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How Companies Prey On Your Ignorance of Tech and Your Fear of Hackers

Antoinette Maria on May 05, 2017

"Everything Else Is Insecure" Meet Nomx. The "patent-pending nomx protocol provides secure, encrypted e-mail, messaging, audio and vide...
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Nathaniel Paulus

Very good article. In addition to shady companies preying on uninformed people, I think we also see legitimate companies using security as an excuse/catch-all. You can't paste passwords because security. End of discussion. All facts not provided by us are now irrelevant, because security.

Then there's HP that sent out a "security update" (I have no idea whether it really had security improvements or not) that made their printers no longer accept non-HP ink cartridges.

Loud shouting of "security" is often a sign of a hallow argument.

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Anton Frattaroli

I use security as an excuse to not have to support old browsers.

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Manzoor Elahi

Security has become the digital equivalent of "won't someone think of the children!"

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George Offley

Good article. It's very true as well. Most people can be safe from about 90% of threats out there by changing some behavioral habits. Use a decent password manager, only pass info to websites with a certificate, keep your computer and antivirus up to date. Delete emails from sources you don't know or weren't expecting anything from, use two password authentication on every account that will allow it. Plus many more.

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KhoPhi • Edited

Interesting to know this ain't happening only in our part of the world.

Some years ago, someone claimed he had built the "first African OS", and the "first African Browser". This, someone, was even referred to as the "Mark Zuckerberg of Africa" by Forbes ( the article was written by someone in search of the rich in the world).

This same person was later touted as "Larry Page" of Ghana.

Recently, another person rose up claiming to have built a 'Search Engine' that will be a Google and Yahoo and YouTube Killer.

The last I checked, YouTube has NO RIVAL anywhere in the world, and yet, a sociology student from a mass-production-graduate university somewhere in West Africa claims to have built something to rival YouTube, Google, and Yahoo combined! That must be some balls there!

In fact, it was just a metasearch engine. This so-called search engine accumulated millions of subscribers in just a short period of time.

To the extent that, this TV presenter who had/has NO idea what he's talking about, took up the false mantle!

My point is, considering the growing number of dumb people in the world, individuals and business are gonna exploit them via tergiversate terms, and throw dust in their eyes more and more.

Unfortunately, the end game is always that, those who try to shine a light on it are considered 'Jealous' and 'haters'. I've been called a Naysayer once!

In our part of the world, many, have, through this means, made headways into levels unscrupulously. Of course, their lies will carry them ahead a bit, but their deeds will fall them.

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Adrian B.G.

We are lucky because we know stuff, working in the field.

Like Neil D.Tyson said, being literate helps you keep the bullshit away.

I can't expect non tech ppl to know the difference between a VPN and WiFi or hashing, but when they have questions they can do research. They first appeal to someone more technical, hopefully that guy is not so biased and can guide them to other resource.

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Ryan Winchester

Companies [...] rely on the fact that you more than likely have no idea how encryption, networking, hacking, etc. works. They throw together a bunch of really technical terms that sound like they make sense and pray you can't tell the difference.

That's what "health" companies, programs, and authors do too! Except with biology and pseudo-science.

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Wajdi Al-Hawari

This is a great article and you dove in to just the right amount of technical detail to make this accessible for a broader audience. Time to give this article to a few people I know. :)

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Caroline Casals

Because I am a reflexive contrarian to any absolute statement, wouldn't Open Whisper Systems / Signal be a good exception to this rule? Or do they not count because they're not asking for your money?