Category: Microsoft Windows

Yesterday, despite massive live streaming issues, Apple introduced the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus, the latest generation of their phones.  For the sake of full disclosure, I do own AlliOSNews, a site dedicated to iOS, much like this site is to Windows Phone.  But in all honesty, I was absolutely underwhelmed by what I saw yesterday from Apple.  If you go purely from a specifications perspective, the new Lumia 830 is on par and in many ways beats the new iPhone 6.  Then there is the cost factor.  It’s a bit eye watering when you come right down to it.

Facebook Messenger for Windows Phone has been updated overnight with performance improvements and a new forwarding feature.  It is the latest update in the instant messaging application that is now across multiple platforms including Windows Phone, iOS and Android.  The update is available now in the Windows Phone Store.  The big new feature is the ability to forward messages to others.

Facebook Messenger for Windows Phone – Free – Download Now

As I have said many times here on the site and on Twitter, I’m a big fan of OneDrive.  It’s a solid, multi-platform cloud storage solution that works brilliantly well Windows Phone, iOS, Mac, Android and of course Windows PC.  It’s also one of the best deals out there if you are an Office 365 user.  For $9.99 per month you get office plus 1TB of storage.  That’ll just about cover anyone I suspect.

One of the great things about OneDrive for Windows 8 is that you can have your PC save your files automatically to the cloud instead of to your local PC.  This not only saves you hard disk space locally (although you can keep a copy local if you wish) but it also is an effective and easy backup to all your files.  By default however this isn’t turned on so this How To will point you how to get there on your PC.

Over the course of the past several months, Microsoft has been slowly and quietly renaming the Nokia apps to the Lumia Apps.  This has all ben a part of the absorbing of Nokia as a company into Microsoft.  Last week during the Lumia 830 announcement at IFA, this became even clearer as every app mentioned by name was Lumia, like the Lumia Selfie app.  Now more and more of what were the Nokia apps are under the Lumia name.

Earlier this week you undoubtedly heard of the iCloud security breach that happened to some well know celebrities.  While Twitter and other places lit up with nudie pics of the like of Jennifer Lawerence, there were a lot of people at Apple frantically trying to find the source of the problem.  Was it a real breach?  Was there an inherent flaw in iCloud where anyone and everyone could be compromised?

The short answer is no.  This came down to, at the most basic level, a brute force attack against usernames and passwords. It was the latest in what seems to be a weekly announcement of someone having data security compromised by hackers.  The problem of course is that we all have digital data – digital footprints and fingerprints – all over the Internet.  From our Facebook account(s) to Twitter to our Banks.  Even our identification to remotely access our corporate networks.  Nobody is immune but you can protect yourself as best as possible.

Identification security is something we should all be vigilant about whether it is on our smartphones, our PCs or Macs.  Security breaches happen at the weakest point so the goal is to make it difficult to discourage but also not so difficult that you yourself are unable to access your data.  Here then are a few tips that you should consider when it comes to your personal data security.

Use Complex Passwords

The most basic thing you can do in personal data security is use complex passwords.  That is, use passwords with a mixture of:

• Upper-Case Letters
• Lower-Case Letters
• Numbers
• Special Character such as @£$%!
• At least 8 characters long

Passwords should also not be associate with any personally identifying information such as:

• Birthdays (yours, your spouses, your children, etc)
• Your address
• Your National Identification/Social Security Number

Complex passwords serve as a strong deterrent for those who would potentially try to gain access to your data.  While any password can be compromised with enough time, complex ones point hackers to easier targets.

It has been just over a month since I re-opened the doors of this site and it has been a great month.  First, thanks to everyone who has followed and welcomed me back into a community I was very active in from 1999 up until 2012.  I really appreciate it.  But this post isn’t about me.  It’s about Windows Phone.  And more specifically it is about how I think Windows Phone is posed for the first time for real greatness in the mobile market.  This comes, in large part, to the announcements that the Microsoft/Nokia team made yesterday and IFA in Berlin.  With three new Windows Phone’s announced – Lumia 830, Lumia 735 and Lumia 730, along with a slew of apps and accessories, yesterday was a banner day for the platform in many ways.

My attention over the past 24 hours though has been drawn to the Lumia 830.  Could it be the single device that takes Windows Phone more mainstream?  Equally, it is clear that (more important than me, the idiot with the microphone) Microsoft thinks that it is the device that will take them to the next level given their direct challenges to Apple and Samsung in their keynote.  Looking at the specs, it’s hard to argue.  In fact I won’t.  I agree wholeheartedly.