{"id":6756,"date":"2024-04-16T15:49:00","date_gmt":"2024-04-16T15:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/advisorator.com\/members\/?p=6756"},"modified":"2024-04-16T15:49:00","modified_gmt":"2024-04-16T15:49:00","slug":"4-16-2024-peek-into-my-mailbag-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/advisorator.com\/members\/2024\/04\/16\/4-16-2024-peek-into-my-mailbag-2\/","title":{"rendered":"4\/16\/2024: Peek into my mailbag"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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More of your tech questions, answered<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Plus: Beeper gets bought, advanced undo options, and refurbished tech for less<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/div>
Jared Newman<\/div>
|<\/div>
April 16, 2024<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n
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Photo by Headway<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Quick programming note: Next week’s newsletter will arrive on Wednesday instead of Tuesday<\/strong> due to the timing of Passover this year. Thanks for your patience!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last time I did a Q&A column in Advisorator, the general consensus I picked up was, “This is great, but don’t do it too often.”<\/em> That was a little under six months ago, so the timing for another mailbag column seems about right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last time around, I answered some of your most pressing security and privacy questions<\/a>. Unsurprisingly, more of those have since arrived. But I’m also going to expand the scope this time with some smart questions about apps, deals, and gadgets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The questions below have been paraphrased for length and clarity, but otherwise come straight from your fellow Advisorator subscribers. Take it away, folks!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More security questions<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Merry A. asks:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I’m getting notifications on my iPhone that say, “This password has appeared in a data leak, which puts this account at high risk of compromise. You should change your password immediately.” Are these legit?<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

If you’ve been using Safari’s auto-fill feature or letting your iPhone save the passwords you enter, then yes. These alerts indicate that you’ve used the same password on a site that previously suffered a security breach, which in turn means the password may be shared among hackers to try and use on other sites. By heading to Settings > Passwords > Security Recommendations on an iPhone, you can view a list of sites where you’re using compromised passwords and tap on the links to change them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(For what it’s worth, many other password managers offer similar features, including Bitwarden<\/a>, 1Password<\/a>, Dashlane<\/a>, and Chrome<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

James M. asks:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“I recently purchased NordVPN and I’m unsure how it will effect access smart home devices and printers, and whether I should run the VPN directly on my router.”<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The VPN shouldn’t interfere with devices on your local network, but it can prevent some apps from from communicating with those devices while the VPN is running. To work around this, Nord offers a feature called split-tunneling<\/a> that exempts some apps from the VPN, and it even suggests apps that may benefit from this setup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your router allows it, running a VPN on the network level means you don’t have to set up the connection on every individual device, but there’s a trade-off: If the VPN causes any connection problems, you’ll need to fiddle with the router settings instead of just temporarily disabling the VPN on one device. (More fundamentally, it’s worth asking whether you need a VPN in the first place<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n

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More questions (and answers) await!<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This week’s full column is exclusively for Advisorator’s paid subscribers<\/a>, including answers to the following questions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n