Surfing, Searching, & Networking 101

Surfing, Searching, & Networking 101

by: Ant Onaf

Everyone knows the internet can be very useful for finding information or learning something new. In all honesty, the internet should be your #1 resource for finding any remote information. The problem is everyone do not know how to use the internet to find information or to their advantage. Itกs simple and Iกll give some tips & secrets to successfully using the internet to your advantage.

Surfing the Web:

The first thing the internet is …is กinformationก. Lots of it. Anything you want to know or need to know can be found on the internet, but where do you find it? There are so many resources and ways of finding information. Surfing the web is probably the best way to find nontargeted information and find a new website. When surfing the web you basically, start with a common site (or not so common). Begin by browsing the content within the site…then you click on a link which takes you to another site and you browse through its content, click on a link within that site which takes you to another external site…and you are surfing the web. Browsing through content. Those few task just mentioned can sometimes be an hour or two worth of surfing, mostly depending on the interest of content.

Searching the Web:

A more targeted approach is trying to find information about a specific product, service, person, place, or thing. For targeted searches we need a tool, something that will help us find what we are looking for. The most common tool is กsearch enginesก. Search engines are designed for this particular task, to find information across the web. Search engines have special digital robots which search through millions of websites at incredibly rapid speeds, crawling and digging through tons of websites and indexing them into its databases for faster retrieval. When you go to a search engine like Google and type in a keyword or phrase then click search you are presented with URLกs which have been indexed within the search engine database and matches the keyword or phrase which you entered. It cannot be expressed enough to say how well you should familiarize yourself with using a major search engine. You should be able to use a search engine to find just about anything you can think of.

Forums & Discussion Groups:

Forums & Discussion Groups are a great way to find information on the web. Participation and contribution is what makes a forum or discussion group useful, powerful, and successful. These are ways to help others, communicate with others, share knowledge or experiences with others, or simply chat and network with others. Most forums or discussion groups are niche markets and targeted to a particular audience. There are a few that are for the general population. A very popular forum in the webmaster world is WebmasterWorld.com (no pun intended), their targeted market is webmasters, online advertisers, search engine optimizers, internet engineers, and internet enthusiast. You can find very useful information within most forums & discussion groups. The proper way to participate & contribute to forums & discussion groups is to help others when you genuinely have an answer, don’t just guess and post…you can make an educated guess and post, but blindly guessing just to rai!

se your rank is childish and unhealthy for the platform. When debating, remain civil and courteous to others. When debating, you should have some sense of intelligence and knowledge about the topic at hand. Respect others opinions and views. Don’t try to change minds but try to get your point across rationally. Never pick a fight or get in between a heated discussion. Keep your username/handle (and real name) respectable. Remember that you cannot hide on the internet any information you provide or any public information can come back and bite you….e.g. username stalking, which I will get into more about later. Stick to those guidelines and your forums & discussion group experience may be well received.

Blogs a.k.a. Weblogs, Online Journals, or Online Diaries:

This is the next generation way of obtaining information on the web, but gracefully becoming a prominent way. Blogs are not only personal entries about a individual life. Blogs are used to convey information and provide a confident platform for retrieving the latest trends, gossip, news, information, rumors, and hype. This can be accomplished by an individual, a group, or a company. Most blogs allow visitors to leave a comment. Familiarizing yourself with a handful of blogs is a perfect way to network and connect yourself with people who share your interest. Blogs are mainly niche markets, though there are many successful miscellaneous, personal, and general blogs. Blogs are most successful when updated daily and is dependent on the social and emotional connection you have with your audience. Blogs are usually personal thoughts, opinions, views, and experiences of individuals. Sometimes individuals form a group and author a group blog, providing thoughts, opinions, views, and experiences from each member of the group, this sometimes makes a more powerful and interesting blog, a popular blog which utilizes groups is boingboing.net. It is a good idea to start a blog of your very own, there are numerous free blog host out here, such as: journalhome.com, blogger.com, and livejournal.com. The blog host makes it easy to begin blogging (the art known as authoring a blog). You simply signup for their service, choose your template (design & layout), and begin writing your entries. You do not need to know any programming, but it helps to understand HTML, if you plan to fully customize your template. It does not matter what you write about, it can be personal, professional, casual, informative, instructional, entertaining, or anything you can muster up. It is your personal space to author. Even though it is your personal space on the web it is strongly recommended to limit your personal information on the web, when visiting any website, never provide too many details. Once you have had your blog hosted for some months/years and it has grown to a respectable state, then you may decide to host your own blog. The main benefit of hosting your own blog is the scalability and branding. Though, hosting your own blog means you will need to spend money, install scripts onto your server, and configure your script and server. I recommend using one of the mentioned blog host before hosting your own blog, hosting your own blog without an audience is not wise. Blog host are the best places to start, because it is free, easy, readily available, and they provide you a community (audience).

