Your $125 and Credit Freeze

In 2017, the credit bureau Equifax–one of the big 3 including Experian and TransUnion–admitted that it had suffered a massive security breach, exposing the personal information of nearly 145 million people, probably including you. Personal data stolen from Equifax included names, birth dates, social security numbers, addresses, drivers license numbers…basically everything bad guys need to steal your identity and open credit accounts in your name. Because their carelessness and negligence enabled the breach, and their delay in revealing the breach exacerbated danger to the public, Equifax recently agreed with the FTC to pay a settlement of $300-$700 million. Though this is little more than a slap on the wrist for a company of that size, it is better than nothing. There are many online instructions on how to claim your $125 from this settlement, or up to $20K if you suffered identity theft and resulting damages and expenses, including this ArsTechnica article, in a simple 2-step process: (1) confirm your eligibility, then (2) submit your claim online. Sure, this requires you to provide your information again to the same company that failed to protect it in the first place, but the cow is out of the barn, so you might as well get paid. As an alternative to cash, Equifax offers free credit monitoring for several years, but this is of little value given the limitations of credit monitoring services and the availability of similar free services elsewhere (e.g., Credit Karma and NerdWallet), not to mention your responsibility to monitor your own credit activity. I claimed the money.

While you claim your Equifax settlement and review your free annual credit report, you may protect yourself by placing a free credit or security freeze on your account with each of the 3 credit bureaus. This NerdWallet article explains the free credit freeze (vs a “credit lock”, which may not be free) and provides the necessary web links (and phone numbers if you’re old school). It only took several minutes for me to create accounts with each of the 3 credit reporting companies–Equifax, Experian & TransUnion–and freeze my credit with each. I created a unique PIN for each that I can use to un-freeze my credit when I need to apply for a new credit card or loan. Anyone lacking those PINs will be unable to gain approval from the credit bureaus to open a new credit account in my name. I suggest that you create your own credit freezes for much more protection than mere credit monitoring.

Apollo 11 in Real Time

To join in celebrating the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing, you can follow the Apollo 11 mission in real time at https://apolloinrealtime.org/11/…click on the link and then the blue NOW button to jump back in time exactly 50 years to the second. The site shows mission status and actual mission communications (audio & transcripts) and images as they happened half a century ago. As I type, the crew–Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins–are in the Command Module, docked to the Lunar Module, nearing the Moon, and are about to enter lunar orbit, where they’ll prepare for the landing attempt tomorrow, July 20th, 1969. At this point, successful landing and return to lunar orbit by Neil and Buzz in the Lunar Module are still uncertain, and a mission abort or worse–catastrophic failure and loss of crew–is a very real possibility. Tension mounts as the lunar surface draws near…

While monitoring Apollo 11 in real time, look for 50th anniversary events in your town this weekend. Here in Houston, there will be public events in Discovery Green downtown and at Space Center Houston in the Clear Lake area on Saturday. NASA listed some nationwide events in an Apollo 11 50th Anniversary press release. Cool stuff for us space geeks!

Floydish

Pink Floyd is at once one of the best bands I’ve ever seen in concert–A Momentary Lapse of Reason tour in St. Louis in the late 80’s (with tickets won in a college radio contest…a great night)–and the worst–when a Texas storm pummeled us in Rice Stadium and blew them off stage, abruptly stopping the open air show (plus car problems on the way home…a less than great night). Regardless of that drenched experience, they remain one of my favorite bands of all time, with so much fantastic, innovative music spanning decades. So, when a friend suggested we see Brit Floyd last week, I was ambivalent–sounded fun, but it’s hard to mimic greatness. It was my first time enjoying the relatively new Smart Financial Centre in Sugar Land, southwest of Houston, an excellent venue with excellent acoustics, even up in the Club level. Sure, it was quite a drive there and back from the Clear Lake area, but the show turned out to be well worth it. Calling Brit Floyd a Pink Floyd tribute band is like saying Disney World is an amusement park–technically true, but the experience is so much more.

