Choosing gifts for the holiday, we most often think about technology. This is the very first thing that comes to mind. Don’t know what to give a friend or relative? How about a new tablet? Everyone loves new gadgets.
New technology brings convenience, but it also comes with risks. For example, threats to privacy and privacy.
This guide is a list of the best gifts for people who care about their safety.
Wallet with RFID blocking
Think your bank cards are safe in your wallet? From pickpockets unequivocally, however, there are also "wireless" pickpockets – scanning RFID chips. An attacker can use an RFID scanner (similar to the one used for payment) to transfer funds from your bank card to himself by approaching you at close range.
Wallets with RFID signal blocking are a modern approach to solving this problem. The wallet is made of fabric that blocks RFID chips, which prevents them from being accessed just like that.
Don’t carry wallets? Such material can be easily ordered on the Internet. Anything can be made from it.
Password manager subscription
If you use the Internet, you definitely need a reliable password manager. The time when a password could be created simply from the name of a beloved pet has already passed.
As the number of passwords and their complexity increase, it becomes quite difficult to remember them all. But this is not necessary, because password managers come to the rescue, for example, 1Password or Dashlane. Passwords are stored in one place and synced across all devices. Thus, you can set complex passwords on sites without fear of forgetting them.
YubiKey
Two-factor authentication, as you’ve probably heard countless times, is absolutely essential to secure your online accounts.
But did you know that that extra layer of security also comes in the form of a cute little USB key? The YubiKey is a small device that connects to your computer and uses four multi-protocol security keys to authorize you as the user of the device.
It can be used to add additional layers of authentication security, for example in combination with a standard password. And it is possible without a password at all, just like a hardware security key.
Microphone blocker
When you open Instagram and immediately see an ad for something that was talked about 20 minutes ago, you realize how amazingly attentive our devices can be. In truth, it’s not that hard for hackers or other third parties to use the microphone on a hacked laptop or smartphone to eavesdrop on its owner.
How often does this happen? Most likely not, but we’ll leave it up to you or the privacy freak you choose to gift. Microphone blocker Mic-Loc for 500 rubles, simply plugs into the 3.5mm audio jack of the device and prevents applications from accessing the microphone.
State Anti-Spying Trend
These days, almost everywhere you go, you are being watched. Sound crazy? This is true. We are constantly caught on camera tapes – store surveillance, government street cameras, drone cameras and smart doorbells or even just smartphones. Much of this is just regular video footage that no one will ever see. But some are being viewed and even analyzed, often using machine learning and facial recognition technologies. The police even used social media images to identify people at the protests.
However, this is not something to be afraid of. Modern man often has to sacrifice his privacy. You can’t completely hide from this, but a lot of interesting and stylish things have been developed to resist surveillance. Phantom sunglasses use a special reflective material for infrared radiation, making it difficult to recognize the face of the person wearing them.
Adversarial Fashion offers an entire line of shirts, sweatshirts and other clothing embellished with patterns designed to trick license plate cameras into filling up their databases with junk data, preventing them from tracking people.
It is worth noting that these clothes should be taken more as a stylish toy for geeks, interesting in terms of how they work and whether they can fool artificial intelligence, rather than as a tool for hiding from real security cameras. Such accessories are more likely to attract more attention than stealth.
USB condom
Yes, such devices do exist and can be very useful. Such a "condom" can keep you safe when using public charging stations with USB ports, such as airports and hotels.
Just plug it in between your device and the charging station, creating an air gap between the USB port and your smartphone, laptop or whatever you’re charging. This precaution will interrupt any data transmission.
The operation of the USB condom is simple: it turns any USB port into a charge-only port by blocking all data lines. You can make it yourself using a regular wire, but if you don’t want to bother, you can order it for $10 on Amazon.
Raspberry Pi 4
If you are looking for a gift for a geek, then you can pay attention to Raspberry Pi. These palm-sized microcomputers have been popular since 2012. They impress not only with their computing power, but also with a virtually unlimited number of application scenarios. The Raspberry Pi is powerful enough to be used as a desktop computer too.
A $6,000 Raspberry Pi 400 was recently released, with all of its computing hardware inside a functioning keyboard. Such a keyboard can simply be connected to a monitor, equipped with a mouse and used as a full-fledged PC.
But the real magic of the Raspberry Pi family is the endless list of useful, creative, and really unexpected things they can be used for.
People use the Raspberry Pi to build retro consoles, control robots and smart home devices, run web servers, mine bitcoin, stream music, run Twitter bots, and many other non-standard tasks that can be a great pleasure to solve with your own hands for any creative person. tech lover.