Doing Your Homework:

Using the mentioned information portals above, you should be resourceful in finding any information you need on the web. When doing business on the web you should only rely on trusted sources. This comes down to doing your homework. If you find a company on the web which you wish to do business with but have never heard of the company, then you should use good judgment. The best way to make a good judgment call is to research the company and website. If you utilize any of the mentioned above you should be able to find reliable information. Gather information from several different sources and then compare the results. Basically, does the good outweigh the bad? You now have a rational review to use good judgment. Using advanced technologies is also sometimes necessary such as using advance search operators, such as: ก ก (which when quotes surround the keyword will return the exact search phrase) or use of the plus (+) sign (which will return any search which contains keywords in your search phrase). A good site that makes use of Google operatives is soople.com.

Username Stalking:

Contrary to the name the art of กusername stalkingก is considered positive in my form of expression. It is wise to choose a quality username when conducting business online. Typically, an active internet user should have a different secure username/password for conducting professional business and a different username/password for personal and miscellaneous activities, as well as a different email addresses. Note: A different secure username/password can also be used for any account which stores any financial or credit card information, you should never use your personal, miscellaneous, or free account username/password in relation with your business username/password or your financial/credit card username and password. Having more than 3 different username/password combinations can become a bit confusing, just the same as explaining it is.

Username stalking is the act of searching the web by usernames. Usernames and handles when applicable are the most visible information about a person on the web. Choosing the right username and handle is suggested because you do not want to misrepresent yourself. E.g. if you never worked on cars you wouldn’t choose a username such as: TheAutoMechanic, would you? You want to choose something that represents you or something which is generic and general. When you are familiar with a plentiful of forums, discussion groups, blogs, and other communities, you will become exposed to usernames. These usernames can soon become handy. If you are on a forum which interest you and after looking through the post you find someone who has your same interest, views, opinions, and thoughts…then surely you would be interested in frequenting his neighborhood. Finding his hangouts can expose you to a new crowd of individuals who you relate to. This new world can possibly be more advanced or less advanced than your current internet world, but hopefully something new and interesting. Do a search on your own username in Google and see if it gives you results from sites which you are a member or have frequented. This is why it is recommended to separate business, pleasure, and finances on the web. Using different unrelated secure usernames/passwords is the best way to separate the three. Username stalking is not anything new, but it isn’t something publicized because most who use that technique are wrong doers for different purposes. This is a great example of how it can be used wisely and responsibly. Always, remember usernames and any other information deposited onto the internet is not a secret, even if you can’t find it.

About The Author

Ant Onaf the owner and founder of www.JournalHome.com. He is an online internet marketer, web advertiser, and IT consultant. Ant Onaf has years of ITrelated experience and Internetrelated experience. His ingenuity, dedication, and passion for technology & internet marketing have made him a monumental icon in the World Wide Web.

This article was posted on March 20, 2005

by Ant Onaf

Introduction To ISDN, Part III: PAP

Introduction To ISDN, Part III: PAP

by: Chris Bryant, CCIE #12933

Introduction To ISDN, Part III: Configuring PPP PAP Authentication

Now we know how the ISDN link comes up (interesting traffic), and some scenarios that might cause the link to stay up, we need to look at ISDN authentication schemes. The two methods Cisco certification candidates must be familiar with are PAP and CHAP.