Brit Floyd’s musicianship was top notch as they adeptly covered the best Floyd songs from the early 70’s through the mid 90’s, with the most focus on The Wall and The Dark Side of the Moon, of course. Perhaps more importantly, their vocals were just as great. Two frontmen, Damian Darlington & Ian Cattell, traded off songs, depending upon whether they wanted to sound more like Roger Waters or David Gilmore. They’re not exact matches for either, and that’s OK, as they both sing very well. A true highlight was the woman who belted out the female vocal solo in The Great Gig In The Sky…wow! In fact, all three female backup singers knocked it outta the park.

Brit Floyd concert in Houston area

Brit Floyd’s stage production values might not match a real Pink Floyd show–nor should they–but still included very impressive and familiar theatrics and tech: lights, lasers, circular video screen above, glowing-eyed pig, and even some video and reenactment of The Wall scenes. Alternately entrancing and energizing, it was a high end rock show, visually as well as aurally.

Brit Floyd took the stage shortly after 8pm, exploded into The Wall with In the Flesh?, and left nearly 3 hours later, including a 20-minute intermission. Their choice to end with a slow, acoustic song was odd (I took that opportunity to beat the crowds to the restroom)…they should have ended on the earlier encore peak with the driving Run Like Hell. Regardless, if you get the chance and like Pink Floyd, definitely check out Brit Floyd, a top shelf “tribute band”.

Toxic Virality

Check out Wired magazine’s deep dive into Facebook’s horrific 2018, “15 Months of Fresh Hell Inside Facebook.” Business journalists Nicholas Thompson and Fred Vogelstein detail Facebook’s attempts last year to corral its self-induced global dumpster fire fanned by prioritization of growth over all other values–particularly user privacy–according to its founder’s mantra: “move fast and break things” (including democracy it would seem). As in previous years, Facebook repeatedly offered familiar, dubious apologies for its most egregious missteps, scandals and user data breaches–when caught–while news feed algorithms continued to promote its prioritized categories of “politics, crime, or tragedy”, driving unwitting user engagement in amplified outrage cycles.

It’s not all bad news, as the article covers some of Facebook’s attempts to atone for its sins. Facebook finally began combating fake news with serious, large scale resources, appropriate when foreign genocides were fueled by malevolent government propaganda on Facebook. The company created “election war rooms” to fight Russian intervention via Facebook in the US mid-terms and other countries’ elections. Zuckerberg even recently announced a new focus on privacy and end-to-end encryption of messages. Unfortunately, that was shortly before a shooter in New Zealand live-streamed video of his murderous attack on a mosque on Facebook–such terrorists could benefit if Facebook loosens control over video streams and mass postings.

Several summary excerpts from the Wired article:

  • Facebook continues to pay for its original sin of ignoring privacy and fixating on growth.
  • Sometimes Facebook makes the world more open and connected; sometimes it makes it more closed and disaffected. Despots and demagogues have proven to be just as adept at using Facebook as democrats and dreamers.
  • The idea of Facebook is to bring people together, but the business model only works by slicing and dicing users into small groups for the sake of ad targeting.
  • For years, smart critics have bemoaned the perverse incentives created by Facebook’s annual bonus program, which pays people in large part based on the company hitting growth targets…Everyone is now given bonuses based on how well the company achieves its goals on a metric of social good.
  • Another deep critique is that Facebook simply sped up the flow of information to a point where society couldn’t handle it. Now the company has started to slow it down. The company’s fake-news fighters focus on information that’s going viral. WhatsApp has been reengineered to limit the number of people with whom any message can be shared.

I left Facebook last year, after the Cambridge Analytica scandal was exposed, before the largest data breach in Facebook history and the narrowed news feed focus on “politics, crime, or tragedy”. While many savvy users also left Facebook last year, the overall Facebook user base continued to grow, albeit more slowly than before. As Facebook wrestles with its fundamental problems of “toxic virality” and disregard for user privacy, it faces a future existential problem in the US: Facebook is for the old (or blissfully unaware), not the young. Most kids are not joining Facebook, sharing instead on YouTube, Instagram (owned by Facebook), Snapchat and text messages. Few Facebook employees proudly tout their company these days. If remaining Facebook users and employees can no longer claim ignorance, they must retreat to faith that Facebook will change, apathy, delusion, or worse.

