We have covered several Skype recorders in the past, including Call Graph, Skype Call Recorder, MP3 Skype Recorder or iFree Recorder.

All have in common that they allow you to record Skype calls. Some can do that automatically while others only on manual request.

Skype Auto Recorder joins the list of applications, but instead of just being “another” audio recorder, it adds features to the table that many of the other programs are not offering.

Probably the most prominent of features is the ability to block and enable calls from individual contacts or groups to be recorded. This happens silently in the background without any user intervention or action.

There is two things that you need to do after installation. You first need to allow the application to access Skype. This pops up automatically after installation if Skype is running, or on the next start of the voice over IP software.

You then need to check the program settings for the initial configuration. Here you can select the output directory and format for recorded conversations, block contacts from being recorded at all, and create filters to change the default save location and name for selected contacts.

You can configure the program to only record calls from contacts that you have added to the filters listing. For that, you need to uncheck Record unfiltered conversations to, to avoid the recording of other conversations by the program.

The last option lets you increase the volume of the recordings automatically.

Calls are from that moment on automatically recorded by the application. Skype Auto Recorder indicates a recording session with a red dot on the program icon. Mp3s are saved with the following parameters: 64 kb/s bitrate, 16000 khz sample rate and mono channel. No settings are provided to change the quality of the recording.

Skype Auto Recorder can be downloaded from the developer website over at Codeplex. (via Addictive Tips)

The Firefox add-on and Google Chrome extension ProxMate looks and feels like an advanced copy of the Grooveshark Unlocker, an extension that unblocks access to the Grooveshark site if it is blocked in a country.

The browser add-on adds two features on top of that make it more practicable. It first can unblock blocked videos on YouTube, so that they become accessible again. It detects blocked contents on YouTube Video pages, channels and search, enables the proxy and reloads the page to unblock the contents on the site.

The second new feature allows users to change the proxy server. This can be useful for privacy reasons, and in situations where the default proxy server may have been blocked or is not functioning anymore.

ProxMate works right after you have installed it in the Firefox web browser. Instead of seeing a screen like the following one that is telling you that you cannot watch the video,

you can watch it just fine with ProxMate enabled.

Please note that while this works automatically most of the time, you sometimes may need to reload the page a few times before the video starts to play.

You can change the proxy server in the settings. Here it is also possible to disable the add-ons functionality on select supported sites.

ProxMate is available for Firefox and Google Chrome. The extension can be useful if you like to access the Grooveshark website or encounter videos on YouTube regularly that are blocked in your country.

Update: Grooveshark Updater also came with options to change the proxy server in the add-on’s settings.

This is not the first occurrence that a critical update is released shortly after a major version upgrade of the web browser. Similar updates had to be delivered after the release of Firefox 9 and Firefox 8.

Firefox 10.0.1 fixes critical issues that came to light shortly after Firefox 10 had been released to the public. This includes at least one startup crash when the browser is opened by the user, and one Java related issue that is causing text fields to hang in the browser. Firefox users can resolve that issue manually by minimizing or resizing the browser. The patch released later today will fix the issues permanently though.

The product planning summary lists additional issues that the developers are currently looking into. This includes issues with AVG’s SafeSearch extension that is blocking the enter key from functioning correctly in the browser’s address bar. While it it possible to click on the go button to be taken to the site, it is a issue that the developers want to resolve as quickly as possible.

Other issues mentioned in the summary are additional crashes, and incompatibilities with Norton products and RealPlayer Video Downloader.

The release is already available on the Mozilla release ftp server and on third party download portals such as Softpedia. It is likely that the new version will be pushed to all users later today. At that point it will also be offered for download on the Mozilla website and as an update in the browser.

Please note that both the standard Firefox 10 build and Firefox 10 ESR will receive the update to Firefox 10.0.1.

The new version introduces GPU accelerated 2D Canvas on Mac and Windows versions of the browser, which according to Google should improve the performance of 2D browser apps and games using the HTML5 technology noticeably.