Password Authentication Protocol (PAP) sends the username and password over the ISDN link in cleartext. Sending any passwords over any WAN link in cleartext is generally a bad idea, but it’s important to know you have this option.

Regarding both PAP and CHAP, it’s a common misunderstanding that each side must authenticate the other. PAP and CHAP both support bidirectional and unidirectional authentication; that is, R1 can authenticate R2 without R2 necessarily authenticating R1. It’s more common to use unidirectional authentication in a lab environment than a production network, but keep in mind that bidirectional authentication is an option, not a requirement.

The configurations of PAP and CHAP do have their similarities. For both, you’ll configure a username/password combination in global configuration mode. Newcomers to ISDN sometimes put the local router name in for the username; remember that the remote router name is the username.

The only real advantage of PAP over CHAP comes in the password configuration. Since PAP actually sends the password as a whole over the link, the two routers can send different passwords during authentication. The operation of CHAP requires that both routers use the same password, and we’ll see why in tomorrow’s article.

Under the BRI interface, you’ll enter encapsulation ppp and ppp authentication pap. So far, your authentication scheme looks like this:

username R2 password CCNA

Int bri0

encapsulation ppp

ppp authentication pap

PAP requires an extra command at this point. The ppp pap sentusername command is required under the interface, indicating the username and password this router will be sending to the remote router.

Int bri0

encapsulation ppp

ppp authentication pap

ppp pap sentusername R1 password CISCO

I always encourage CCNA and CCNP candidates to use as many debugs as possible when working in their lab, since these commands show us how things work. For any PPP authentication, always run debug ppp negotiation before sending interesting traffic to trigger the call. Watching exactly how PAP and CHAP work give you a much better understanding of what’s going on ขbehind the commandข, and makes you a stronger candidate and a stronger networking engineer.

Tomorrow, we’ll take a look at CHAP, and why routers cannot use the same password on both ends of the link.

Keep studying!

Chris Bryant

CCIE ™ #12933

[email protected]

About The Author

Chris Bryant, CCIE (TM) #12933, has been active in the Cisco certification community for years. He worked his way up from the CCNA to the CCIE, and knows what CCNA and CCNP candidates need to know to be effective on the job and in the exam room.

He is the owner of http://www.thebryantadvantage.com, where he teaches CCNA and CCNP courses to small groups of exam candidates, ensuring they each receive the individual attention they deserve. Classes are offered over the Internet and in person in select cities. Chris has customwritten the Study Guide and Lab Workbook used in each course no thirdparty training materials or simulators are used. You’re invited to visit our site and check out our CCNA and CCNP courses and study aids, and to sign up for our weekly newsletter written personally by Chris. Chris is always glad to hear from Cisco certification candidates at [email protected]

This article was posted on August 12, 2004

by Chris Bryant, CCIE #12933

How To Manage Your Username And Password The Easy

How To Manage Your Username And Password The Easy And Secure Way

by: Jerry Yu

Have been an Internet user for more than 9 years, I have 100กs of logins and passwords to keep. Iกm paranoid. Iกm now even more paranoid after I joined YMMSS because I use online payment systems on weekly basis if not daily.

I used to use Microsoft Excel to manage my usernames, passwords, and other registration information, both online and offline. Excel is not safe because there are programs to crack password protected Excel workbooks and I even cracked the spreadsheet and VBA source code password for one of my old Excel financial models I developed. Today I still use Excel to store some personal information but I only save the Excel file on my another PC that is not connected to Internet.

In my article ก6 Essential Steps to Protect Your Computer On the Internetก, I highly recommended the award winning RoboForm. Free version of RoboForm (http://www.roboform.com) does come with limitations such as 10 Passcards only. If you don’t want to buy the Pro version (costs $29.99 as of my writing), there is an easytouse freeware (see below) you can download right now and manage unlimited usernames and passwords.

