When you encrypt a file or a hard drive, is it really secure?

There's no such thing as perfect security. Someone with sufficient time and money, and a strong enough motive, can crack anything.
So the real question becomes: Is your encryption secure enough. And the answer is: If your encryption software uses a recognized and respected standard such as AES or Blowfish, and you use strong passwords and take other precautions, it almost certainly is. 
If given enough time or processing power, any password can be cracked through a brute force attack--where a program throws words and random character strings at an encrypted file until it stumbles upon the right password. But with a sufficiently strong password, the time and processing power required is just not practical.

 

 

To get an idea of how quickly a password can be cracked, check out How Secure is My Password? When I tried the word password, the web site told me that a conventional PC could crack it "almost instantly." On the other hand, if I used a random string of eight lowercase letters, my files would be safe for all of 52 seconds. But a string of 18 characters, including digits, punctuation, and upper- and lowercase letters, would remain safe for "3 quintillion years." I think that's sufficient--even assuming the use of hardware more powerful than a single PC.
But back up your strong passwords with other good habits. Always be suspicious about possible scams. Keep your security software up to date. Never share a password with anyone with whom you wouldn't share a credit card account. And if a Web site offers two-step verification, use it.
When you come right down to it, your security system doesn't have to be 100-percent impenetrable. It just needs to be harder to crack that most other, equally-tempting targets.
See Learn to use strong passwords for more on protecting yourself. And read the original forum discussion.

                    ANDROID APPS DOWNLOAD

 

DOWNLOAD APK FILES FROM THE LINKS BELOW

 

 

The Z10 Has Arrived In The U.S.

 

 

After several delays, broken promises, and doomsday prognostications, BlackBerry’s next-generation smartphone, the BlackBerry Z10, hits U.S. stores tomorrow.
For a company still eyeing a comeback in the brutally competitive smartphone business, the U.S. launch of the device represents a particularly critical turning point. Despite the BlackBerry falling from grace here, the U.S. is still the device’s largest market, representing 20 percent of total subscribers, according to an analyst. A successful launch that attracts old and new users alike could provide BlackBerry with the fuel to turn itself around. But should the Z10 come out cold, BlackBerry could be looking for a buyer within a year.
Yes, the stakes are that high for a company that once reigned over the smartphone world, its trademark Qwerty keyboard phone holstered to many belts in corporate America. Since then, BlackBerry has fallen on extremely hard times, its market share and stock price withered from their prime just five years ago


 The day has finally come. The new Blackberry Z10 has been released on AT&T for $199 with a two year contract. If you are a Blackberry fan and on T-Mobile or Verizon, you are going to have to wait a few more days. If you are with Sprint — like me — you will not get the chance to purchase this phone. Sprint has announced that they will only be carrying the Blackberry Q10. Now for me, it’s is worth the wait for the Q10. I love that QWERTY keyboard.

Google is getting a smart watch too?

First Apple, then Samsung, and now Google. Word has it that another tech giant is working on its own wrist technology being developed in its Android unit.

A smartwatch boom seems to be going on. Besides smaller companies debuting new wrist technology, the tech giants are also grabbing for a piece of the pie.
Google is the newest company to supposedly be stepping into the watch world. According to The Financial Times, Google's smartwatch is allegedly being developed by the company's Android unit rather than its X Lab.
This is telling because it means that, unlike Google Glass, the company may be looking to get a consumer product out to users on a speedier timeline.

How to customize your Facebook page for free

Give Facebook a near-complete makeover by using the free Social Fixer add-on for Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and other browsers not named Internet Explorer.

Facebook's built-in customization features
There's a boring sameness about Facebook profiles. Pretty much all you can do is add profile and cover photos, change what appears on your timeline, and tweak the contents of your news feed. The Facebook Help Center provides instructions for adding a profile picture and cover photo; adding, hiding, and deleting items on your About page; and customizing the content of your news feed.
There's also information in the Help Center that describes customizing the appearance of a Facebook Page. According to Facebook's Managing a Page section, Pages can be created only by people who are "the official representative of an organization, business, celebrity or band."
Not being an official representative of anything or anyone in particular, I'll have to leave the Facebook Page crafting to someone else, alas.