Text Negotiation

I occasionally read NY Times articles using their app on my iPad Pro. My digital NY Times subscription costs $17/month including tax. They gave me a free Google Home last year to try it out, but recently I decided I wasn’t reading the NYT enough to justify the cost, so I texted their customer support today to cancel. After being handed off between a few different reps, here’s how the final SMS conversation went:

Pamela: Thank you for being a valued Basic Digital Access + Google Home subscriber of The New York Times; you’re truly appreciated! …Are you sure you want to give up these great features and if so could you let us know why to make sure we are providing quality service?

Me: Please cancel. I’m cutting expenses.

Pamela: I am sorry to hear that. We would really hate to lose you because we value your readership here at The New York Times. I see you are reaching out to us due to a price concern which I can totally understand because 2019 has started off rough for me financially as well.

[I assume “Pamela”–the rep or the AI bot–had been trained/programmed to say “yeah, me too” to any customer issue for a nice touch of empathy.]

Pamela: How about if we helped you out with the bill for a while? Would you be interested in staying with us a little longer if I was able to offer you Basic Access for a discounted rate of $2.00 per week for a year?

[Oooo…Pamela’s got some room to haggle! How low can she go?!]

Me: No thank you, please cancel.

Pamela: How about only $1.00 per week instead for a year? There is no commitment and you can cancel at any time you would like.

[Now we’re getting somewhere!]

Me: $0.50 per week would be OK. 

Pamela: I have an even better deal: 8 free weeks. How does that sound?

[How can you know where the line is until you cross it?!]

Me: And then $0.50 per week after that.

Pamela: We do not have that rate. I really do apologize for the inconvenience. It will be $3.75 per week after 8 weeks. If you are not interested in this limited time offer I will process your cancellation now.

[Looks like I reached Pamela’s limit. Time to reel it back in.]

Me: $1 per week for a year is OK. 

Pamela: Great to hear! Please bear with me while I update your account… Thank you for being the best part of The New York Times. Have a wonderful day!

So, Pamela (or it’s programmer) gets to take credit for retaining a nearly lost customer, while I get a 73% price reduction…win/win!

Keto Cupcakes

Varya put us on a mostly Keto low-carb diet over a year ago, enabling both of us to slim down from peak weights, me by 35 lbs! I certainly don’t mind Keto’s focus on steak, smoked brisket and ribs, cream, cheese, eggs and bacon, and other proteins–supplemented with salads, coleslaw and vegetables–but now and then I miss tortillas, potatoes, popcorn and deserts. So, we have cheat days every couple of weeks, when we’re allowed to chow down at Star Cinema Grill, Lupe Tortilla, El Tiempo, or another of our carbo-licious favorites, indulging in chips, fresh tortillas, tres leches and the like. At home, Varya has been experimenting with Keto sweets, which seems like an oxymoron until all doubts are erased as you enjoy one of her Keto candies, donuts, or cupcakes with coffee for breakfast…a great way to start the day!

Varya’s Keto cupcakes taste as good as they look!

Strong Passwords

PasswordSecurity.info and HaveIBeenPwned.com can securely check the strength and security of a password you are using or thinking of using. If either site finds your password has been compromised, i.e., already posted by/for hackers in an online data breach, then change it immediately and never use it again! HaveIBeenPwned.com explains why you should never reuse the same password for multiple accounts. PasswordSecurity.info may find that your password has not been exposed in a data breach, but still offer suggestions for strengthening it, such as maximizing character variety (use upper and lower case letters and numbers and special characters) and password length (longer is better). The site estimates the time required for a brute force automated attack to guess your password, but I’m not sure that includes the latest NSA tools, so take it with a grain of salt.