Chrome users can open the internal page chrome://gpu to check their computer’s graphics feature status. The page lists five features and their hardware acceleration status.

The Swiftshader software 3D rendering technology has been licensed by Google and implemented into the Google Chrome Beta browser to improve the performance of 3D contents on older graphics processing units that do not support GPU based hardware acceleration. While not performing as well as GPU based acceleration, it should boost the performance on systems that were unsupported until now.

At the same time, we recognize that many people with older GPUs and graphics drivers have not been able to experience the rich content provided by technologies such as WebGL. Chrome is now able to display 3D content via SwiftShader, a software rasterizer we licensed from TransGaming, Inc. Although SwiftShader won’t perform as well as a real GPU, it will be an improvement for many of our users on older operating systems such as Windows XP.

The Swiftshader software rasterizer will automatically take over on systems that do not support gpu hardware acceleration. Chrome users who would like to see performance information can start the browser with the following two flags:

• –blacklist-accelerated-compositing
• –blacklist-webgl

Chrome will then download Swiftshader components to the computer to make them available. This can take a few minutes. Some users have even reported that the process is stuck on their system, with no option to get the components to download properly. You can remove the flags later on.

Chrome Beta users should have received the update to version 18 by now. Interested users who want to download the beta version can do so at the Beta channel over at the Google website. (via)

Some use it for larger scale modifications, for instance by removing people from images or placing other objects in photos. That’s not an issue if this is disclosed, but that is usually not the case. This is especially important in advertisement, as it may give you the wrong impression of a product.

Back in 2010 I reviewed the Error Level Analysis web service that you could use to analyze photos for modifications. It appears that this service is being shut down soon.

FotoForensics has been created to fill the gap that it is leaving on the Internet. The new service improves upon the old in several ways. It supports both jpg and png image formats, and allows you to not only upload a photo from your computer, but also to analyze a photo that is already hosted on the Internet.

All you need to do to get started is to select either option. The program processes the selected image and displays its results on the next page.

This won’t do you any good if you do not know how to interpret the results.

JPEG images use a lossy compression system. Each re-encoding (resave) of the image adds more quality loss to the image. Specifically, the JPEG algorithm operates on an 8×8 pixel grid. Each 8×8 square is compressed independently. If the image is completely unmodified, then all 8×8 squares should have similar error potentials. If the image is unmodified and resaved, then every square should degrade at approximately the same rate.

ELA saves the image at a specified JPEG quality level. This resave introduces a known amount of error across the entire image. The resaved image is then compared against the original image.

If an image is modified, then every 8×8 square that was touched by the modification should be at a higher error potential than the rest of the image. Modified areas will appear with a higher potential error level.

A good getting started guide is the tutorial on the Foto Forensics website that demonstrates different modification levels with sample photos.

A new version of SmartScreen Filter has been integrated into the Windows 8 Developer Preview. It is not clear yet if the feature will make it into the final version of Windows 8 in this form, or at all, but it is likely that it does. Whenever you execute a file that you have downloaded from the Internet, it is first checked by SmartScreen Filter against a database. Files that cannot be identified are blocked automatically, and a warning is displayed instead.

Windows protected your PC

Windows SmartScreen prevented an unrecognized program from starting. Running this program might put your PC at risk.

The only two options on the screen are the highlighted OK button, and a more info link that is nearly as distinguishable from the background. A click on OK closes the message and blocks the executable from being started. If you want to start the program, you need to click on More Info. This changes the Windows protected your PC screen slightly.

Microsoft displays publisher and program information, and a run anyway button. The program will be executed on your system if you click on that button.

This feature has the potential to cost you some time and a lot of nerves. If you are running an up to date antivirus software, you probably have no need for SmartScreen Filter’s additional protection.

Disabling SmartScreen Filter In Windows 8

You can disable SmartScreen Filter in the Windows Control Panel. Use Windows-Pause to bring it up, and click on Control Panel in the address bar afterwards. Select System and Security and then Action Center afterwards.

