Two Excellent Internet Security “Buffers” That I Use…

Gnomie Chuck Johnston writes from Taiwan:

Hi, Chris!

Really appreciated your recent video on Privacy As Far As The Desktop Can See. Good advice that I (mostly) follow!

I’d like to share a couple of security “buffers” that I use to guard my online excursions. I haven’t heard them mentioned recently, but they sure have saved my bacon a few times!

OpenDNS
I’ve been using OpenDNS for years, and have really come to appreciate the security it provides while allowing for a lot of personal tweaking and adjustments. According to OpenDNS’ on-site blurb: “OpenDNS protects more than a million people a day across hundreds of thousands of schools, businesses and homes as they navigate the Internet. We block phishing sites and give you the power to block adult sites, proxies, and individual domains.” Best of all, it does this at the router level! ALL of the computers on my home network are invisibly protected. OpenDNS does more than provide security. It also speeds up Internet access, provides shortcuts to frequently used sites and intervenes with intelligible information when I mistype a URL or when a site is down.

Calling Link ID Advisor/Toolbar
I’ve been using Calling ID Advisor/Toolbar for nearly a year, and I love the way that it protects me both in Outlook 2003 and in IE7. In combination with IE7’s own Phishing filter and OpenDNS, I’ve not been sucked into a malicious site by click on a link in OL or IE for a long, long time! Like OpenDNS, there is a way to give feedback on sites that are not malicious or otherwise beyond the pale of good “netiquette.”

Both of these services probably err a bit on the side of overprotection, but not by much. Knowing that there are lots and lots of bad folks working to snare my information by any possible means, I’m not adverse to a modicum of overprotection!

Hope you can mention these two fine, free services in your Web log!