Give Facebook some personality with Social Fixer
Just because Facebook hasn't placed much emphasis on customization to date doesn't mean we're stuck with the layout and options the company offers. The Social Fixer browser add-on spiffs up your Facebook account with such features as news-feed tabs, feed filters that let you direct specific items to one of your tabs, image previews, and themes.
Social Fixer works with Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari, Opera, and other browsers, but not with Internet Explorer. I tested the Chrome version of the add-on. The first screen of the program's seven-step setup wizard lets you choose the recommended settings or a "minimalist" approach that turns off most of the add-on's features by default.
The option to place application and game posts in separate tabs on your news feed is selected automatically on the setup wizard's second screen. The third lets you customize the chat list by removing the chat sidebar and replacing it with the old pop-up chat list. You can also show all online friends on the chat list (this option is selected by default), or use a compact chat list that does away with thumbnail images.

How to Enhance Your Router With Open-Source Firmware

The stock firmware included on many broadband routers takes advantage of only a fraction of the hardware's capabilities. We explain how to use use powerful open-source firmware to unleash the beast in your router.

 

 

As the number of connected devices in our homes and offices continues to multiply, the limitations of many consumer-grade broadband routers become increasingly apparent. Not so long ago, many users had just one or two systems connected to the Web through their router. But today, many users have multiple smartphones, tablets, printers, laptops/notebooks, and desktop systems connected to their routers, along with such consumer electronics devices as Blu-ray players, HDTVs, and game consoles.

When a basic broadband router has to juggle so many connected devices simultaneously, bad things can happen. If you're lucky, everything works; but for many routers, the load that the connected devices impose becomes excessive, resulting in poor performance or instability.

One potential solution is a drastic upgrade to open-source firmware that can increase the performance and enhance the stability of many routers, and also add lots of new features.

Prepare Before You Commit

Flashing open-source firmware on a broadband router isn't particularly difficult, but the broad range of routers currently on the market means that the process varies from one device to another. If you decide to give open-source router firmware a try, we strongly recommend that you conduct all of your research and obtain all of the files necessary for completing the task before making a single modification; a little prep work will help ensure that the process goes smoothly.

About Mobile Number Portability(MNP) in Nigeria:

About Mobile Number Portability(MNP) in Nigeria:  

 

 CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIDEO

  Where the Director of Public Affairs of the NCC talked about MNP in Nigeria:

So, What is Mobile Number Portability?

MNP will enable a subscriber move from his service provider (donor) to another (recipient) without losing the number he/she already uses (eg change from MTN to Glo Mobile without losing his/her MTN number).

When you request to change your service provider, the recipient provider will issue you a new sim card but you will still retain your phone number. This simply means a subscriber can keep his/her phone number when changing from one service provider to another despite the change in the SIM card of the subscriber.

For you to understand the processes involved in MNP, you have to familiarize yourself with the terms below:

  *Port In: joining a new service provider

  *Port Out: leaving a service provider

  *Subscriber : The customer that owns the number to be ported

  * Recipient: The service provider that a subscriber is changing to

  *Donor: The service provider a subscriber is changing from.

Example

If subscriber A wants to leave MTN for Glo Mobile, it means subscriber A is porting out of MTN and porting in to Glo. MTN in this example is the donor, while Glo Mobile is the recipient.

So, How Do I Change My Network Without Losing My Number?

If you want to change your service provider, you will have to visit a recipient operator via one of its points of sale such as office, friendship centre, high street store, corporate sales team, or authorised dealer.  For example, if you want to change from MTN to Glo, you will have to visit a Gloworld outlet or a Glozone shop to request for MNP.

When you get to the office of the recipient, you will be issued MNP request form to fill. You must have a valid proof of identity with visible photograph, your SIM must be ACTIVE, you must be able to provide the serial number of your SIM card and you must have registered the active SIM card.

A new SIM of the recipient provider will be issued to you and the SIM will be registered at the office. You will be informed to text "PORT" to 3232. If you fail to send the text, the request will not be honoured.

The recipient provider will forward your request to NPC (Number Portability Clearing House ) where validation will be carried out. If validated OK, the SIM will be activated and you will be informed.

Once your new SIM is activated, any airtime you have left on your old SIM will be wiped off and calls you make thereafter will be billed according to the default tariff plan of your new service provider BUT your phone number will still remain the same.

Cheers!