Monday, December 19, 2016

Tech News: Amazon makes it's first drone delivery in England

We've all seen the commercials.
Amazons cute little drones (I prefer the term quad-copter myself) delivering a package to an Amazon Prime customer within minutes of ordering on the company's web page.

The online retail giant conducted it's first drone delivery test on December 7th in Cambridge England. Delivery to the customer took just 13 minutes from the customer ordering online, and the drone flight from the company's fulfillment center, to the customers residence. The delivery falls under Amazons "Prime Air" trial.* In case you're wondering the order involved an Amazon Fire Stick and a bag of popcorn ;-D


Check out Amazons Prime Air Trial web page for more info on this cool delivery service.

* Amazon is only currently testing the drone delivery service in England. Currently FAA regulations prohibit commercial flights in the US, however Amazon is working with the FAA to seek it's approval in the US. 

Wednesday, December 14, 2016

How to: Erasing the past with CTL+Z in Windows

It's bound to happen. You just downloaded an important file and you move the file from the Downloads folder to your Documents folder.
Whoops...That wasn't your Documents folder! 

Instead of spending the next 15 minutes looking for that rascal. Use this rarely used keyboard shortcut that undoes your last action - CTL+ Z thereby "erasing the past".
Too bad there isn't a CTL+Z for things we've done in real life!

Sunday, December 4, 2016

How to: Recovering a lost Wifi password

Okay....so you forgot your Wifi password but you need it for your laptop.

You know wrote it down on that sticky note but that has long disappeared. You still have access from your phone, but all you see is a bunch of "*******".

Accessing your wifi password

First, before going full frantic mode, check the modem that your ISP provided for you. Usually WiFi passwords are listed directly on the Modem from your Internet Service Provider. If that's not the case you can always reset your Wifi password by accessing your routers web page

But that's alot of work.....you can actually view your wireless password within a configuration file on your Android phone......one caveat....you phone must be rooted.

If you've rooted your phone, open a file manager. If you don't have one, download a file manager similar to X-Plore or Astro from the Play Store.

Open your file manager and locate data/misc/wifi and find the file wpa_supplicant.conf. If you're unable to find it try locating wep.supplicant.conf. 
It's simple text file, so once you tap it your notepad should open it.

This file lists the current networks you have saved on your phone as well as your passwords to the networks.

Saturday, December 3, 2016

Tech News: Over 1 million Android phones hacked

Over 1.3 million Google accounts, which include photos, documents and email have been accessed by hackers by way of apps which were not available on Google Play Store.

Checkpoint, a cyber security firm, has named the hacking campaign "Googligan" and has set up a website named "Googligan Check Point" for consumers to determine if their Google accounts have been hacked.

The infection begins when a user downloads and installs a Gooligan-infected app on a vulnerable Android device, or by clicking on malicious links in phishing attack messages. Checkpoint states the code is targeted towards Android devices which have The Jelly Bean, Kit Kat, and Lollipop versions of Googles operating system.


Google has since removed the apps from thier Play Store, which contain the malicious code. However the attacks are still prominent as 3rd party websites still list apps that contain malware.









Android users have the option to download unofficial apps from 3rd party vendors and websites, but it is advised not to due to incidents like these.