You don’t have to be an FBI suspect to have your car tracked, recently the GPS manufacturer Tom-Tom admitted it sold users’ traffic data to Dutch police which was used to set speed traps and security researchers discovered Apple’s iPhone is storing location information that is used by Apple for research purposes.
On the 15 May 2011 702 Sydney program, Philip Clarke and Paul Wallbank discussed are our phones, GPS and other electronic devices tracking us and some of the things we should be aware of when using mobile phone and other GPS enabled technology.
We had a full board of callers and promised we’d get back to some of the following;
Images not showing in Internet Explorer
Kim called about her computer not showing images in Internet Explorer running on Windows Vista. This could be simply a matter of ticking the Show Pictures check box in the Advanced tab of the Internet Explorer Options settings. We explain how to do this, and how to handle further similar problems, on our IT Queries website.
Free Backup options
One of the most irritating things to lose when a computer crashes or you replace it are your email and contacts. Arthur asked about backing up this important data in Windows Hotmail Live on his Windows 7 computer.
Unlike some of the earlier versions, Windows 7 comes with its own backup program which Microsoft shows you how to use it on their website. Make sure you choose to backup your profile as this will save all your email, contacts and favorites along with your computer settings.
Once you’ve created the backup, we’d suggest using an online service like Dropbox or Box.net to keep a secure copy of these files.
Fixing a slow computer
Kristina asked about speeding up her computer that’s running slowly, particularly when Outlook 2003 is open. The first step is to backup your Outlook data which is saved in a PST file, just in case something goes wrong.
Next you should uninstall any programs and add ins that might be interfering with Outlook then run the Mailbox Clean Up Tool to get rid of anything you don’t need.
Having cleaned up Outlook, it’s time to run the Outlook Inbox repair tool which will fix any inconsistencies in the PST data store.
Once you’ve cleaned up Outlook, it’s time to do a general clean up of the computer that will flush out anything unnecessary on your system. Follow this with a drive check by running chkdsk which will clean up minor problems with the way your computer has saved data.
With all of these clean ups done you should have a much fast computer, if you don’t it may be time to call a computer technician.
Next 702 Sydney Weekend segment
We’ll have the date of the next 702 Weekends up on our events page in the next few days. The next Nighlife spot will be on June 16 where we’ll be discussing how to secure your data against incompetent organisations.
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Surely there is some federal legislation prohibiting unscrupulous vendors using my info w/o my permission. If there isn’t there shld be. Lobby Stephen Conroy NOW!!!