The Hidden Keyboard Shortcut Cheat Sheet in Your iPad!

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If you’re working on an iPad with a physical keyboard -  it could be a Bluetooth keyboard or an iPad Pro with Apple’s Smart Keyboard - there are quite a bunch of useful keyboard shortcuts you can use to work faster. Many are exactly what you would assume if you have Mac experience; for instance, Command-F generally maps to Find. If you want to see a list of supported keyboard shortcuts in an app, simply press and hold the Command key on the keyboard until an information panel appears. Some apps, like Calendar (shown below), even have multiple pages of shortcuts; swipe to see them all. Not all apps will display the cheat sheet, but most of Apple’s productivity apps do. Cool, right?

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How to Lock Down Your Facebook the Best You Can.

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Facebook has dominated the news headlines of late and not for good reasons. As you know, there were the 50 million Facebook profiles gathered for Cambridge Analytica and used in the 2016 presidential election. 

Because of this, many may have thought about deleting their accounts but let's get real, it's probably not the first time you've thought about that. If you’re done with Facebook, you’re welcome to deactivate or even delete your account. Facebook provides instructions for both actions. Deactivating your account will only make your account invisible on Facebook, whereas deleting your account may eventually result in most of the data being removed (up to 3 months later).

The problem is that Facebook is useful. Right? It may be the only connection you have with certain friends or family members, and many informal groups use Facebook for meetup logistics. You may also have a business page established on Facebook, which will require a personal account for Administrative privileges. So, for many of us, losing access to Facebook could or would hurt our real-world relationships and activities. What to do?

If you’re a business, it may make sense to keep your Facebook page but avoid relying on it. Remember, Facebook is not your friend. Earlier in 2018, Facebook announced that it would be prioritizing posts from friends and family over public content, which is a nice way of saying that Facebook is depreciating business-related posts. So make sure you have a Web site that you control and make sure that customers can easily find it and contact you through it. 

On a personal level, there are two ways to think about privacy on Facebook:
Limiting the information you share with other people on Facebook
Limiting the information that you’re willing to provide to Facebook at all.

If Facebook doesn’t have certain data about you, they can’t sell it to the highest bidder, let it be harvested by hackers, or use it in ways you might find creepy.

To control who on Facebook can see what you share, click the ? button on the Facebook Web site on your Mac, or tap the button in the bottom right corner of the Facebook iOS app and then tap Privacy Shortcuts. Then click or tap Privacy Checkup and run through the steps to make sure you’re sharing the right info with the right people. Be sure to lock down or remove any apps that you don’t need, since they can leak all sorts of data!

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Also, go to Facebook’s Privacy Settings & Tools page. Click the Edit button next to each item, and make it as specific as you can. You also might want to review the posts you’re tagged in and remove those that you don’t want on your timeline.

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But what if you don’t want to give information to Facebook for it to use? Go to Facebook’s page for Uploading and Managing Your Contacts, and delete them all. You’re just giving away your contacts’ personal information without their permission otherwise. Of course, this will require us to depend on others to be smart with their data and your information as well!! Be smart, everyone!

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To ensure that contact uploading doesn’t happen again, in the Facebook iOS app, tap Settings & Privacy > Account Settings > General > Upload Contacts and make sure the switch is off. (Some versions of the Facebook app just have Settings, not Settings & Privacy, and show a popover for Account Settings.)

Also, in the iPhone Facebook app, go to Settings & Privacy > Account Settings > Location > Location, and make sure it’s set to Never. And whatever you do, keep Location History off—Facebook doesn’t need to know everywhere you’ve ever been. Unless you love checking-in or tagging locations on photos...& in that case, you are doing exactly what they want and designed you to do. 

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If you’re perturbed by the way Facebook’s iOS app is trying to capture your contacts and locations, you could delete it from your iOS devices and rely instead on the Facebook Web site, which can’t access nearly as much information about you. To make it easier to open, in Safari, visit facebook.com, tap the Share button, and then tap the Add to Home Screen button in the bottom row of the share sheet.