You want your bank and email accounts to be very secure, because if a hacker gets online access to your bank account, he can transfer your money elsewhere, and if he gets into your email account, he can request a password reset for your bank account by pretending he forgot it, receive a password reset link in your (now his) email account, and gain access to your money. Treat your email account as the key to your kingdom.

1Password and LastPass are both great password managers for generating and storing the longest, strongest, most random, unguessable passwords for your accounts. You can also save credit card, medical and other sensitive information in these secure databases, but password management is the critical feature for securing your online assets. I prefer 1Password on my and Varya’s Macs, iPhones and iPads, and love that 1Password is able to use FaceID on my iPad Pro. Check them both out, pick one and use it!

I recently convinced my wife that using simple passwords on multiple accounts puts her at greater risk, as one compromised account could be a door to more accounts, which puts us both at greater risk. Similar to using vaccines, protecting yourself helps protect others. So, please use long, strong, unique passwords and password management software, and if one of the above sites finds that one of your passwords has been compromised, change it immediately!

Newish Bands

These are a couple bands that I found myself listening to more than many last year…

Lo Moon

I barely paid attention when Lo Moon played “This Is It” on Jimmy Kimmel early in 2018. I must admit that we all too frequently skip the bands on late night shows, especially when streaming them on Hulu during breakfast. Varya was listening, however, and remembered, suggesting this song a couple weeks later when I was looking for new romantic evening music (you can only hear so much Enigma). “This Is It” is catchy, no doubt, but the next song on Lo Moon’s self-titled debut item is what really hooked me, the atmospheric epic “Loveless.” Perhaps not the ideal song title to request of Siri or Alexa when snuggling up to your Love, so I usually just ask the digital ladies to “play the album Lo Moon.” Fortunately, the whole album is great, whether you’re chilling alone or warming up together. I’ve been hoping for a follow-up album, and they whetted my appetite with a new single in November, “For Me, It’s You,” a good sign of more to come. Lo Moon rising!

Greta Van Fleet

If you’re not paying attention, it is possible to hear this young Michigan band and not be sure you’re not listening to Led Zeppelin circa early 1970’s. Even a well-versed Zep fan might hear Greta Van Fleet’s “Safari Song” or “Highway Tune” from their first album and think he overlooked some obscure BBC radio session (ignoring audio quality). And yet the three Kiszka brothers plus drummer Wagner claim they aren’t intentionally channeling, or worse, aping the mighty Zeppelin. In fact, far from some tribute band with more original material, these guys come across as genuine, impassioned rockers, not just saluting the banner but waving it furiously high. While I challenge you to listen to “When the Curtain Falls” or “You’re the One” from their second album and not think of Plant, Page, Jones and Bonham thunder, you can’t discount it as mere derivative mimicry. When the band played on a recent SNL, lead singer Josh Kiszka’s early Plantian nouveau hippie wardrobe was overpowered by his wailing vocals and his brothers’ infectious exhuberance. More (flower) power to these torch-bearing kids from the North!

Favorites Last Year

What was likable about 2018? At least a few things…

The Three-Body Problem is Cixin Liu’s impressively ambitious and imaginative science fiction trilogy (The Three-Body Problem, The Dark Forest, Death’s End), spanning centuries from the terror of the Chinese Cultural Revolution through humanity’s first contact with other civilizations in our galaxy all the way to…well, suffice it to say that some really weird, wild stuff goes down in the far future. Cixin Liu’s epic is considered “hard” sci-fi, meaning no magic wands or dragons or even an unexplained “warp drive”, and plenty of cool technological extrapolations from current scientific understanding, from the smallest quantum scales up to the entire universe(s). The first book hooked me, the second dragged on a bit, but the third again delivered mind-expanding excitement, so stick with it if you get bogged down. Ok, so The Three-Body Problem was published a decade ago, but I just read it last year, so I’m calling it my favorite novel of 2018.

