Informed Choice Search Results

How To: Hack Someone's Cell Phone to Steal Their Pictures

Do you ever wonder how all these celebrities continue to have their private photos spread all over the internet? While celebrities' phones and computers are forever vulnerable to attacks, the common folk must also be wary. No matter how careful you think you were went you sent those "candid" photos to your ex, with a little effort and access to public information, your pictures can be snagged, too. Here's how.

How To: Don't Like Traditional Christmas Trees? Try Out One of These 7 Festive DIY Alternatives

The concept and structure of Christmas hasn't changed much since its inception. In its infancy, Christians recruited Roman pagans by associating Christmas with the Saturnalia, an ancient Roman festival in honor of the deity Saturn (also held in December). The pagans had long worshiped trees (as did other historical cultures) and would bring them into their homes and decorate them, something that influenced our modern holiday decorations. While certain things such as gifts and ornaments have b...

How To: 21 Miraculous Uses for Coconut Oil

What can't coconut oil do? This edible oil, extracted from the copra or meat of a coconut, has done what most other food, beauty, and health trends have not: demonstrated real lasting power. Indeed, the "superfood" continues to make headlines, with its many uses the subject of debate, study, and fervent support. From the obvious (cooking) to the less so (home improvement), there are likely many coconut oil uses you're not yet aware of.

How To: Install an Off-the-Shelf Hard Drive in an Xbox 360 (Get 10x the GB for Your Money)

Since the day of the Xbox 360 release, storage space for the device has been overpriced beyond belief. OEM 250GB HDD models still cost $110 USD! A 250GB hard drive should not destroy my wallet, Microsoft. Storage space, especially on HDDs, is cheap. You can buy a removable 2TB external for only $100 USD, so it's a little beyond my comprehension to see how they calculate their MSRP to yield such a large profit. On the other hand, Xbox 360 had very impressive hardware specs back in the day, equ...

How To: The Novice Guide to Teaching Yourself How to Program (Learning Resources Included)

Today's post is a small go-to guide for beginner programmers in Null Byte. With many of our community members picking up programming from our Community Bytes, it only makes sense to lay out a one-stop guide for your reference. Hopefully this guide will help you make an educated and thoughtful choice on what programming languages you want to learn, and how you want to learn said languages.

News: 21 New Features in Android 8.1 for the Essential Phone

After testing a series of Android 8.0 builds, Essential hit the reset button and jumped to Android 8.1 Oreo. The beta program didn't last long, as Essential has now released the official 8.1 update to the masses. The features from the 8.0 betas are all still there, plus a few goodies specific to the updated version. We'll highlight the standouts here.

Compared: The Best Antivirus & Security Suite Apps for Android

The Play Store hasn't been the most secure place for apps lately. A quick Google search for "Play Store malware" will give you a taste of some of the malicious apps that snuck their way onto Android's official app store. Google is aware of the problem and they're tying to fix it, but their new Play Protect program doesn't have a great track record, so you might want to look elsewhere.

How To: The 5 Best Phones for Video Chat

Video chatting has become an important factor in the overall smartphone experience. Even just a few years ago, 37% of teens were making video calls on a regular basis, and that number has surely grown. 85% of households with infants have used video chat apps to call relatives in other cities, and it's been shown that toddlers can create bonds and learn from visual cues in video calls.

How To: Prepare and Present a Panel at a Steampunk Convention

If you've been to a convention of any sort before, you know that there are good and bad panels, and that their inherent goodness or badness often has little to do with the actual content being discussed. That's because giving a panel is a skill that not everyone has. However, it is a skill that everyone could have! In this article, I'll tell you how to give a good panel on practically any subject. Image by Shannon Cottrell

How To: Send Audio Messages on Your Apple Watch Instead of Transcribed Text

If you're a fan of sending audio messages on your iPhone, you might be disappointed when tapping the microphone button in the Messages app on an Apple Watch. You'll see it when crafting a message, but it won't send any audio because it's for Dictation, which turns your speech into text. If you'd rather use it to compose and send audio clips, there's a way to do just that.

How To: Change the Brightness of Your iPhone's Lock Screen Flashlight

Whenever you need a flashlight, your iPhone's LED flash may be enough to break through the darkness, and you don't even need to unlock your screen to use it. But your LED flash's brightness level may be too strong or not powerful enough. It's not immediately obvious how one would change those lumens from the lock screen, but doing so is almost as fast as turning it on.

How To: Use Instagram's Secret App Icon Menu to Choose Light, Dark, Retro & Other Official Icon Variations

Yes, that's right: Instagram has a sneaky, inconspicuous, cryptic, hush-hush way to change its iconic, colorful icon on your Android's or iPhone's home screen and anywhere else it shows up throughout iOS. The app really outdid itself too, with 12 alternative icon designs from its classic look to new themes, all located in an impossible-to-find preferences menu — unless you know the trick.

How To: Stop Deleting iPhone Notifications One by One — Clear All Alerts at Once by Doing This

If you're like me, no matter how hard you try, your iPhone's notifications are a mess. There's just too many of them. That's when it becomes helpful just to get rid of the whole bunch and start fresh. However, deleting alerts one at a time is as tedious as it is unnecessary since you can clear all of your notifications at once.

How To: Build Pro-Level Games with This GameGuru Bundle

If you're a tech-savvy coding pro, you have a virtually limitless number of great career choices to choose from. Whether you're interested in working at a small tech startup, freelancing as a cybersecurity specialist, or founding the next Google, having a solid understanding of development terminology and general programming will inevitably get you far.

How To: Protect Up to 10 Devices with This All-in-One VPN

With millions of people working from home as a result of the coronavirus outbreak, hacking is on the rise. Nefarious black hats are taking advantage of the fact that workers have been forced to abandon their secure office networks in favor of home wireless connections. And white hats are spending even more time at home trying to be the next great ethical hacker.