Tech News and Commentary

Dave and the team discuss old TVs abandoned at people's homes by a man wearing a TV over his head (picture below), the Galaxy Note 10, the security measures of a Welsh public toilet, Amazon's returns and Kohl's gains, a driver's 8 Pokemon Go phones, and more.

Our guest this hour:

Tony Frangiosa, Founder & CEO of InstallerNet

Roger in Wheeling, West Virginia listens on 1370 WVLY and asked: "Presently have a flip phone from Walmart, looking to move up to a smartphone. Not looking for anything fancy. Don't do a lot of texting. Probably don't text at all. Would like to get some apps - like to shop online for groceries. What do you recommend as a low-entry phone that's not going to cost me an arm and a leg, with the fact that I don't use cell phones often."

http://www.intotomorrow.com/media/podcasts/2019/08-23-2019/08-23-2019-H2S1.mp3

Roger, your needs are very basic and really most smartphones will do.

You can probably stay with Walmart and buy a Samsung J7 for less than $100 and get what you need, or get an older iPhone or a Samsung S7 for under $200 and they’ll do what you want.

You might look into services like Consumer Cellular. These are no-contract plans. You can get basic plans with 250 minutes of calls and 250MB of data per month for $20. The plans go up from there if you need additional calling and data. When you’re at home, you can connect it to wi-fi and not use up your data allotment. And they have basic smartphones like a ZTE model for $60 or a MotoE5 Play for $80.

Given how little you plan to do with your phone, any cheap option will do, there’s no reason for you to spend a lot of money.

Jim in Bandon, Oregon listens on 630 AM KWRO and asked: "My question relates to news I've been reading about how hackers can intercept passwords, credit cards, other sensitive information, just by being close to you in an airport or a shopping mall or wherever. Is this a real concern. Also heard there are cases you can buy for your phone, don't know if they are lined with lead or some other substance that can block the ability of the hackers. Is that a worthwhile purchase?"

http://www.intotomorrow.com/media/podcasts/2019/08-23-2019/08-23-2019-H2S2.mp3

Jim, no, it’s not.

If anyone is intercepting passwords and credit card transactions they’re probably doing via the network the computer is using.

Typically, passwords and financial transactions travel via encrypted connections, but if you’re accessing a site that is less secure, someone connected to the same network as you can sniff out the plain text information that you put out into the network.

The main advice people offer here is to avoid public WiFi and unprotected WiFi, but the last part of that is not great advice. Anyone with the WiFi password can still sniff out the contents of the data flowing through the network.

To dodge the issue you can look into using a VPN server. Virtual Private Networks encrypt the traffic you send out creating a secure tunnel through a potentially insecure network.

If you do get one, and it will probably cost you a few dollars a month if you do,