Download freeware Password Safe from SourceForge.net the Open Source community.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/passwordsafe/

Here are some great features of Password Safe:

No installation is required. Simply download and double click the pwsafe.exe file.

Easy portable. Just copy and paste the EXE file and .dat database file to any disks. Be aware that when you open Password Safe in the other disk, you need to specify the database file location (the .dat file).

One master password unlocks an entire password database that can contain all your other passwords.

Grouping. Usernames and passwords can be grouped into different categories you define, eg. Email Address, Payment, etc. You are in total control.

Strong, random password generation.

Copy username and password to clipboard so that you don’t have to type them. Always keep in mind that you should never type any username and password.

Browse to URL. With one click, the URL related to your username and password can be opened in your default web browser. Another save on typing.

You can create more than one password database (but you have to memorize more than one master password. Not recommended.)

Here are some tips of using Password Safe (version 2.04) and managing password in general.

Tip #1 Always create a strong master password (Safe Combination as used in the software).

Strong password should meet the following criteria:

At least 8 characters long to prevent cracking. The longer the better.

The password should contain lowercase, uppercase, numeric, and any other characters that are available on keyboard.

Ideally you should not use any meaningful words or numbers in the password. Totally random password is the best.

Tip #2 Let PasswordSafe generate random password for you.

To generate random password:

Click the menu item Edit.

Select Add Entry (or use corresponding icon button).

When the dialogue window opens, on the right hand side, you can see a Random Password Generate button. Click it, a random password will be automatically inserted in the Password field.

The generated random password is constructed according to the password policy defined in Password Safe. You can modify the default policy.

Click the menu item Manage.

In the dropdown menu, click Options.

Click the Password Policy tab.

Change the policy based on the strong password criteria stated above.

Some sites only allow alphanumeric passwords so make sure you select the appropriate check boxes when this is the case.

Tip #3 Very Important: Never type your master password when open PasswordSafe.

Keylogger spyware can record keystrokes.

How can you enter master password without typing? I do this.

Step 1: Open a Notepad file (.txt).

Step 2: Copy and paste an article from any Internet website to this .txt file.

Step 3: Select characters from this article and copy, paste to form your master password.

Tip #4 Very Important: Never lose your master password.

I memorize my master password. In addition, I also physically write it down to a hand written study material that has my previous uni works. Among the 1,000กs of words, I placed my 22 characters master password in two different pages in encrypted format that can let me derive my master password.

Tip #5 Categorize username and password.

When you add a new entry, you need to specify Group, Title, Username, Password, and Notes. The entries that share the same Group name will be gathered together automatically.

One Group can contain another Group as its sub Group. For example, I have Email Address group which contains three subgroups as Friend, Work, Family.

Tip #6 For security reasons, always use Copy Username to Clipboard and Copy Password to Clipboard.

Remember, never type username and password on a web form. This is how to do it.

Highlight an entry.

Right click mouse.

In the popup menu, select Copy Username to Clipboard or Copy Password to Clipboard

Go to your login form, paste the username or password.

You can use mouse to do copy and paste. If you prefer shortcut keys, this is how.

Copy: Ctrl+C Paste: Ctrl+V

Tip #7 Use กBrowse to URLก rather than typing URL in browser address bar.

When you enter a new entry or edit an existing one, you can enter a URL (must start with http://) in the Notes field. You can save website login pageกs URL in this field. When you need to open a login page in browser, right click the entry and click Browse to URL in the popup menu. Then the login page will be opened in your default web browser automatically.

Tip #8 Don’t forget to backup your password database file.

Use the Make Backup menu item to save a second copy of your password file.

Tip #9 Store your backups in a different offline computer or location.

This is a widely used backup strategy.

If you don’t have two computers, you need to use other storage media to save a second copy of your backup file and version them by date (easy to track back). Other storage media can be zip drive, thumb drive, floppy disk, CD, etc.

Off site backups are also important. Don’t overlook this. You lose all your data if you lose both your computer and your other storage media all together for any reason.

