security_class_101 Day_2

security 101:

Day 2: 

LastPass

LastPass is my cloud based Password data-base management application. I personally use KeePassX for local, and LastPass for my Internet passwords alone. I like different features in either app better. The major advantages to LastPass are the full range of Browser compatibility(IE,Opera, chrome/chromium, safari).  The browsers it does not play well with are:Maxthon, Avant, and a bunch of the Linux web-browsers(epiphany{gnome}midori), while a bunch of Linux browsers are based on the source code of firefox.

I will say that I am reviewing this from a free user perspective. If anyone wants to see a review of the pro, and how yubiKey works with LastPass. Although Hak5 has done a bunch of episodes on using yubiKey's, and LastPass.

LastPass advantages:


~ compliant w/ all of the major operating systems:Linux/mac/windows/BSD(sadly no haiku)

~ has a two factor authentication w/ cards, to perform two factor auth. with the free version.

~ has a security check for checking the strength of your passwords.
(there were three fast screens that flew by encrypting passwords, sending passwords, calculating password strength...)

~share the results to brag to your friend's or like in my case be disappoint by a mere 86%...:~{

~ Imports from almost any format, but doesn't export into many formats.

Import

VS.

export

~  Secure notes for keeping "secret" Lists.
(you can also copy/paste anything in one of thise lists you want.)


~ one click filling of form-data
(although I use AutoKey 2 automate strokes portably from inside a encrypted volume)

~Generate secure Passwords...

The LastPass Password generator, to give you an unlimited amount of random passwords.

 ~ It is my opinion that LastPass strength's lay in Cross-platform/browser, security check you can share with your friend's, a strong encryption focus. You can also use your Last Pass from the local Encrypted Vault. The Vault does work off-Line from your web-browser, but will alert you to off-Line being used. So even if Last Pass is doing maintenance, your still golden. I use my KeePassX local Linux password data-base, to fill in the Master-Password for my LastPass every time I log into most any of my browsers(I like Maxthon/Avant, Midori, and Epiphany as well...:/).

Although I think the main advantage from using any kind of password dataBase, is going to be the ease of use it is for (possibly-incompentent non-tech. users)to enter propperly strong passwords, and to easily change them if they find out their NT was attacked. 

Linux Mint 12 review: pt. 3 (B) 10 things 2 do after fresh install.

Top 10 things I do after a fres install continued:

3~ Disable auto-run. This is irritating to my control freak nature.

Notice the check box, at the bottom. 

All settings button leads you back to the main settings menu which looks like this.

4~ set up any necessary user accounts, depending on your specific situation.

I set myself as the admin, and my rommate's account to a standard user.

The plus and minus keys add/remove accounts. You must click the unlock button, as administrator to change any account settings.

Notice auto-login is switched on. I only recommend this,
with a standard user account on a Desktop PC. 

 5~ Change the Wallpaper of the back-ground. I chose the cube wallpaper. Although I really like a lot of the mountain backgrounds in Mint 12.

Notice the Dual-screen working very nicely.
I had to set this up in the Nvidia X server settings.

6~ Install Drop-box to sync my documents.

7~ mouse settings

I increased acceleration & sensativity, and checked show  position of pointer
when the control key is pressed. 

8~ set the nautilus file manager to open folders w/ a single click.

Just click the single click to open items radio button,
and the change is instantly applied.

To get to the File Management preferences go to the edit menu, and down to preferences.

9~ Make sure the Power/Screen settings are set properly for my situation.

On a laptop my main concern is power consumption, and on a Deskotp my main concern is making sure that I can watch movies from start to finish.

The default setting was to turn off after a half an hour.
I also switched the screen lock to off.

I choose Don't suspend when inactive.
Since this is a Desktop critically low power is pointless.

~10 customize my web browser(s) to my individual needs.

In chrome this is super-simple, because I have my g-mail account linked to my browser settings. So all of my extensions, web apps, and book-marks are linked in one easy step.

In Firefox I have to manually re-install all of my extensions, theme, and most common sites I visit I sync as well. I protect my Fire-fox passwords with a Master password.

After I have synced Fire-fox on-line, I choose to sync my  fire-fox data with chrome. Then I put a similar Master password to Google chrome.

Please check out Linux Mint on Distrowatch.com for more information & download it for yourself.

Link: Linux Mint's distrowatch page.

 I would also encourage you to go to the Linux Mint page, and create a user account so that you can help create the ratings for the software you enjoy. After all that is what has made Linux so resilient from the beginning, was peer review of the code. This gives every Linux mint user the chance to be a much needed part of the community. Microsoft or apple tell you what is good by marketing to you, but Linux Mint asks you to Learn from your peers. The Linux Mint community, also has an incredibly helpful community. My (LM) U/N is: zarr0BoogZ.

http://community.linuxmint.com/

Mini Post: Linux mint 12 installation slides.

 This is what happens after you successfully finish entering your user data, during the Linux mint 12 installation.

Welcome to Linux Mint.
Welcome and thank you for choosing Linux Mint. This slide show will show you around while the system is being installed on your computer.

Browse the web.
Be fast and safe on the web with Mozilla Firefox. Enjoy Java, Flash, and multimedia content.

Listen to music and CD's.
Enjoy your music with Banshee. Plug-in your MP3 player or extract songs from your audio CDs. Listen to pod-casts and on-line radios. Discover new artists on last.fm, the Internet Archive and the Amazon MP3 store. 

 

Watch videos and DVD's.
Insert a DVD and enjoy a movie. Watch high-definition videos with VLC.

