Benjamin W. Smith

Benjamin W. Smith

Benjamin W. Smith  //  Sysadmin by trade, Pythonista by passion. Dad to two boys and a girl. Guitarist. I like my coffee black, just like my metal.

Feb 3 / 10:59pm

Facebook SSL All-The-Effin-Time (mostly)

This evening I found out that either someone hacked my Facebook, or my phone network routed me through Tampa, FL (seen something similar before, just not so far away).  Regardless, I have to say that Facebook seems to have fairly decent security mechanisms.  

That being said, I can't stress enough how important it is to make sure you're as secure as you can be Facebook, so here is how to turn SSL on all-the-effin-time (except with some apps/games that don't support it, *le sigh*).

 

  • Visit: https://www.facebook.com/editaccount.php
  • Next to 'Account Security', click 'change'.
  • Under 'Secure Browsing (https)', click the 'Browse Facebook on a secure connection (https) whenever possible' check box.
  • Now click 'Save'.

 

There, doesn't that feel better?

To be honest, it was probably my weak ass password (for shame!), and not browsing over a non SSL connection that got my account compromised, but this important and you shouldn't hesitate to do it.

Hopefully by the time you read this sentence, you will have enabled SSL.

Seriously.  Do it.

Filed under  //  facebook   security   ssl  
Sep 11 / 11:05pm

Facebook "noise"

So, I've noticed an unnerving trend on my facebook account; a chaotic flurry of applications & notification..

On a daily basis I login to facebook only to find, on average, 10 notifications that are all from applications. No personal touch, only canned messages. It's almost spam like, except for the fact that I solicited these messages :(..

It's almost overwhelming how many times my warewolf gets attacked, or my vampire get's chumped! Not to mention the requests for new applications..

Neat linux tip for the day:

# nl [file] | grep [string]

That will return the string you're looking for with it's line number prepended to it!

Filed under  //  facebook   geek   linux