Protecting your Android device and your Privacy

Its been a while since I have written about how to protect your self from the prying eyes of government. So if your trying to protect your self against the NSA, GCHQ, or who ever here are some things that you can do to help protect yourself.

How a Cracker breaks wifi and more details, WEP,WPA,WPA2,WPS and more

Attacking wifi tools and how attacks work.
Wifi types are open, wep, wpa1, WPA2, wpa2 enterprise. There are also services on wifi to help people connect for the first time easier.  This service is called wps.  WPS is either active or passive. So here are the bellow

KitKat Android 4.4 Privacy using Privacy guard or AppOps

We all may know that Google removed an essential tool for keeping your self privacy in your control on your device. So here are some ways that you can control that.

Standard Trouble Shooting steps for Exchange ActiveSync (EAS)

Trouble shooting your smartphone is a pain and can be hard for your tech support group when they do not have a smartphone to play with themselves to see what you’re seeing.

Some of the most common smartphones in my company are Samsung galaxy s3, galaxy s4, Motorola DROID maxx, and maxx HD. So these are some of the problems that our users get especially after migrating from BlackBerry devices.

Android Virus

Android along with every other operating system has viruses. recently defcon 2013 a researcher discovered that they can modify the android APK and still keep the signature of the package to make it look authentic.

Overclocking the Galaxy S3 CM10.1 and benchmark

Overclocking Your Galaxy S3 D2ATT is fun. Things can go wrong when your upgrading though if you follow the steps and have some know how you can get more performance out of your device at little risk.

Providing Battery Power for your Samsung Galaxy s3, s4, or other smartphone/tablets

Keeping power on your device is always a good thing and when your using a smartphone your screen will eat up your batter before the end of the day.

Parsing Your Alogcat on Android terminal emulator

When running alogcat you will be getting lots of logs that you do not need and it is important to filter out the junk.

Getting alogcat working on JellyBean

Since Jellybean the only logs that applications will be able to see is their own since jellybean updated its security to prevent other applications from view them.

Theming our Android OS

When Theming your android device there are somethings that I like doing. For one I like seeing the background and don't like the look of having large widgets on my home screen.

I personally don't like the Stock UI that comes with my Samsung Galaxy SIII. So I have removed it and went with a Custom Rom called Cyanogenmod I prefer their custom book logo and their system icons then that of samsungs.
You can find Cyanogenmod located here.
http://www.cyanogenmod.org/

Though I am not fond of the default Launcher. So I use the NOVA Launcher. When Using the nova launcher it lets me change the way my home screen looks. I do not like having the google search on the home screen. I use the menu button to bring up the google now to search. It also gives a lot of other controls.

The next thing is using the nova launcher to change the icons.  I prefer round icons than the default ones that come with android. The Rain apps look like the screen shoot bellow.

For the background I use a Anime hd wallpaper app to get the background. They have loads of different anime pictures.

The Clock you can customize the color to meet what your background is. The clock app that I am using is BobClockD3.

Let me know what you think. there are many other things out there that can be used out there to help you theme. Though these things generally depend on what rom your using and the launcher.

Happy theming,
-Local Tech Repair Admin

Secure your Android phone

Securing your phone is a very important thing in this day and age. If you get mugged, if you get a virus, or get pulled over by a cop that wants to peak in your phone. Securing your info is essential to keeping your information private and out of others sights.

Things to do with Root

Rooting is one of the best things when it comes to smartphones. Rooting give you power, customization, privacy, and control. Here are some ways you can use your rooted phone to give you some more of that.

Android Gaming - 2013

I once heard that the android and mobile os was going to replace the traditional console.  Though what I have seen is that android does not have the development quality as that of the console market. 

Amazon Dungeon Defenders: Second Wave

So recently this week I got a new device and went to install Dungeon Defenders Second Wave from amazon where I had bought it. Then i noticed it wasn't there anymore. And no were to be found on amazon.

Samsung Galaxy S3 I747 Remove Custom Rom Count

For those that are flashing your phone and flashing custom roms you can sometimes trip the counter and when something goes wrong and you need to return your phone or send it in for warranty you need to have it read as 0. So how do you reset it?

How to Root & Overclock Your Samsung Galaxy S3 I747

When you get a new phone or just getting tired of not being able to remove the ATT crapware from your device. Rooting the device is always a good way to do it.

Samsung galaxy s3 crash with N.O.V.A 3

So started playing around with my new Galaxy S3 i747 phone. As normal overclock and root it like normal. There is a lot you can do with and rooted and over clocked phone. The phone seems to handle it well when clocking at 1.8GHz and the GPU set to 480 MHz. stress tested it for around 30 mins and it work fine.

Android NodeBeat Review

I recently got NodeBeat for android. I was not really expecting much for a simple music program that or something a non music person could use. Though I must say I enjoy it.

SwiftKey 3 Beta

Not to long ago swiftkey 3 beta opened. I recently got my hands on it to see if they had really made any difference from the swiftkey x app. Right off the bat I did not notice any difference. Though from other bloggers it seems to be that they changed around their UI a little and added a some new themes. If this was a all they did I would wonder why they would make a new product for people to buy. Though it looks like they added some new smarter prediction software based on your sms, gmail, twitter, and facebook.

Android Antivirus What Apps Work and Which Do Not Work

I had written an article earlier about a simple test to see which anti virus apps work better for android than others. Though recently AV-Test.org was able to do some more comprehensive tests on the topic. So here is their results.

If you like to check out my reviews of some of the different AntiVirus apps for android check it out here

If your looking for a free android antivirus that did really well. Avast android is one of the few that did well and it is free.

"Mostly traditional anti-virus vendors are in the top range of the average family detection results (> 90%): Avast, Dr. Web, F-Secure, Ikarus and Kaspersky. Exceptions are Zoner and Lookout which make into the top 7 group. Using these products you don’t have to worry about your malware protection." -- AV-TEST.org

Some of the products that you should be avoiding for buying or it you have bought you should probably just remove them sense they don't do much in the area of protection are Bullguard, Comodo, G Data, McAfee, NetQin and Total Defense which had detection between (40 - 65%).

If your wanting to read the full report of what they have check it out here

I hope this helps you decide one what anti virus apps to get for your android and keep you from wasting money on ones that won't do anything for you.
- Local Tech Repair Admin