A notable amount of Mac users have discovered that a random OS X password popup window can appear from iCloud, FaceTime, or Messages, any of each asking for the respective iCloud password. The random password request is very non-specific and just has the logo, “iCloud Password – Please enter your password for email@address” with options … Read More

Though most advanced Mac users will find it easiest to enable root with Directory Utility from the GUI of OS X, another option is to turn to the command line. No, we’re not talking about using sudo or su, we’re talking about enabling the actual root user account, which can be appropriate for some complex … Read More

Many users who send PDF documents with sensitive data back and forth will password protect the files from their Mac so that only authorized users can read and access the data contained within the document. This is fairly common with everything from contracts to accounting and financial records, and it’s equally common to sometimes require … Read More

Mac users who have multiple user accounts on a single machine may sometimes wish to hide a specific user account from appearing on the login screens of OS X. This is fairly common for systems administrators who want to hide an admin account that can be used for direct or remote troubleshooting, but it can … Read More

Adware is generally something most Mac users won’t have to worry about, but that doesn’t mean that OS X is entirely immune to the potential nuisance, and nobody likes it when their browser has been hijacked by that type of junk. If you’re at all concerned about adware impacting your Mac and web browsing, you … Read More

Users who require higher than usual security measures often set a firmware password on a Mac, which requires that a password be entered before the typical OS X boot sequence begins. While these low level passwords are quite secure, but that higher security also means a forgotten firmware password can be a significant problem. Nonetheless, … Read More

When you properly set up Touch ID to unlock your iPhone or iPad, many users add several different of their fingers to the configuration so that they can unlock the iOS device in different orientations. That’s a good idea, but sometimes you may want to change which fingers (or whose fingers) are allowed to access … Read More

Apple has released an important security update for Mac users, labeled as OS X Bash Update 1.0. The update addresses a recently discovered critical security flaw known as “Shellshock” that impacts the bash shell, the default shell used by the Terminal app of OS X, and is recommended for all users to install even if … Read More

Every app in the iWork suite offers optional password protection of files created, modified, or opened within their respective application. In practice, this means that no user will be able to open or access the file and view the contents on their Mac or iOS device without entering the password first. Password protecting iWork documents … Read More

Touch ID and the iPhone fingerprint reader has been around for a while now, but a great feature that seems to not get much use is the ability to unlock an iPhone with a touch and a fingerprint – that means not having to enter the passcode when you want to unlock the iPhone. Instead, … Read More

The login screen of OS X defaults to showing the account pictures and user names of all accounts on the given Mac. This is undoubtedly convenient for most users as it makes logging into accounts much faster, but for situations where a Mac requires higher security, users may wish to hide user account names from … Read More

Mac Safari users who have the Adobe Flash plugin installed are likely to find it disabled automatically by Apple, due to a recent security issue with the Flash plugin. That basically means if you don’t have the very newest Flash version installed already, and most people don’t yet, you’ll see the a “Flash Out Of … Read More