Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online?

#211

Post by barbecue_sauce » Wed, May 29, 2019, 9:04 PM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #209

barbecue_sauce wrote: post #39

Keep them offline. Get them smartphones, preferably iOS. Educate them about scams. My parents still conduct the majority of their personal business offline, and though I have scoffed at this in the past, it makes more sense for them and also keeps them safe. Their bills come in the mail, and its not uncommon for them to go to a department store and pay the bill for that chain's credit card in person. They meet with t…

Keep people offline by getting them smartphones? What?

Keep them offline... (for the most part).

Re: Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online?

#212

Post by mosselman » Fri, May 31, 2019, 8:10 AM UTC

robgibbons wrote: post #192

marcolussetti wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think installing an AdBlocker is one of the first things I do when asked to help someone. While I understand and regret the impact on people's business models, it seems to really mitigate issues for those less tech-savy (anecdotally that is). Something like uBlock Origin or the like might be a good idea to avoid this issue.

I install Privacy Badger and uBlock Origin for my Mom's computer. I also showed her how to disable them temporarily if a site isn't working as she expects.

I find, after some testing, that Privacy Badger has quite some impact on the speed with which pages load, think around 1 second in some cases, which I find a lot. I therefore recommend against this setup, which I have run for months now, after finding out about the performance impact. Instead I'd recommend using Firefox with its built-in blocking and adding ublock origin to that.

Re: Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online?

#213

Post by mosselman » Fri, May 31, 2019, 8:15 AM UTC

Consultant32452 wrote: post #155

bradleyankrom wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advice I could have used five years ago. I don’t even know how to talk to my parents about current events/politics now because we don’t share a common base of facts.

The hardest part of broaching this problem is learning to accept that, as a percentage, you're probably just as wrong about the facts as your parents are. Everyone likes to think that it's only "those people" who are foolish, subject to conspiracy, or other negative descriptors. Statistically, that's just not realistic. And even if you're 100% right, approaching people with the humbleness of assuming you're 80% wrong…

> you're probably just as wrong about the facts as your parents are.

It depends on the subject. If you believe that climate change doesn't exist, that we never went to the moon or that the earth is flat, you are just plain wrong and I am right.

Re: Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online?

#214

Post by mosselman » Fri, May 31, 2019, 8:22 AM UTC

rmtech wrote: post #174

defen wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My in-laws got hit by an absolutely ridiculous phone scam. Basically some guy called and said "Hey this is Apple, this is an emergency, your iCloud got hacked, you need to install this remote desktop software and give me your credit card info so I can fix it for you". They are smart people but they still fell for it. So, the advice we gave them was that no organization is going to use a phone call to deliver importan…

> They are smart people but they still fell for it. If they fell for that then they're not very smart. Would a smart person fall for it if a random hobo turned up at their door and claimed to be Jesus, but BTW he really needs you card and pin for 20 minutes, oh and $500 in cash as well! .....

Everybody has blind spots or moments of weakness. Scammers get a lot of practice and everyone could fall for a specific scam.

Assuming people aren't smart because they fall for a scam doesn't do them justice and it shows a lack of empathy on your part.

Re: Ask HN: How do I make sure my non-technical parents are safe online?

#215

Post by mosselman » Fri, May 31, 2019, 8:24 AM UTC

PascLeRasc wrote: post #13

Maybe this is off-topic, but everything I know about personal security I learned from my mom. She gets spam calls like we all do, claiming to be health insurance or the IRS or something, and she'll always hang up, look up the right phone number, and call that back and see if there really is anything going on. Same with emails, she doesn't click links but instead goes to the website independently and logs in there. Sh…

> ...I'd bet most of our parents are kinda the same.

Haha, I am 100% sure that this is not the case.