Howdy! Hope things are going well for you this week.

As much as we hate them, passwords are a fact of digital life. They're important. So important that it really is critical to understand what it means to have a "good" password. And I'll absolutely admit that can be a challenge as the definition of "good" keeps changing. Read more...

Also this week:

Password vaults are one of the ways that we deal with the ever increasing complexity of passwords. They'll often enter passwords for you without needing to lift a finger. Problem is that sometimes they don't. Understanding how they do what they do can help. More on how password vaults work.

One of the problems I deal with regularly is people worrying about the wrong thing. Microsoft recording your Skype calls? Recent news might have you believe they do (not really), but honestly, there's something scarier to worry about when it comes to call recording. Read more...

When you delete a file from your machine it's removed -- from your machine. But what about your backups? Understanding how deletions and backups relate can save you in a disaster, as well as saving you from embarrassment. Read how, and when, files are deleted from backups.

I mentioned last week that Ask Leo! information is available in several ways. Today I just want to highlight one specific way that I believe can help a lot of people.

Towards the end of every Ask Leo! article written or updated in the past couple of years you'll find two sections: Podcast audio, which includes an embedded audio player so you can listen to my narration of the immediately preceding article, and Video narration, which includes an embedded YouTube video player so you can watch me narrate the article, if you like.

Have a great week!

How Do I Choose a Good Password?

We frequently hear of major websites suffering data breaches that expose millions of user accounts and passwords to hackers.

This type of theft makes the concept of “good passwords” all that much more important to understand.

Continue Reading: How Do I Choose a Good Password?
https://askleo.com/5440

How Do Password Vaults Enter Passwords?

This may seem like a silly question, but how do you get a password manager to enter the correct password when you need it? I have tried several password managers and I have yet to discover how to get it to enter the password.

It's not a silly question at all.

Password managers, aka vaults, use several techniques and indicators to decide when, where, and how to fill in your information.

I'll review some of the basic concepts that apply to most password vaults, as well as some of the complexity they have to deal with — including sites that seem to explicitly prevent their use.

Continue Reading: How Do Password Vaults Enter Passwords?
https://askleo.com/91936

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Are My Skype Calls Recorded?

Is Skype really not recording my private video calls on their servers anywhere on the internet or on hard copy?

In the past, my answer was that I thought it extremely unlikely that your Skype calls are recorded … at least by Skype. Recently there's been a wrinkle that indicates things may not be quite as private as we thought.

I'll dive into a number of reasons I believe that it's still mostly private and nothing, really, to worry about.

However, there's another, potentially much more dangerous scenario a lot of people overlook. Unfortunately, many are paying a very steep price for that.

Continue Reading: Are My Skype Calls Recorded?
https://askleo.com/6364

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Are Deleted Files also Deleted from Backups?

I back up to an external drive. When I later delete files from my C: drive, will those deletes be removed in future backups on the external drive? I don't want to restore files that I no longer want.

It depends on the specifics of your backup process, but in general, once you back something up, it remains in the backup file until the backup itself is deleted.

That's important, as we'll see shortly.

If you delete a file from your hard drive, the file is simply not present in future backups.

Continue Reading: Are Deleted Files also Deleted from Backups?
https://askleo.com/6404

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