Dennis Faas

Infopackets Reader Steve T. writes: " Dear Dennis, I am running Centos 6 32-bit (i386) on a virtual machine and recently I started having 'PYCURL ERROR 22' every time I use 'yum list updates' or 'yum -y update' to list and download updates. The ... error message says ' [Errno 14] PYCURL ERROR 22 - The requested URL returned error: 404 Not Found '. I have gone to the wiki.centos.org/yum-errors as the error message suggests, but have not been able to find a solution to this problem. Can you help? " My response: I asked Steve if he would like me to connect to his virtual machine using my remote ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Neil W. writes: " Dear Dennis, Thanks for your interesting article on whether a VPN is safe for online banking . However, one question I can't seem to find the answer to is: do I need VPN on a public network? Do I need a VPN on a ... private network? What about a VPN on a shared network? An example might include a student doing banking at a university shared network. What do you think? " My response: Short answer: A VPN, or virtual private network is useful in a few cases - for example: hiding your tracks online (to some extent, but with major limitations) or accessing geo- ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Jeanie G. writes: " Dear Dennis, I believe I have been scammed by Quick PC Experts ( quickpcexpert.com ). I was using my web browser and suddenly a virus warning appeared on my screen, stating that I needed to call Microsoft ... certified support at 1-855-724-2570 . There was no way for me to close the virus alert window. I was very frightened and so I called the 1-800 number. The person I spoke to had a very thick Indian accent . Quick PC Expert then confirmed that my computer was infected, and that's when I let them remotely connect to my PC. They installed a firewall and ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Sue P. writes: " Dear Dennis, I stumbled upon your website and read your article about GoDaddy email not syncing with Outlook. I have been dealing with a similar issue - GoDaddy emails are slow to send, and GoDaddy emails are slow ... to deliver. In fact, just about everything with GoDaddy is slow - yet, I'm paying over $300 a year to host my site at GoDaddy. They initially got me to sign up on $5.99 a month promise, but with all the extras I've agreed to, the costs add up quickly! Surely their must be a better choice. I was wondering can you give me a rough idea as to how do I ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Jamil S. writes: " Dear Dennis, Lately I have been inundated with Microsoft virus alerts in my web browser claiming that my PC is infected and to call a 1-800 number to fix the problem. There is no way to dismiss the window. The ... Microsoft virus alerts appear suddenly and without warning, even if I'm on Amazon.com (for example). Sometimes the alerts have a very loud verbal pronouncement of a virus and insist that I call the number on the screen. Does Microsoft send virus alerts? Or is this fake? I have scanned my PC and it says no viruses. What gives? " My response: Does ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Gloria D. writes: " Dear Dennis, The other day I went to uninstall a program on my Windows 10 PC using Control Panel -> Programs and Features, and noticed there were about 20 or more Java updates installed on my system. I ... regularly receive messages from the Windows 10 Action Center that there is a new Java update available and that I need to download it due to security updates, which I always do. Therefore, I have four questions: is it safe to remove old Java updates? If so, which Java updates can I uninstall? Can I remove older Java versions? Is the latest Java ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Debra P. writes: " Dear Dennis, Lately I have been inundated with Windows 10 popup notifications that come from websites I've visited previously. I also receive a lot of email alerts. The popups are coming from bottom right corner ... of my screen and I have no idea how to stop it. Can you please tell me how to disable all Windows 10 notifications ? " My response: I asked Debra if she would like me to connect with her using my remote desktop support service in order to have a closer look, and she agreed. Below I will discuss my findings. How to Fix: Disable All Windows 10 ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Simon J. writes: " Dear Dennis, Last week I had a fake 'virus warning' error message pop up in Chrome while I was viewing Amazon.com. It said my computer was infected and to call a 1-800 number to 'fix' the 'problem'. After ... reading your articles, I knew it was a scam. At any rate, I did an antivirus and antimalware (malwarebytes) scan on the system - both said my system was clean. Flash forward a few days later and I got another fake 'virus warning' in Chrome. At this point I uninstalled Chrome, then deleted the c:\users\[my user name]\appdata\local\google\chrome folder ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Joni D. writes: " Dear Dennis, I have a gmail account, and over the years I've signed up for a few newsletters and promotions. Long story short, my gmail inbox contains 44,000 emails in total; 38,000 of those emails are located in ... the 'promotions' folder. I've logged into gmail.com and tried to mass delete my gmail inbox, but I have no idea how to do that. Selecting 50 items per page and clicking 'delete' would take years to clean out my inbox. Do you know how I can mass delete my gmail inbox , spam, promotions and similar from my gmail account? " My response: I rarely ever ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Tina J. writes: " Dear Dennis, I recently did a clean install of Windows 10 May 2019 Update (version 1903) on my main PC. My C drive is an SSD and only has 120GB of available space. As such, I have modified my the location of my ... Documents, Pictures, Music, and Video so that it points to the D drive which has 2TB of available space. In the past this hasn't been an issue, but since the Windows 10 May 2019 update, I cannot redirect my Pictures or Documents folder to the D drive - though both the Music and Videos folders had no problems changing locations. When I try to move ... (view more)