Stephen Colbert was very funny on the Daily Show, was fairly funny on the Colbert Report (though I never really got hooked by his O’Reilly Factor spoof), and is like a laser-guided smart bomb of funny on The Late Show, especially this year, a worthy successor to Dave Letterman. Since CBS doesn’t put shows on Hulu like NBC and ABC do, I have to digitally record the over-the-air broadcast (or watch it in the ancient way, live, though I’ve been loath to submit to a TV network schedule for many winters). The strengthening Late Show is worth the extra effort above and beyond a simple app subscription. Sharp as a tack in appearance, manner, knowledge and wit, this fellow Stephen became my favorite of the nightly late night comedic hosts in 2018. (In the weekly category, it would be a toss-up between John Oliver and Bill Maher, both devastatingly funny in very different styles.)

Apple’s iPad Pro 12.9 with the Smart Keyboard Folio has finally made the iPad a viable alternative to my 7-year-old MacBook Air as my primary personal “laptop” for traveling and lounging around the house. Sure, iOS 12 is still very limited relative to MacOS, as are many iOS apps relative to their MacOS and Windows counterparts, so occasionally I am forced to sit at my desk and use the big iMac. Like many online tech pundits, I feel that iOS software, originally designed for the diminutive iPhone over a decade ago, has not yet caught up to the excellent hardware at the top of the iPad lineup. However, I find that with the real keyboard always attached as a foldable cover and stand, I am able to easily handle most personal tasks (e.g., email, browsing, shopping, banking, IOT control) on my newest iPad, and am very glad that some common MacOS key combinations also work in iOS on the big tablet (e.g., copy, paste, search, switch apps). In fact, I am writing this post in the WordPress app on the iPad, though again it is limited relative to editing on the WordPress site in a Mac browser. Videos and games look great on the 12.9″ screen, and run smoothly, quickly on the A12X Bionic processor, without compromising excellent battery life, making it a great travel companion. I haven’t yet attached a large monitor to the iPad, but like knowing that I could if necessary. And how did I ever live without Face ID, simply looking at the screen in lieu of typing or pasting passwords or wiping the BBQ sauce off my thumb for Touch ID?! The iPad Pro 12.9 is by far my favorite new device of 2018.

HaveIBeenPwned is Troy Hunt’s security-focused site that helps you answer the seemingly simple titular question: have you been pwned (pronounced “poned”)? Being pwned is to be utterly, humiliatingly defeated, perhaps in a video game, or by hackers in this security context. Troy’s site lets you check if your email address has been listed in an online data breach (spoiler alert: it almost certainly has, especially if you’ve ever used Yahoo, Facebook, Marriott, Target, Equifax, a credit card, the web, an internet-connected device…you get the idea), and more importantly, if one of your passwords has likewise been compromised and posted online. (Read his explanation of how he keeps your typed-in password safe.) So what if it has?

  • If you’re the non-savvy type who repeatedly uses a simple Monkey-123 style password for multiple online accounts, this site will help you confirm if your easily guessed/hacked password is already public knowledge.
  • Hopefully, knowing that your “super secret” password is no secret will motivate you to use longer, stronger, more random passwords, preferably with the aid of a password manager like 1Password or LastPass. (I’ve tried them both and prefer 1Password in MacOS and iOS, but your mileage may vary.)
  • Still not concerned? Consider this: if an online ne’er-do-well gains access to your email account due to your weak password being easily guessable or posted or sold online after a data breach, he can gain access to all of your other accounts by having password reset links sent to your (now his) email account (because you’re probably not using 2-factor authentication, you slacker), and easily steal your money and identity with just his laptop in a distant land. Thus, your email account can be the key to your entire kingdom–protect it wisely.

HaveIBeenPwned has been around a while checking email addresses, and Troy recently added the password check feature, making it one of my 2018 favs.