Here is an important thought. Lets always assume that anything you post to Facebook or allow Facebook to have access to could end up on the front page of your local newspaper… or the New York Times. Nothing on Facebook is ever completely private—Facebook has shown it currently isn’t trustworthy or reliable—and the best way to ensure confidential information doesn’t leak inadvertently is to avoid posting it to Facebook in the first place. Sorry.

Apple Pay Is Easier, More Secure, and More Private Than Using Credit Cards!

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You’ve probably heard of Apple Pay, but have you set it up so you can use it to pay for purchases at checkout? If not, why not?! These days, most people would say that they are worried about the security of technology but Apple Pay is about as secure as you can get. Give it a try!

It’s one of those living-in-the future Apple technologies that feels really cool every time you use it. To this day, people stare with a combination of amazement and envy when I use it to pay. Still! And don't get me started on the convenience of using the Wallet App to store my boarding passes when I travel. I will touch on that later.

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How does Apple Pay work? Simply put your iPhone, iPad, or Apple Watch within an inch or so of a compatible payment terminal (look for an Apple Pay or contactless payment logo). I like using my Apple Watch but all the devices work with ease. Using the iPhone, place your finger on the Home button to use Touch ID (or double-press the iPhone X’s side button and authenticate via Face ID, or double-press the Apple Watch’s side button), and you’re done. The entire transaction will take much less time than opening your wallet, although you may still need to sign a receipt.

What happens behind the scenes when you use Apple Pay? How does this work? The good news is that Apple Pay is significantly more secure than a magnetic-strip credit card and has advantages over chip-embedded cards too. First, theft prevention is baked in. A typical thief can’t use Apple Pay from your device because they can’t get past Touch ID or Face ID, or provide your Apple Watch passcode. Yep. They really can't.

Also, the store where you shop gets no data about you - they don’t know who you are, where you live, what your card number is, or anything else unless you showed a rewards card or provided your phone number. Most importantly, you never have to worry about your credit card number being jotted down, scanned, or skimmed.

How does this magical process work? When you set up Apple Pay, the Wallet app sends your encrypted credit card details to Apple, after which they’re passed along to your card’s payment network. What comes back is an encrypted Device Account Number—a long number that’s stored in the Secure Enclave chip on your device. That chip is protected by a digital moat, keeping it isolated from nearly all activity on your device. The Device Account Number is unique to your device and card, so nobody else can use it. Encryption and security, that's Apple.

When you pay with Apple Pay, the Secure Enclave chip transmits the Device Account Number, along with a few other details, including a one-time transaction code. Everything is encrypted, so even if an attacker were listening to the traffic, no transaction details would be revealed. The information remains encrypted until it reaches the appropriate party, at which point, if all goes well, your transaction is approved and processed.

Millions of payment terminals in the United States accept Apple Pay, including those found in most major national chains, so you shouldn’t have to look far to find one. You can also use Apple Pay in some iOS apps and some Web-based shopping carts when checking out in Safari.

To set up Apple Pay, on your iPhone or iPad, tap Settings > Wallet & Apple Pay > Add Credit or Debit Card and follow the easy instructions—it’s fine to let the device scan your card so that you don’t have to type your credit card number; the image is discarded immediately after setup.

After adding a card, find it in the Wallet app and tap the card’s info button at the lower right to explore the Info and Transactions screens. Notice that four digits from the card’s Digital Account Number appear on the Info screen—if you want to return an Apple Pay purchase, you’ll give these digits to the merchant instead of sharing your credit card number.

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Don't forget, starting in iOS 11.2, Apple introduced Apple Pay Cash, which lets you make person-to-person payments within the Messages app. It’s great for splitting restaurant checks! We told you how to use that fun party trick in a previous blog here: Split Restaurant Checks with Apple Pay Cash!

The bottom line is that Apple Pay is easy to use, preserves your privacy, and enhances your financial security. And it is really COOL! Maybe next, we'll review how Apple Wallet App is fun at the airport too - think boarding pass. 

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