Linus' House of IT: 15 cents please

[Linus]

Originally Posted by Andrea

It has been a while since this thread has been used so I am assuming between the financial crisis and inflation your price has gone up. I will deposit a quarter and if that isn't enough, please bill me.

A few days ago our home internet wasn't working. My honey tried the usual: reboot and reset the router. He finally called our provider where he was told to change a setting to No Proxy. It worked.

My honey was frustrated with the whole thing and didn't ask any questions so I am hoping you can explain to me why a setting that had been okay for several years was now not okay. And what is Proxy and how does No Proxy affect us?

Thank you in advance for your sharing your knowledge.

So it sounds like there may be an issue here. First, let's explain what a proxy is.

A proxy is a special kind of computer that acts on behalf of another computer. The term comes from the voting reference (voting by proxy) where someone can have a friend or family member vote on their behalf at things like stock meetings, political meetings, etc.

Usually we use computer proxies for one of two reasons. The first is to surf anonymously. For example, if you visit here, we (the admins) can see what IP address you are accessing the site from and a rough idea where you are (and to be clear, we don't monitor this simply because it's too much time and not something we do unless we have an issue with some or suspect someone of being a spammer).

If you were to access the site through a proxy, every time you visit a page you "ask" the proxy to go to the page. The proxy goes to the page, gets the page information (e.g., text, pictures, etc.) and then turns around sends it back to you. A proxy can be anywhere in the world. So, for example, if I was visiting the website from my home but using a proxy in Tokyo, it would show up as if I was in Tokyo and not Los Angeles.

Hopefully that helps.

Now, on why it changed. I have a question: does the router have wifi on it? And if it does, do you have a password on the wifi and have you changed the default administrator password? Most of the time these routers come with a default admin password and it's very possible that someone could have gotten into the router and changed those settings to use your router to surf.

It is EXTREMELY important to change the password on the router to something that is difficult and not related to anything you like (e.g., movies, tv shows, celebrities) or covet (e.g., kids, spouse, friends, family, furrkids). The password should NOT be less than 12 characters, have both lower and upper case, numbers and special characters (e.g., !@#$%^&*....)

[Andrea]

Originally Posted by Linus

Now, on why it changed. I have a question: does the router have wifi on it? And if it does, do you have a password on the wifi and have you changed the default administrator password? Most of the time these routers come with a default admin password and it's very possible that someone could have gotten into the router and changed those settings to use your router to surf.

It is EXTREMELY important to change the password on the router to something that is difficult and not related to anything you like (e.g., movies, tv shows, celebrities) or covet (e.g., kids, spouse, friends, family, furrkids). The password should NOT be less than 12 characters, have both lower and upper case, numbers and special characters (e.g., !@#$%^&*....)

Yes, it is on WiFi and yes, there is a password assigned by the internet provider. It is at least 15 characters long and has never been changed. Heck, I don't even know how to change it. I don't believe it has upper and lower case, or special characters.

If someone had changed the router password, how would I have been able to access the internet on my laptop and tablet? How would changing to No Proxy have allowed me internet access?

Thank you for the Proxy explanation. I don't think I need to be able to use a proxy but with NSA and such.....

[Linus]

Originally Posted by Andrea

Yes, it is on WiFi and yes, there is a password assigned by the internet provider. It is at least 15 characters long and has never been changed. Heck, I don't even know how to change it. I don't believe it has upper and lower case, or special characters.

If someone had changed the router password, how would I have been able to access the internet on my laptop and tablet? How would changing to No Proxy have allowed me internet access?

Thank you for the Proxy explanation. I don't think I need to be able to use a proxy but with NSA and such.....

The password I'm referring to is the administrator password, not the wifi one. I suspect that the router is at 192.168.1.1 and they usually have a default password. (something like admin/password) unless the ISP changed it.

And it's possible that someone changed it for their own purposes or accidentally selected the wrong option. If the admin password was never changed it's possible.

Oh.. and a proxy won't prevent the NSA from looking at your stuff. The only way to ensure that they don't see your stuff is to not surf the web or be online.

[Andrea]

Originally Posted by Linus

The password I'm referring to is the administrator password, not the wifi one. I suspect that the router is at 192.168.1.1 and they usually have a default password. (something like admin/password) unless the ISP changed it.

And it's possible that someone changed it for their own purposes or accidentally selected the wrong option. If the admin password was never changed it's possible.

Oh.. and a proxy won't prevent the NSA from looking at your stuff. The only way to ensure that they don't see your stuff is to not surf the web or be online.

No, I do not currently use an admin password. I will set one up though.

<waving to the NSA> Guess I will just continue not doing suspicious stuff. I mean, if I am not doing anything wrong, I have nothing to worry about. Right? /end sarcasm

Thanks again for the info, Linus. The check is in the mail.

[Gemme]

I know it's been mentioned before (not sure if it was here or not, though), but it would be nice to have more than a handful of hours between the 'your subscription is expiring' notice and the paypal pull.

I didn't get online last night and sometime between 7:30am yesterday and 6am this morning I got both the expriration notice and the notice of the paypal pull. It wasn't even 24 hours in between. It feels like we used to have more time before. Can that be adjusted?

[Medusa]

Originally Posted by Gemme

I know it's been mentioned before (not sure if it was here or not, though), but it would be nice to have more than a handful of hours between the 'your subscription is expiring' notice and the paypal pull.

I didn't get online last night and sometime between 7:30am yesterday and 6am this morning I got both the expriration notice and the notice of the paypal pull. It wasn't even 24 hours in between. It feels like we used to have more time before. Can that be adjusted?

Answered on "Good, Bad, Ugly" thread...

[TruTexan]

I have tried to get to chat from both home page buttons but cannot get it working with Google Chrome. It was working fine yesterday.
I am using Windows 7 pro and google chrome.
I"ve tried clearing out my cookies and cache, keep getting the same Error Message on the webpage that opens for chat on my home computer, as it opens a different window to chat on....here is what it says:

Oops! Google Chrome could not connect to host7110.123flashchat.com

[Linus]

Originally Posted by TruTexan

I have tried to get to chat from both home page buttons but cannot get it working with Google Chrome. It was working fine yesterday.
I am using Windows 7 pro and google chrome.
I"ve tried clearing out my cookies and cache, keep getting the same Error Message on the webpage that opens for chat on my home computer, as it opens a different window to chat on....here is what it says:

Oops! Google Chrome could not connect to host7110.123flashchat.com

It's not you. It's our chat provider. They appear to be down. Hopefully they will be back soon. Try in an hour or so.