AskWoody Free – 20.47.F – 2023-11-20

ISSUE 20.47.F • 2023-11-20 • Read online • Text Alerts! • Gift Certificates The next free edition of our newsletter will be published on December 4, 2023. You're reading the FREE newsletter You'll immediately gain access to the longer, better version of the newsletter when you make a donation and become a Plus Member. You'll receive all the articles shown in the table of contents below, plus access to all our premium content for the next 12 months. And you'll have access to our complete newsletter archive! Upgrade to Plus membership today and enjoy all the Plus benefits!   In this issue FREEWARE SPOTLIGHT: SlickRun — A powerful way to launch anything Additional articles in the PLUS issue PUBLIC DEFENDER: Microsoft adopts passkeys in Windows 11 — death to passwords! PATCH WATCH: A serving of zero days ADVERTISEMENT WinX DVD Video Software Black Friday Mega Sales Attention, video enthusiasts! This Black Friday, WinXDVD Software is unleashing exclusive deals on its top-notch multimedia tools. Elevate your video experience with following products with lowest price of the year. WinX DVD Ripper - Digitize Your DVDs Collections. Rip encrypted DVD movies, TV series to MP4 videos at No.1 speed with GPU acceleration. WinX Video Converter - Convert 4K, HD videos to 420+ formats. Reduce up to 90% video size losslessly. Edit video in clicks. WinX MediaTrans - Two-way sync videos, photos, music, ebooks, podcasts, voice memos, PDF, etc between iPhone and computer. Claim Black Friday Deals Now! FREEWARE SPOTLIGHT SlickRun — A powerful way to launch anything By Deanna McElveen We all have that handful of programs that get installed on every new computer. Now we have another. Eric Lawrence, a developer hailing from Texas, has created a very nifty, free program called SlickRun that is so intuitive and so, well, slick that you will be using it in no time. SlickRun is so powerful that once you get it customized to your liking, it will become second nature. Things like "intuitive," "slick," "nifty," "powerful," and "free" are the sort of descriptors that find themselves on Deanna's list of always installed software. ADVERTISEMENT Here are the other stories in this week's Plus Newsletter PUBLIC DEFENDER Microsoft adopts passkeys in Windows 11 — death to passwords! By Brian Livingston When Microsoft enhanced Windows 11 in a September 2023 update to support "passkeys" — a more secure form of authentication — it signaled the beginning of the end for insecure and hard-to-remember passwords. To create a passkey, you simply use whatever method unlocks your devices: a character-based PIN, your face, a fingerprint, or what have you. You then visit any website or other remote service that's passkey-compatible. The server exchanges with your device an "authentication token." This uniquely identifies you and the device you are using to sign in. The token is a private/public key pair. Your PIN, photo, or fingerprint is never sent across the network, where it could be intercepted by man-in-the-middle attacks. PATCH WATCH A serving of zero days By Susan Bradley In a lighter-than-usual November release, Microsoft is patching 63 vulnerabilities, including three already under targeted and limited attacks and three deemed critical. Even though you and I will see the same number of patch installs, the number of underlying vulnerabilities for the month is down compared to past years. But that doesn't mean you should change how you install updates — wait to see what side effects may occur, my usual recommended practice. Know anyone who would benefit from this information? Please share! Forward the email and encourage them to sign up via the online form — our public newsletter is free! Enjoying the newsletter? Become a PLUS member and get it all! Don't miss any of our great content about Windows, Microsoft, Office, 365, PCs, hardware, software, privacy, security, safety, useful and safe freeware, important news, analysis, and Susan Bradley's popular and sought-after patch advice. PLUS, these exclusive benefits: Every article, delivered to your inbox Four bonus issues per year, with original content MS-DEFCON Alerts, delivered to your inbox MS-DEFCON Alerts available via TEXT message Special Plus Alerts, delivered to your inbox Access to the complete archive of nearly two decades of newsletters Identification as a Plus member in our popular forums No ads We're supported by donations — choose any amount of $6 or more for a one-year membership.   The AskWoody Newsletters are published by AskWoody Tech LLC, Fresno, CA USA. Publisher: Susan Bradley (publisher@askwoody.com) Editor: Will Fastie (editor@askwoody.com) Your subscription: This email sent to manojdole1.copa@blogger.com To change your email address, view the instructions. 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