Select Change SmartScreen Settings on the left. This opens the following menu where you can turn Windows SmartScreen off.

The following options are available:

• Require approval from an administrator before running unrecognized programs from the Internet (recommended)
• Give a warning before running unrecognized programs from the Internet, but don’t require administrator approval
• Turn off Windows SmartScreen

Windows SmartScreen could be Windows 8′s User Account Control. A feature that aims to make the system more secure and annoys the hell out of users at the same time. (thanks Caschy for the tip)

Ciuvo identifies items on shopping sites automatically, pulls price and other information from its database, and displays those information in a small toolbar that it attaches to the top of the web page.

This toolbar highlights the cheapest price it found in its database, the number of total sites carrying the item, and links to additional information like product videos.

You can use the information to compare the price on the site you are currently on to the cheapest price that Ciuvo found in its product database. This can be reassuring if the site you are on has the cheapest price, or a money saver if it does not. Details about each offer are displayed in the menu that opens up when you move the mouse cursor over offers in the toolbar.

Here you see the price and shipping information, whether the product is available, the store’s rating and a short description of the product.

A click opens the item’s page on the shopping site in a new browser tab. It is still important to compare the product details on all shipping pages to make sure that the same product is offered on both. The add-on had for instance issues identifying different product versions on a single Amazon item page. It always compared the price of the default product with its database.

Ciuvo checks YouTube for product videos which can be viewed directly on the shopping site. Just hover with your mouse over the video menu and select one of the videos to watch it directly in an overlay on the page.

Here is a short add-on demonstration video.

Ciuvo is only compatible with select online shops in the US, UK, Austria, Germany, France and Poland. Firefox users interested in an unobtrusive price comparison add-on should check it out.

One user recently created a Perl script that dumped all of the site’s magnet links. The dump contains more than 1.5 million torrents indexed by The Pirate Bay website in a fairly simple format:

ID|Name|Size in bytes|Seeders|Leechers|Magnet Link Hash

The whole archive takes up 90 Megabytes in zipped format, and 164 Megabytes unpacked on the system. It is not clear why seeder and leecher information have been added, as they are constantly changing.

The magnet link only contains the hash, and not the necessary link structure to load it into a torrent downloader. You need to add magnet:?xt=urn:btih: in front of the hash for that to work correctly.

You need to load the archive in a program that is capable of loading a 164 Megabyte text document (Notepad++ is an option). You can use the text editor’s search to find the files you are looking for.

There is a discrepancy between the number of torrent links in the dump and the number of torrents listed on The Pirate Bay website. The footer lists 4.5 million torrents, of which not all are hosted by the site. It is also noteworthy that adult torrents have not been included in the dump.

The author of the script has released the script at Pastebin.

The dump is significant for a number of reasons. First that a large number of torrents fit in a small archive, and second that the archive will remain functional even if The Pirate Bay would shut down completely.

This archive could furthermore help if The Pirate Bay website is blocked in a network or country. (via Torrentfreak)

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google is about to launch Google Drive for real this time. Sources are not disclosed, and information other than the name of the cloud based hosting service are not offered in the article.

It is likely that Google Drive will offer free basic storage options and upgrades for users and teams that require more than the basic amount of storage. The pricing structure has not been revealed yet, but it seems possible that Google could simply add Drive o the list of services that you can already purchase additional storage for.

When you compare those prices to Dropbox’s tiered structure, you will notice that they are a lot cheaper. Google Drive users had to pay $5 per year for 20 Gigabytes of extra space, while the cheapest storage increase on Dropbox would set them back $99 per year for 50 Gigabytes.

Then again, it is not only about storage space but also about functionality and accessibility.

Techcrunch back in September of 2011 mentioned that Google Drive would come with a synchronization software to sync data between desktop computers and mobile devices. If that is the case, and if support goes beyond Windows and Android, then it could force Dropbox to adjust their pricing structure to stay competitive.

It is not clear yet if Google will encrypt data stored on their servers.

Drive ultimately would allow users to access data on the Internet and on all supported devices.