WordPress.com (not to be confused with the older, less user friendly WordPress.org) made it quite easy to start this blog after I deleted my Facebook account last summer. Like many increasingly knowledgeable users, I finally was fed up with Facebook’s long history of scandal and trading users’ data privacy for profit, not to mention its failure to address its pervasive fake news problem, making it a platform for propagating misinformation, toxicity and risk to people around the world. I now miss a few updates of moderate interest from friends and family–though I still get the most important news from the closest ones the “old fashioned” way through texts, email, and (gasp) talking–but lets face it: most posts on Facebook fall into one of three categories: narcissistic bragging, time-wasting garbage, or blatantly biased propaganda (including fake news). Leaving Facebook was like breathing fresh air again, and regaining lost hours every week. Starting a new blog on WordPress nostalgically reminded me of the fun I’d had writing blogs in past decades. So, WordPress, and my decision to switch to it, are among my favorites of 2018.

Recent Flicks

We just flew back from Missouri, after spending a fun week with Mom, Sis, Erzingers, and old school buddies. Since I have yet to make an entertainment post, and to (barely) meet my goal of posting at least monthly, here are a few movies I’ve recently enjoyed and recommend…

Alpha could be called The Invention of Dogs, as it tells the story of an Ice Age European boy who befriends a wild wolf during an arduous journey and struggle for survival. Sure, the simple story can be a little dopey and obvious at times, but I very much enjoyed the beautifully inventive and dynamic visuals, supplemented by very well executed CGI, and dramatic soundtrack underscoring the sweeping vistas, flora and fauna of 20 thousand years ago. I watched it on my iPad during the return flight this afternoon, but felt that it would have been better suited to the big screen and surround sound at home.

BlacKkKlansman very successfully blends comedy with the darkness of past and present racism and hate-crimes in America. John David Washington and Adam Driver deliver great performances that sell the seemingly absurd idea of Ron Stallworth, a black cop in CO, infiltrating the KKK in the 70’s. I also enjoyed the surprise appearances of Alec Baldwin and Topher Grace as white supremacist villains/idiots Dr. Beauregard and David Duke. I’m guessing the latter is not a fan of this excellent Spike Lee joint. 🙂

Searching is a very modern take on a father looking for his missing teenage daughter. Everything you see on screen is…well…on a screen of some sort, be it FaceTime video calls, social media posts and videos, GPS mapping, etc. You may be thinking, why would I want to watch laptop/tablet/phone screens for 100 minutes when I do that for much longer periods every day?! But the director, Aneesh Chaganty, actually pulls it off very well, often cleverly, and after I noticed this “gimmick” early on, I later forgot about it, or at least wasn’t overly distracted by it. I enjoyed the urgent, fast-paced detective work of the story, and found myself rooting for the desperate father played by John Cho of Star Trek and Harold and Kumar fame.

Sicario: Day of the Soldado is perhaps not quite up to the same high level as the original Sicario, may be a bit less believable at times, and while retaining Josh Brolin and Benicio Del Toro, it lacks Emily Blunt. Still, I remain a sucker for a good action flick with well-trained soldiers and a pumping, tension-building soundtrack, and this one delivers on those fronts about as well as the first. If you don’t mind on-screen portrayals of violence and death, watch ’em both with the volume cranked!

Crazy Rich Asians is pretty much the lightweight rom-com I expected, with a lot of familiar elements, but still funny and pretty enough to recommend as a good date night flick. Jimmy Yang of the Silicon Valley TV series, Ken Jeong of the Hangover movies, and especially Awkwafina deliver hilarious performances. And I’ve liked Michelle Yeoh since Tomorrow Never Dies and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This is more forgettable than those, but still quite fun.

And for some trippy sci-fi fun…

Annihilation is from the same director, Alex Garland, as the more sinister, scarier (and better) Ex Machina. I enjoyed the latter more, but still recommend this for great visuals, malevolent tension and decent action/sci-fi performances by some of my favorite actresses: Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Tessa Thompson. As underscored by my favorite novel trilogy of the year, Three Body Problem, contact with extraterrestrial life may not turn out so well for us.

Enjoy!