Pcworld 15 great free privacy downloads

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The following three can help you surf anonymously, avoid trouble at wireless hot spots, and receive alerts about certain sites that may host malware designed to invade your privacy.

To keep these pieces of information private, try Tor, a free program that protects your anonymity as you surf. The Tor download includes other software that you need for maintaining your privacy—notably Privoxy, a proxy program.

The programs work well together; and because the software self-configures, they are simple to use. Tor runs in your system tray. To become anonymous, right-click the icon and choose Start. To stop surfing anonymously, right-click again and choose Stop. You can even change your Tor identity for maximum cloaking. Download Tor Price: Free. In a hotspot at a public location, a bad guy can set up a sniffer to snoop on all the data sent by everyone nearby.

The snoop can see all of the information you send and receive over the Internet, including your user names and passwords. It works in much the same way as the VPNs that companies use for their remote employees. Hotspot Shield is quite simple to install, set up, and use, with one caveat: During the installation process, you must make sure not to let the Dealio toolbar be installed. When you first launch the program, your default browser will launch and display an ad.

But you can close that window and continue to surf safely. Download Hotspot Shield Price: Free. One of the best ways to protect your privacy is to avoid getting infected by malware. These days, most people get infected by downloading infected software or by visiting a Web site that installs malware without their knowledge. MacAfee SiteAdvisor does a great job of letting you know. Hover your mouse directly over the icon, and a pop-up will appear, informing you of what might be dangerous about the site.

It details whether the site has dangerous downloads, whether the site sends spam to you if you register on it, and whether the site includes links to other sites that are known to be dangerous. Best of all, Site Advisor works when you browse sites, too.

The software displays a small icon at the bottom of the screen as you surf. The icon warns you when you hit a dangerous site.

The Web is built on interactivity, but those wonderful interactive features can be used to attack and damage your PC. Many other apps also collect details about your phone, your usage patterns, and possibly your location, then ship it off to analytics firms and advertisers.

Lockdown is a free and simple utility for iOS and Mac that prevents apps from connecting with these data trackers. If you do want a VPN service, however, Lockdown sells it as an add-on subscription.

One other note: The app can hinder your ability to log into Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp, but turning it off while logging in seems to solve the problem. For marketers that want to track your online behavior, your email address is the ultimate prize.

You don't have to install an entirely new OS to experiment with Linux. If you get impatient while waiting for Windows to copy large files from one folder to another, try Teracopy. This handy utility copies files significantly faster than Explorer can, and lets you pause and resume transfers, too. Sign up to gain exclusive access to email subscriptions, event invitations, competitions, giveaways, and much more.

Membership is free, and your security and privacy remain protected. View our privacy policy before signing up. Ultimately this laptop has achieved everything I would hope for in a laptop for work, while fitting that into a form factor and weight that is remarkable. This smart laptop was enjoyable to use and great to work on — creating content was super simple. As the Maserati or BMW of laptops, it would fit perfectly in the hands of a professional needing firepower under the hood, sophistication and class on the surface, and gaming prowess sports mode if you will in between.

Browsers are largely free, and mostly fantastic already. For Windows users there is Ghost Browser , which lets you sandbox separate online identities while viewing them all in a single window. Ninite makes loading up a new computer a breeze. Run the executable, and Ninite installs all of them in turn, and it automatically declines the offers for bundled bloatware so many free apps try to sneak in. No muss, no fuss, no hassle.

Accidentally installing unwanted bloatware is one of the greatest dangers of free software, the sanctity of Ninite aside. For everything else, use Unchecky. The Windows Security software enabled by default in Windows 10 provides solid protection for most users, but no single antivirus utility offers bulletproof protection, especially against the latest and most clever threats. App launchers let you activate software far faster than navigating Windows, even if you use the Windows key and search for an app by name.

But Launchy can do much, much more: Open any file or folder in mere seconds, shut down your PC, or even kill processes and perform math calculations with the right plug-ins. Launchy is another Windows utility that is unto itself; however, the developers do accept donations, and we highly recommend tossing the developers a few dollars for this excellent program.

A lot of them cost money. You can even encrypt 7-Zip archives with a password to send them securely. If you spend all day unzipping massive archive files then maybe a faster utility like WinZip is worth it. For most of us, however, 7-zip is just great. Your PC might have a DVD-playing program installed if you bought a boxed system, but if not, the simply wonderful VLC media player can play your flicks and music, and podcasts, and… for free.