It is likely that Google will make the service available under http://drive.google.com/. The page is currently returning a 404 not found error which indicates that it has already been created by Google (if you open a bogus subdomain you get a different error).

Google Wallet as of now is only available in the United States, on two wireless providers – Sprint and AT&T, and only if the Samsung Nexus S 4G smartphone is used. Whenever Google Wallet users make purchases, they need to enter the pin to verify it. One of the weaknesses of the system is that Google decided to use a four digit pin limiting the possibilities to just 10,000. While that is convenient for the user, it is problematic from a security point of view.

Joshua Rubin over at Zvelo published an article yesterday that describes how his company analyzed the data Google Wallet saves to the phone to find out that the pin could be brute forced quite easily.

Researchers at Zvelo discovered that Google was saving the pin in encrpyted form on the smartphone. With the hash and salt discovered, they immediately started to program a brute forcing software to decrypt the information.

Google Wallet Hacker displays the Google Wallet pin in about a second after it is run. The program has to be run on the smartphone Google Wallet is used, which is currently the greatest restriction.

The vulnerability has been disclosed to Google before it was publicly disclosed. The system has not been updated yet though which poses a risk to Google Wallet users. Mitigating factors have been posted by Zvelo which may help Google Wallet users keep their pin secure from brute forcing attacks.

• Do Not “Root” the Cell Phone – Doing so will be one less step for a thief.
• Enable Lock Screens – “Face Unlock,” “Pattern,” “PIN” and “Password” all increase physical security to the device. “Slide,” however, does not.
• Disable USB Debugging – When enabled, the data on mobile devices can be accessed without first passing a lock screen challenge unless Full Disk Encryption is also enabled.
• Enable Full Disk Encryption – This will prevent even USB Debugging from bypassing the lock screen.
• Maintain Device Up-To-Date – Ensure the device is current with the latest official software.

Should you be using Google Wallet right now? This is ultimately your decision, I for one would refrain from using it until the issue gets resolved.

First thing that users notice is the new installer. Avast notes that the beta versions can be installed over existing Avast 6 installations, or separately on the system. The custom installation provides options to install a typical, minimal or custom version of the security software on the system. Especially the latter option should appeal to security interested computer users, as it allows them to block modules from being installed on their computer. Here it is possible to disable any module that you do not want to use, and not only some which seems to be more common in custom installers. This can for instance be useful if those modules are not needed or interfering with other security software installed on the system.

Avast 7 Beta is compatible with all recent 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the windows operating system and the Windows 8 Developer Preview version released last year. The program interface has received a facelift as well. Core program features are available in the side bar menu.

The Real-Time Shields display for instance displays visual information about each security module installed on the system.

One of the new features that Avast has integrated into the beta versions is a cloud based reputation service which improves the decision making process of the program.

Here is the full list of new features:

• New installer
• UI facelift
• FileRep service (cloud based)
• Streaming updates
• Sandbox & Autosandbox improvements
• Browser protection improvements
• Remote assistance feature to help your friends with computer troubles
• Support tool
• Export/Import settings
• Screensaver facelift
• runs on Win8 Developer Preview

It is recommended to check the known issues before installing the beta software on a system.

- In some cases, WebRep Chrome plugin is not installed correctly
- The Safezone browser is opening each time when you switch back and to the Safezone
- Plugins for Outlook 2k3 and 2k7 show “runtime error” message
- Sometimes autosandbox toaster does not close correctly
- Problems with avast sounds on Win 7 and Win Vista
- Remote assistance feature sometimes crashes on Win 7 32b, Win Vista 64b
- avast! account functionality is disabled

Avast’s Auto Sandbox feature sounds like a real winner, if Avast gets the detection right. It puts suspicious processes automatically in a sandbox to prevent them from damaging the underlying operating system, other programs and files.

