For those that knows me, it’s not a surprise that I’m a bit paranoid with digital security. But in a good sense, I believe, because I do not suffer from this condition. It is an active and rational decision to be constantly aware of digital dangers. I am also very tolerant towards including extras security steps on the daily habits.

Inspired on two Brazilian stories involving cryptography, I decided to take a closer look into personal encryption. One from the fraudulent banker that could never be convicted because all the evidences were in his encrypted desktop computer. The federal police were never able to crack it. The other one was a forgotten laptop with major corporate secrets. The company? Petrobras, the Brazilian oil company and one of the top oil companies in the planet. Petrobras said that the secrets were safe: the strong encryption would hold any eyes from looking inside.

Imagine if suddenly someone steals your computer. Aren’t you going to be crazy?! Your personal photos, family stuff, work notes and free access to email and banking from the machine.

Note: I am talking about only encrypting the hard drive, so it is only useful for avoiding losing data in case of someone stealing your computer. Nothing else. Simple but efficient.

About 2 years ago, I discovered an open source product that I loved: Truecrypt/Veracrypt. It promised total protection for people like you and me. Being open source also adds much trust: not only I will not be locked with a single provider, but the method could be tested and commented by hundreds of eyes.

My desktop is unbreakable ever since. With powerful processors we have today, it is easy to turn all disks encrypted. Even the main Windows and Linux hard drives are protected. So if a theft steals my PC, I will lose the hardware but not the software. The information inside is unreachable. Even for USA government 😉 Ever. Hear that Obama? Ever!** **And the performance drop is unnoticeable. Amazing. I’m a happy customer.

On whole in the wall I was always worried but never dealt until: my smartphone. No need to say that it is probably the most vulnerable hardware that we own (we carry it everywhere) and it is full with important information. Easy to lose it somewhere or to be robbed. The information can be shared through the world. Finally I tried on my beloved Galaxy S3. One thing I knew I would gave to give up is the convenience of easy and fast access to my phone; entering a strong passwords all the time, because the whole point of the encryption is to lock other people out! For some, it is just a too heavy burden. For me it was not. A small price to pay.

While the encryption of the memory card was excellent, using it on the main phone’s memory compromised too much the performance. Odd. From boot to app switching, the lagging response was irritating. After two weeks, I had to revert it. Immediately it started to respond. I’m now gathering some strength to try this again. I’m going to read more to see what I did wrong. I know it is worthy.

Do you scramble your digital life or it can be read in plain view?

In less than an year, I’ve bought my 3rd, 3rd!, smart phone.

This time was a personal mistake: I lost my last phone inside the public bike’s baggage compartment. I was sooo pissed. The son of a bi*** that took the bike later removed the GSM chip and then I was unable to track it back. Even an application installed remotely was not able to reveal the position of the phone in order to let me to retrieve it.

It took me so much effort to get it back that I finally decided: I’m going to buy another phone. I had to decide if it would be a smart phone or a simple one. But frankly, this is the kind of thing that you do not see any use if you never used, but after having one you know the use. You get addicted to this phones.

So next stop was choosing one. After some thought, I decided to buy the very hipped Samsung Galaxy S3.

Samsung Galaxy S3

The white version is simply gorgeous. Very good looking phone. The ICS (Ice Cream Sandwich) was already installed with a very nice selection of preinstalled apps.

Nothing like the old Motorola from T-Mobile and those crap German stuff. Samsung gave it a real love and personality. While the S Voice, the voice command app, is not very good, the calendar one is very beautiful and handy. I like it a lot. The Samsung app store does not add any value from the Google Play, but it does not hurt either.

I’ve never had an Apple’s iPhone, but comparing to my friends that have one, I absolutely prefer the Samsung Android. First is the hardware: S3 have an amazing camera and camera memory (it can take several several several photos in sequence), it’s faster, with NFC (but here in Brazil is not used at all) and expandable storage through memory cards. On the software side, S3 uses the latest Android, ICS, and have the whole flexibility of Google environment. Also, as already said, the Samsung software is fairly good

I was really upset about losing my last phone. Who wouldn’t? But I’m definitively happier with the new one

Note 2012 11 19: Last night Jelly Bean update has been delivered! The butter initiative to make the UI more responsible seems to work (however it is not revolutionary faster, no). All the eyes go to Google Now: the new search app is now very, very voice driven. It gives nice answers several daily questions with a nice card concept.

Due to my personality, I’m generally a very active and anxious person. Loads of ideas come into my mind every day. I struggle to keep focus on what is important, what I’m currently working.

To “gain” time, I like to listen to podcasts or audiobooks while I am working on something. It is fine when the work is repetitive, and you can free your mind by putting your body into an autopilot, separating mind from body. You can even see your physical existence, like you are dead and see your corpse. It requires training but by perfecting this technique allows you to do multiple things at the same time.

However, for tasks that require both concentration and creativity, identifiable sounds get in the way. Some words triggers some brain switches that makes my attention to direct to stuff that is not the work. And takes a lot of time to force my mind to concentrate back into productive tasks. Listening to music triggers the same switches.

I don’t recall the exactly place where I found about that rain sounds are relaxing. It’s kinda of common sense, but to deliberately listen to rain is not. Investigating the internet I discovered a web site that is so simple that is great: rainymood.com. It keep an infinite loop of a pure relaxing rain recording. With the eyes closed, you could easily feel sad and introspective, with an immense need of a good book and a blanket by just freeing your mind with this hypnotic music. An equivalent solution exists for my Android phone, with Rain Sounds. When the sleeping time comes, it makes a lot easier to put this on and lay down in bed. The sleep comes much sooner. Much calmly. Much rainy.

As an alternative, I’m also a Grooveshark.com recurrent user, BUT, basically listening to the ambient radio station, which have a selection of music that are essentially instrumental, no identifiable patterns and never raise the music energy to the point that is bring our attention. Since Grooveshark is not -currently- blocked on my company, it is a great place to avoid the external noise and focus in the work. With your ears locked, it is time to kill some to-do tasks using martial arts like GTD/pomodoro.

Getting Things Done (GTD) is an organizational method created by David Allen, described in a book of the same name. The Getting Things Done method rests on the principle that a person needs to move tasks out of the mind by recording them externally. That way, the mind is freed from the job of remembering everything that needs to be done and can concentrate on actually performing those tasks.

I read the book and love it. It balances theoretical reasoning and practical attitudes. It says explicitly that it is not about a computer program or a special type of notebook. You are free to use any system you want. Webmail, Outlook, notebook, folders, color tags� you decide. But the book is smart enough to give you hints about using them, just for the sake of starting soon and being practical.

It at least opens the mind to be more productive in our ordinary life. Just don’t go crazy thinking about it all the time because, paradoxically, it can be really nonproductive.

PS: I recommend you strive to use itfor 3 months, forcing yourself. It’s easy to start but because it requires a new mindset, keep using the system harder and harder with time.

Jesus just resurrected.

The bunny brings us chocolates. Chocolate eggs in fact.

It’s birthday of: the writer Tom Clancy, my cousin Andr� Massa and my uncle Alexandre, F1 team manager Flavio Briatore and � god was right on this one�� the wonderful actress Jennifer Morrison.

Also, it is the day of twin saint brothers Cosmas and Damian.

Happy Easter�for everyone