Cerebral Palsy Alliance

Posts Tagged ‘security’

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Help! I can’t view YouTube videos

YouTube is almost like the Web 2.0 version a free virtual Op Shop where you can find all sorts of audiovisual goodies that you thought had been lost to the world forever.

Occasionally, some unlucky shoppers can’t view the merchandise at all. Web2Go gives you a few possible solutions.

One of the most difficult things about computer troubleshooting is that problems can often have any number of causes. It’s really a matter of testing all the eventualities until you can pinpoint the right one. (Trusting your hard-won computing intution can also come in handy at times but this takes years, and a mountain of electronic heartbreak, to develop.)

The same can be said for YouTube videos that won’t play when you want them to.

So, instead of writing a door-stopping post this week to help you in your quest to enjoy watching thousands of hours of air guitar wannabes – or in my case ABBA and Queen video clips ; ) – on YouTube I thought I’d provide you with a shopping list of links to solutions and let you have all the fun!

Try these ideas on for size:

Do you have the right web address to view the video? It only takes one out-of-place character to foil your viewing plans. Make sure you have the right web address first.

You may not have the latest version of Flash Player. (Flash Player is a free piece of software that enables you to view multimedia, especially on the Web. If you don’t have it installed, YouTube videos won’t play. Here are the instructions on how it install it.You may have Flash installed correctly but it is clashing with another program so it won’t allow you to view videos properly. Try uninstalling Flash Player and reinstalling the latest version. Here’s how.Some YouTube afficianados using the Internet Explorer 7 browser have reported that clearing their Internet history has fixed the viewing problem.Make sure the JavaScript option is turned on in your web browser.Temporarily disable your firewall to check if it’s blocking certain types of web content. If you are using the personal firewall that comes built in with Windows, click here.It might not be an issue at your end at all. The person who uploaded the video may have used an incorrect file format or the file they tried to upload to YouTube may have been too large. If you suspect this might be the problem, try playing another YouTube video and see if you can view it correctly.

If you’ve tried all of these ideas and still can’t get your YouTube videos to work, please contact me via the comment box below and we’ll see what else we can come up with!

Alternatively, if you get your YouTube videos working like a dream and you find a hidden gem that you’d like to share with your fellow Web2Go groupies, please let us know! Happy hunting.

Next week … Help! My Internet bookmarks are out of control.

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Help! How can I tell if a website is safe to use?

This week Web2Go spills the beans about how to ensure your information is safe online, especially when you use Internet banking sites.

A few of my friends flatly refuse to use Internet banking sites and online retailers like Amazon.com and ebay for fear of getting their money, or perhaps worse, their identities, stolen.

They’re right – it’s a jungle out there – but if you take care online with some commonsense steps, you can diminish the risk of being another victim of cybercrime. Sadly, you’ll never be able to remove the risk altogether.

Firstly, be very selective about the info you give out online. (I’ve seen so many people putting their mobile numbers and home addresses on their Facebook profiles lately, it’s scary.)

Using email to send credit card or password details is never a good idea. It’s not secure, which means that potentially anybody could view the contents of your emails as they travel between your computer and their final destination.

If you are entering personal or financial details into a website, check to see if it has SSL (Secure Socket Layer) encryption. When information is encrypted it gets scrambled so that others can’t view what is being transmitted.

When it reaches its final stop the encrypted info is deciphered so that it can be read in its original format. Verisign, a company that sells and authorizes SSL certificates for websites, has a good explanation here.

If a site has SSL encryption you will usually be able to see a little gold lock icon sitting somewhere at the top or bottom of your Web browser. The web address may also slightly change to show ‘https’ at the beginning which stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure.

Alternatively, a site may include a logo from a company such as Verisign or TRUSTe, an organization which certifies and identifies trustworthy websites and helps online consumers to find them.

Using malware (virus) protection software will also help you to weed out any dodgy vendors.

Internet banking can be a minefield if you don’t take similar precautions.

Change your password regularly and remember to use a combination of upper and lowercase numbers and letters. Additionally, never follow a link to a banking site sent to you in an email (it’s most probably a phishing scam, like the one my friend Carrie got drawn into).

Also, ring your bank for confirmation of their website address and bookmark it rather than just Googling it each time you need to use it. (Setting up bogus – but authentic-looking – sites and getting them listed on search engines is another way that scammers can find their way to your bank account details.)

If you do want to shop online, consider getting a credit or debit card with a low limit or opening an account just for online transactions. (PayPal is another popular way to exchange funds online.)

Yes, you are taking risks when you provide your personal or financial information online but there are many things you can do to make your cyber-shopping or banking experience a whole lot safer.

If you’re still worried you can always check out websites such as StaySafeOnline.org or the Australian government’s StaySmartOnline or NetAlert sites.

Next week … Help! How do I add stuff to my Facebook profile?

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