Many companies provide online storage services for a fee. You can store any digital files (you should password protect these files first) on their secure servers. Search Google and you will find a lot.

I have two computers. One is used to surf net and it does not have any sensitive info stored on it. Another one is for my development work (not connected to Internet) and it has my backup files. I also store my backups in a thumb drive and CDs sometimes.

About The Author

The author, Jerry Yu, is an experienced internet marketer and web developer. Visit his site http://www.WebActionGuide.com for FREE กhowtoก stepbystep action guide, tips, knowledge base articles, and more.

This article was posted on October 19, 2004

by Jerry Yu

Securing Your Accounts With WellCrafted Passwords

Securing Your Accounts With WellCrafted Passwords

by: Daniel Punch

In the past I’ve never really paid much attention to security issues when it comes to user names and passwords. Frankly I figured it was all a lot of overblown hype. This led to an unfortunate incident that involved my website being attacked, apparently by a skillful youth with a propensity for mischief.

The main security flaw with my website was probably the simple fact that the username and password were exactly the same. Granted I did realize that this wasn’t highly intelligent but I didn’t have the power to change it myself, and I didn’t think it really mattered enough to bother about it. Having an identical username and password is a massive ขnonoข in computer security. Your username and password should not even be related along the same line of thought. A username of ขDragonข and a password of ขFireข is not a secure combination.

For maximum security, passwords should not be cohesive words or phrases and should not be too obviously related to something like your birthday or the birthday of someone close to you. Personal information is one of the first things used when people attempt to break passwords. Having a password of ขPasswordข is indeed humorous and ironic but it is not in the least bit secure.

A ขbrute forceข password hacking technique involves using certain rules and guidelines to take a guess at possible passwords and generally works through a dictionary of sorts, trying combinations of possible words and common characters. Your best bet at creating a secure password is to pick a random collection of letters, numbers, and symbols, including varying case changes (in a password the letter ขaข is not the same as the letter ขAข, so alternating at random between upper and lower case will increase the difficulty encountered in cracking your password). Selecting a sequence of characters on the keyboard (such as ขasdfข or, worse, ข1234ข) definitely does not create a secure, random password.

Having symbols in your password is an easy way to greatly increase security. These are the special characters accessed by holding the ขShiftข key and pressing one of the numbers at the top of the keyboard. If you want to truly expand your arsenal of special characters, try holding down the ขaltข key and pressing a combination of numbers on the num pad (the rectangular collection of numbers on the right hand side of most keyboards) then release ขaltข. For example, holding ขaltข and pressing numbers, 1 then 6 then 8 and releasing ขaltข will give the character ข¿ข. Most combinations of 3 numbers will enter a different symbol into your password. This may make it a little harder to enter your password but it makes it a lot harder for anyone else to crack it.

To make passwords easier to remember you can use something original, like the name of your favorite character in a book (personal information that other people won’t know). Then add some numbers to it, perhaps use the ขLeet speakข (check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet for exact definition) method of changing letters to numbers and generally mix things up so that to you it seems coherent and memorable but to an automated pattern recognizer it seems random. For example, ขjAm35_5m1Th¿ข (ขJames Smithข) is actually surprisingly secure. In this case the password’s meaning is obvious to a human reader but it will take a lot of work for them to divine the password without prior knowledge.

For additional security you should not use the one user name and password for every account that you have. If you do and someone manages to get hold of your details for one site they pretty much have the run of your digital life. It is not particularly vital to have perfect passwords for less important accounts (e.g. web based email from Hotmail, forums you visit etc.). These sites can quite happily be accessed using the same password. However, bank accounts, work email etc. should be made as secure as possible.

Hopefully a few of these tips will assist you in making your online activities more secure. Keep these guidelines in mind, change your password on a semi regular basis, and with any luck you’ll be able to avoid the hacking menace that befell me.

About The Author

Daniel Punch

M6.Net Web Helpers

http://www.m6.net

This article was posted on August 29

by Daniel Punch