down when you’re on the road, but these five items are fairly small and light — and can keep you powered, connected, secure and backed up while you travel for work or play. So before you go, consider one or all of these items for the various pockets of your gear bag if you don’t have ’em already. (Oh, and get some protein bars and other snacks to stuff in there, too. You know what those airport delays are like in winter.)

battery1. External Power Pack: If you’re a long way between electrical outlets and your phone’s charge is slipping away, consider toting an external battery pack along to keep your handset powered for a few extra hours. Most external batteries are tube- shaped and charge up from your laptop’s USB port or phone’s AC adapter. When your phone runs down, just grab its USB cable from your AC adapter and plug it into the external battery for another shot of juice. External batteries also come in the shape of smartphone cases, like the product line from Moiphe; the company makes an $80 PowerStation brick that will charge up just about any USB-enabeld device — like tablets and media players.

ethernet2. Ethernet Cable. While WiFi has become the most popular network connection type on the road, you can still find Ethernet jacks on your journey when you stop at some hotels and business centers. You may have to supply your own cord to connect to the jacks, but  short, travel-worthy lengths of Ethernet cable are available for just a few dollars at places like Monoprice.com or on Amazon.com. Plug in and log on!

adapter3. Ethernet Cable Adapter. A wired Ethernet connection can be a fast and reliable on-ramp to the Internet, but many ultrabooks have tossed the RJ-45 Ethernet port overboard when designing slimmer machines. Many of Apple’s newer laptops have ditched the jack, but you can get a Thunderbolt Port-to-Ethernet adapter or a similar USB-to-Ethernet adapter. If you have a Windows-based ultrabooks, check with your laptop’s manufacturer (Lenovo, for example) or at an accessories shop for a compatible adapter that provides a port for an Ethernet cable. Most adapters cost about $30.

token4. VPN Token or Service. The public networks you encounter in your travels may have little or minimal security. If you’re traveling for work and have access to your corporate virtual private network (VPN), be sure to pack the security token you got from the IT department. If you don’t have access to a VPN through work, you can find VPN services around the Web for a relatively low price — TunnelBear, HotSpot Shield and F-Secure’s Freedome are among the many options .

usb5. USB Flash Drives. For years, these little portable pals have been a convenient way to stash, move or back up files without a network connection — and they’re cheaper than ever. You can get 8 gigs of space for $5 to $10 at plenty of places around the Web. Seriously, buying a carbonated beverage at the airport can cost more, so grab a flash drive or two and rest assured your files are backed up securely right to your pocket.

PTJ 129 News: Identity Crisis

Those massive corporate data breaches just keep rolling on like an endless Mardi Gras parade, don’t they? Last week’s big heist from the Anthem health insurance company  may have actually started almost nine months ago, though. Brian Krebs, keeper of the excellent Krebs on Security blog, is among those reporting that open-source information used to analyze the attack suggests that the first Anthem network intrusions took place in April 2014. When the hack ‘n’ heist was announced last week, Anthem quickly put up an information page and frequently asked questions page for its customers. Some experts have also suggested putting a security freeze on your accounts if you really want to throw up a roadblock.

Also hacked: The Twitter account of Anthony Noto, the chief financial officer of Twitter. Oops.

The White House is at least trying to get an agency together to help sort out online security incidents. The Cyber Threat and Intelligence Integration Center is expected to serve as a portal for members of the intelligence community to share and compare cyber threat data.

Google is also celebrating Safer Internet Day until February 17th, The company put up an online Security Checkup tutorial that guides you through reviewing your permissions and security settings. It takes about two minutes to complete and has a reward, Google will give you a permanent two-gigabyte bump in your Google Drive storage space. So that’s win-win, but perhaps Google ought to to some safer Internet housekeeping and clean out those nasty adware apps posing as games in its Google Play store.

safer

On a happier health-related note, Google announced this week on its Google Blog that it was adding fact-checked medical information to its Knowledge Graph feature of Google search. Who knows what else they’ll be adding to search by the time the annual I/O conference rolls in — it’ll be May 28th & 29th this year.

Smart TVs may be getting a little too smart for some people. There’s chatter around Samsung’s Smart TV this week, particularly the voice activation feature that can be used to control the set by talking when it was revealed that the TV can eavesdrop and record private conversations that take front of the TV and transmit the information to third-party companies.

bigTV

Samsung acknowledged the practice in its user agreement for the TV and said users can turn off voice activation whenever they want and other users have gone to more extreme measures Samsung, realizing that clumsy wording its is EULA was causing uproar, later went to its corporate blog to clarify that the Smart TV does not randomly record private living room conversations and its really just about transmitting the spoken-word commands to Nuance for translation into action. Still, many people have noticed a similarity to the spying telescreens of Big Brother in George Orwell’s novel 1984.

Hey, a $10,000 Ethernet cable? Some gearheads are clearly a bit skeptical, but if this sort of thing appeals to you, we also hear there’s a super-cool bit of New York City real estate over there for sale, too.

scribdScribd, the service that offers unlimited access to certain ebooks for a monthly fee, is bringing the same approach to comics — yes, unlimited access to the company’s digital comics offerings for $9 a month. No DC Comics, though. Yet, anyway. But look! Up in the sky! At least you can use Apple Pay on JetBlue starting this month.

Apple is also hard at work on the next couple versions of its iOS software. Several tech blogs are reporting that there’s an iOS 8.4 update down the road when the Apple Watch arrives this spring and that one may include a new streaming Beats music service. And later this year, look for iOS 9.

purse

And finally, the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum announced this week that it has some long-lost space artifacts from Neil Armstrong’s Apollo 11 mission to the moon. Although Mr. Armstrong died in 2012, his widow contacted the museum recently and said she found a white bag known as a “McDivitt purse” in one of Mr. Armstrong’s closets. The random objects inside the bag turned out to be about 10 pounds of hardware related to the original moonwalk — including the 16mm Data Acquisition Camera that was mounted in the window of the lunar module Eagle to record the historic landing and “one small step” step. Here’s hoping the Smithsonian does an Inside Neil Armstrong’s Historic Space Purse exhibit soon!