Manage your photos.
Organize, enjoy and share your photos with gThumb or Picasa. Export your albums to CD, to the web, or to on-line services such as flickr or PicasaWeb to share them with friends and family.

Stay connected.
Keep in touch with your friends and contacts, by email, messenger, or on your favorite social networks. Linux Mint provides all you need to interact with Twitter, Facebook, MSN, ICQ, GoogleTalk, AIM, Yahoo and many other networks. 

Be productive.
Use Libre Office to create4 professional documents, spreadsheets, and presentations that are fully compatible with Microsoft Office. Archive documents, emails, or web pages to PDF. Send and receive files with Giver on the local network. Share printers or access them remotely.

Install software.
Browse through 30,000 free applications from the Software Manager. Enjoy screen-shots and user reviews. Install software with one click of the mouse.

Run Windows software.
Install Wine and run Windows software in Linux Mint. Or install Virtual-box, and run Windows itself within Linux Mint.

Customize your desktop.
Make yourself at home and modify any aspect of your desktop. Choose from a large variety of themes, icons and backgrounds. Linux Mint is open and easy to customize.

Keep your system up to date.
Receive fixes and security updates all in one place, for the entire system, including the software you install.

Find help.
If you're curious about something or if you're facing a problem, simply ask around. Linux Mint is the 4h most widely used Operating system in the world. It comes with a user guide, a community website, a collection of tutorials, active forums, and chat rooms, and one of the most dynamic communities on the Internet.

Linux mint 12 review: pt. 1 Installation

This slide-show shows you around, while you are waiting for the installer to finish.

I had so much to say about this Linux distribution, that I am breaking it up into several parts.

Live mode worked great for me to poke around, and get my bearings within Linux Mint. I am really grateful that my task-bar has been returned to me.

I used k3b on Linux mint 11 to burn the project. Which is great, because it takes a check-sum of the .iso before attempting the burn. Then after the disk is burned you can choose to save, &/or verify your data. Although I have had the problem, of k3b being rather picky about accepting discs.

 k3b is my preferred Linux burning program, no matter which platform it is on. I really wish that it had a windows equivalent. I have never had any burn failures, while using k3b.

BIOS chip.

Because my windows refuses to do the factory reset from the main HDD(hard-disk drive) hidden rescue partition. I am guessing because I had to replace the mother-board. The mother-board has the same exact physical make-up, except for a slightly newer version of the BIOS(Basic Input/Output system).

All that means is that I have another whole HDD to install and test Linux distribution's in bare-metal form. Although I do plan to test many Linux installs within Linux Mint 12. I have decided to keep my Linux Mint 11 intact on my other internal 360 GB HDD.

I want to go into some of the basics of choosing a partition scheme, file-system format, and mount-points. I do this so that you won't have any trouble making changes on your own computer. I will include slides from my own desktop, and net-book.

The complicated part of the install doesn't even start, until you get to this screen. Many people get scared of this step, because it could wipe out other operating systems, or personal data. If you have properly prepared, you will have nothing to worry about.

It is crucial that you click something else, if you want to multi-boot Linux mint 12 with other Operating systems. I would only use erase/install if you are sure your files are backed up, and you just want a simple

• PARTITION SCHEME:

  

  notice the 10gb partition(far right)_windows restore(primary)
  Notice that the extended partition has two sub-partitions.

  
  

  
  



creating a SWAP file.

•  Well There are two types of primary partition's main primary, and extended primary.
• Extended primary partitions, are partition's that have been sub-divided into logical partitions.
• Lucky for Linux is that it can boot from logical, or primary partitions.
• A SWAP partition is used when your programs can't fully fit into RAM, those files will be swapped to the HDD.
• Although HDD's are slow compared to RAM. So Ideally you want to have as much memory as possible. Windows has the same principle with it's Swap file. Although windows swap file is on the main system drive. This is a huge success in ensuring a stable Linux Operating system install.
• FILE-SYSTEM FORMAT:



Linux mint HDD partition scheme viewed
with Gparted partition editor.

• NTFS is the default windows file-system for many years now
• Ext4 journaling is the standard Linux desktop file-system right now.
• btrfs aka butterFS is getting ready to replace ext4 in the future.  
• the SWAP file should be @ least equal to double, the amount of physical memory in your computer. 
• MOUNT-POINT selection:

  

  My primary Linux drive partition scheme.

• / is the base of the Linux file-system. Also known as root.
• You can remap parts of the file-system to other partition's.
• /boot is often put on a separate 100-200 MB partition to ensure proper working of the GRUB2 boot loader.
• GRUB is what switches between Operating systems at boot time.
   
• /media is often set aside on a separate file system, So that the / partition including system files will not overfill. That would cause a real slowdown.  I would give as much as possible to this partition. These are where your personal files will be stored
• I am going to finish up this review with a slide-show from the install.
  
  
  
  

  

  Just click continue if you Live in the USA.

  
  

  
  

  

  just click continue if the right time-zone has been selected.
  It does not matter if the city is correct, only the time
  zone.

  
  

  
  

Compared to the partition steps all the rest of the steps as you can see, are really simple. 




Although I will not show it here There is a step where you input your user name, real-name, and password. On that same screen you can choose to login automatically, although I only choose this for guest accounts on desktop computers. 


You can also choose to encrypt your home folder, so that all of your personal files are safe from prying eyes. I choose not to do this, on my desktop, but do do this on my net-book. It is a lot more likely that my net-book could be compromised.




Which brings us to the final step:











Just click install now. You still have the user information screen, but after which you are treated to a slide-show to introduce you to Linux mint. It will tell you when to reboot your computer, marking the finish of your Linux mint 12 install.