I would not recommend running the beta version in a productive environment though. It is likely that Avast will release the final version of the program in the coming months. (via Vishal)

Omnibox Prerendering basically preloads some of the pages that are presented to you in the browser’s address bar. This reduces the time between hitting the Enter key on the keyboard and seeing the page fully rendered in the browser window. It is not clear how Chrome selects those pages, but it is likely that your previous browsing history and bookmarks may have something to do with it. This does create some overhead though, especially if the browser does not select the right pages that often.

Chrome users who do not want or need the prerendering feature can disable it in the following way:

• Open chrome://flags/ in the Chrome address bar and hit enter.
• Locate the flag Prerender from omnibox and change the feature’s state to disabled.



The second new feature is the automatic scanning of executable files like exe or msi in Chrome to warn you if you are downloading a malicious file or a file from a host that is know to host a high percentage of malicious downloads.

Google maintains a whitelist of files that are not checked. All other files are checked with Google to retrieve more information. While not a fail safe approach, it can warn users if they are about to download known malicious files. The concept looks similar to Microsoft’s SmartScreen Filter. It does not seem possible to disable the feature right now in the browser.

In addition, a total of 20 security vulnerabilities were closed in Chrome 17 of which one received the highest possible severity rating of critical.

You can read up on the changes at the official Chrome Release blog. Chrome updates should already been applied to existing Chrome Stable installations. You can verify the version with a click on Wrench > About Google Chrome. There you can also download and apply the update if the browser has not been updated yet.

The browser add-on, available for both the Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome web browser, monitors all browser tabs automatically from the moment it has been installed. It cannot notify you of updates if a website is closed though, which means that it is best for users who have their messaging and social sites up whenever the browser is up and running.

Tab Notifier can display notifications even if the browser is minimized or not visible on the screen.

The extension watches all open tabs but the active tab by default. This behavior can be modified in the extension options to a more stricter policy. Instead of watching all sites, it is possible to configure the add-on to watch only sites listed in the settings window.

Notifications furthermore can be configured to close automatically after a set amount of seconds, which may be useful for users who receive many throughout the day.

A right-click on a web page and the selection of the configure tab notifier for site context menu option displays a site specific configuration menu. This overrides the global extension settings so that it either offers to run a whitelist or blacklist of sites.

Advanced users can use regular expressions to fine tune title matches for specific sites. This can be useful if a site uses different page titles instead of just one (or to be only notified if the notification count reaches ten or more messages).

Notifications are displayed in the lower right corner of the screen, and not in the browser window. Firefox users can download Tab Notifier from the Mozilla Add-ons repository, Chrome users from the developer’s website. Apple Macintosh users need to have Growl installed to use the extension.

TrueCrypt is that solid that its developers need to update it only once or twice a year. The last update dates back to September 2011 where support for Mac OS X 10.7 Lion was added to the application, and the update before that was almost a year before that.

Yesterday the first 2012 update was released. The change log over at the TrueCrypt website lists minor improvements and bug fixes as the only changes in TrueCrypt 7.1a. It does not go into further detail, other than stating that these have been applied to all supported operating systems.

TrueCrypt users can download the latest version of the application from the official project website. You need to close all TrueCrypt instances running on the system before the update can be installed.

Should you install the update if you are running a version of TrueCrypt that is not causing problems or issues on your system? I’d say you may still want to update to TrueCrypt 7.1a, considering that the update may have resolved rare bugs that you might experience in the future if you do not apply the update.

If you are a new TrueCrypt user you may be interested in our collection of TrueCrypt tutorials that we have published over the years. Here is a short selection of guides to get you started:

• Create a secure data safe with True Crypt
• Create a secure USB Data Safe
• How to Create a Hidden Encrypted Volume With True Crypt
• Storing Data In The Cloud With Dropbox And TrueCrypt
• Disguising True Crypt Volumes In MP4 Videos
• TruPax, Create TrueCrypt Containers Without True Crypt

Are you a TrueCrypt user, or do you prefer a different encryption software? (via Caschy)

Google is about to launch Screenwise, a project that allows them to monitor the sites users visit and how they use them. For that, participating users get paid up to $25 in gift cards over the course of a year. Users who sign up get a $5 Amazon gift card right away, and then additional $5 gift cards for every three months they stay in the project.

According to the information posted on the Screenwise Landing panel, Google attempts to use the information to “improve Google products and services and make a better online experience for everyone”.

Participating users need to download the Google Screenwise browser extension for the Chrome web browser and use the browser for their Internet activities. Eligible are Google account users who are at least 13 years of age. Google notes on the page that the company will not save user email addresses, or “associate it with any other personally identifiable information”.

Google has partnered up with Knowledge Networks, a research company that specializes in Internet research.

Interested users can submit their email address to receive notifications when registration opens. According to the landing page information, users will receive participation information in the coming days.

The process, even though opt-in, will certainly face its share of criticism, especially since Google is currently already facing public pressure over their privacy policy and terms of service changes.

The question is, how many users are willing to give up their privacy for 12 months for $25 in Amazon gift certificates? What’s your take on this?

The incident came to light only recently, when hackers started to upload code sneak peeks and information to the Internet.

Symantec by then asked users of pcAnywhere to stop using the software to analyze and mitigate any arising risks. Symantec later on released a security recommendations whitepaper that described possible risk scenarios.

• The encoding and encryption elements within pcAnywhere are vulnerable, making users susceptible to man-in-the-middle attacks, depending on the configuration and use of the product. If a man-in-the-middle attack should occur, the malicious user could steal session data or credentials.
• A secondary risk: If a malicious user obtains the cryptographic key, they can launch unauthorized remote control sessions and thus access systems and sensitive data.
• If the cryptographic key itself is using Active Directory credentials, it is also possible for attackers to perpetrate other malicious activities on the network.
• In an internal pcAnywhere environment, if a network sniffer was in place on a customer’s internal network and the attacker had access to the encryption details, the pcAnywhere traffic could be intercepted and decoded. This implies that a customer either has a malicious insider who planted the network sniffer or has an unknown Botnet operating in their environment. As always, security best practices are encouraged to mitigate this risk.
• Since pcAnywhere exchanges user login credentials, the risk exists that a network sniffer or Botnet could intercept this exchange of information, though it would still be difficult to actually interpret the data even if the pcAnywhere source code is released.
• For environments with remote users, this credential exchange introduces an additional level of exposure to external attacks.

These information where later removed from the whitepaper after a patch had been issued.

The hackers in the meantime have released email correspondence on PasteBin. Here it gets a bit blurry as both sides apparently tried to broker a deal that would prevent the source codes from being released to the public. According to Symantec, it was a sting operation from the very beginning. The hackers on the other hand stated that they tried to “humiliate them” further.

A torrent of the source code has since then been released on the popular Bittorrent indexing site The Piratebay where it quickly climbed into the top 5 seeded files of the Misc category.

The hackers have already announced that they will also release the Norton Antivirus source code.

Should Norton and Symantec customers be worried about the source code release? Symantec stated that user’s who have upgraded the products to the latest version have nothing to worry about.

Android users can download Chrome Beta from Android Market, where it is available for download. A version of the browser has also been downloaded and made available again by members of the XDA-Developer forum.

Chrome for Android Beta ships with some Chrome desktop features, including the browser’s omnibox to search and navigate directly from the browser’s address bar, a tab driven interface, and the private browsing mode (incognito mode). Other features of the desktop version, like themes and extensions support are currently not available in the beta client.

Chrome for Android furthermore synchronizes bookmarks and open tabs with desktop versions.For synchronization to work, you need to sign in to Chrome on all devices that you want to synchronize.

The mobile version of Chrome introduces several device specific features. This includes options to flip through all open tabs with a swipe, or the new link zooming feature that makes the selection of links more comfortable in the mobile browser.

Google has released a video that introduces the Chrome for Android beta version. The video demonstrates the tab swiping capabilities of the browser among other things.

Most user comments on Android Market, Google Plus and other announcement locations are quite positive. The average rating currently on Android market is 4.3. Critics have pointed out that Chrome for Android does not support Flash, and that it is not possible to switch to the desktop version of a site if available. Positive aspects are speed mainly and the synchronization of tabs and bookmarks.

Google plans to release the mobile browser in other countries in the near future. It is not clear at this point in time if pre-Android 4.0 devices will also be able to download and install the browser. (via Caschy)

Have you played around with Chrome for Android yet? Let me know what you think of this initial release in the comments.

All drive partitions are listed underneath each drive with their assigned drive letters, file system, size and status.

Below the drive listing is an area with six tabs that display information about the selected hard drive or partition.

The Information tab lists everything there is to know about the selected drive. From the firmware version over transfer mode and version, to the drive’s rotation rate, temperature, transfer features and controller information.

The S.M.A.R.T. tab lists all Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology information that the drive provides. This can be helpful for troubleshooting purposes, as you get realtime data that may reveal upcoming drive issues. Error logs, including self-test logs, write and read stream error logs or extended self-test logs are displayed in the logs tab next to it.

The Control tab lists supported drive features and whether they are enabled or not. This includes features such as S.M.A.R.T. but also Advanced Power Management, Advanced Acoustic Management or Auto Offline Data Collection. State changes are not saved even though it is possible to click on on or off to switch a feature on or off.

DHE Drive Info offers additional tools that are mostly relevant to technicians. This includes a built-in sector browser, a list of all supported features and commands, and an option to create reports via the File > Save Reports menu.

Regular users can configure the program to display a notification if a drive’s temperature reaches a selected threshold.

DH Drive Info is a useful hard drive diagnostic software for the Windows operating system. The portable nature of the application makes it a good fit for a troubleshooting DVD or USB stick.

You will notice immediately that WunderMap uses Google Maps as the underlying mapping service. The zoomed in map displays weather station information by default. This includes the temperature and wind strength and direction, with options to switch to dew point / humidity or precipitation instead. A click on a weather station displays all available information, plus forecasts.

Additional weather related information are selectable on the right. From severe weather and satellite imagery to webcams, traffic or storm reports. All that it takes to enable the new layers is to check an item to have it displayed on the map. Most offer options to change data sources or display different kinds of information on the map.

One interesting option is available with a click on the clock icon next to the selected location. Here you can go back in time (hour, day, month or year) for information about the weather location at a specific date and time in history.

You can furthermore select future dates (in the day range) to see weather forecasts on the map.

The different layers, and the ability to go back in time, make WunderMap an interesting service. It is usually not something that you would go to to get a weather report though. The service has its specialized uses, you can for instance pull past data from holiday locations to see how the weather conditions have been during your planned stay.

Some layers are only available if you are displaying a location in the United States. You can check out Wundermap here.

Some might now bring forth the old argument of having nothing to fear if you have got nothing to hide, which has been refuted over and over again. One argument against is that you may value your privacy. There is really no need for someone else to see family photos, financial documents or private email messages when you are crossing the border.

Zer0 is a basic program for Windows that deletes files so that they become unrecoverable on the system. The developers state that it is using a “high security file deletion” algorithm, but fail to elaborate on that. Tests confirmed that files can’t be recovered with software like Recuva or Undelete My Files.

While that may do for private use, it is not recommended for corporate environments because of the lack of information.

Files can only be added via drag and drop to the program interface. Each file is listed with its full file path, size and a status code.

A click on delete removes the selected files from the system and overwrites the occupied space on the hard drive so that it cannot be recovered afterwards. Successful deletions are indicated in the status column in the interface.

Zer0 is nowhere near as sophisticated as Eraser for instance. The program still gets the job done even though you’d probably would want to skip it if you are deleting a lot of files regularly on the system.

You can download the program from the developer website. Please note that a “free of all sponsored” offers version is provided on the download page next to the regular program versions. If you download the regular version, you will notice that it is filled to the brim with those offers that install toolbars and other gimmicks that you may not need on your system.

Free File Wiper is an alternative that provides more information about the file deletion process.