Some Interesting Sidelights to this discussion
  • As of yesterday 3/24/2017 I am unable to reach the TOR Project website other than through the TOR network. The error message I get is "unable to establish a secure connection" but it appears OpenDNS may be blocking access because the TOR project offers hidden routing that could be used for illicit purposes??? There is no problem reaching the site using TOR and the Onion Routing network.
  • On the TOR project site, I found an experimental pre to early alpha sandboxed version of the TOR browser. Since all iOS apps and any MacOS app distributed via the App Store must be sandboxed this is a prerequisite for an iOS version of the TOR browser. As there is already a version of Firefox for iOS and there are other browsers using the Onion Routing network for iOS it is apparently the digital signature hiding that is the sticking point at this juncture. (If I am housebound much longer, I may get bored enough to dig into the source code and see if I can figure out what is going on, but I will have to get really bored to do that.)
This thread has finally pushed me over the edge, and after years of indecision, I finally decided to turn on FileVault last night just before I went to bed. (NOTE: I cloned the system to an external drive so if anything goes wrong I can always get back to go.) There have been a few learnings with this as well...
  • I don't know about earlier versions of FileVault but in MacOS 10.12.4 beta 8 or 9 (I have lost count) you can Encrypt either the user folder or the entire drive. I elected the entire drive. The first step after turning on FileVault in system Preferences > Security & Privacy is rebooting…
  • It makes sense when you think about it but when you turn FileVault on Automatic logon is deactivated — permanently
  • I have not rebooted a second time but apparently bluetooth does not turn on until after the password is entered. Fortunately the Magic Keyboard and Magic Keypad can be connected via a lightning cable as well as wirelessly or I would not have been able to enter the password. (Memo to self: keep a couple of lightning cables handy.)
  • The system can be used as soon as it reboots, but encrypting the drive can take some time. Mine has been "encrypting" for 18 hours and the progress bar says there are some 15 hours left to go — oops, now it says 5 hours. Patience is a virtue I am told but I have never been convinced of that and at my age it is unlikely I ever will be.
  • Even with the encryption running in the background I have not encountered any noticeable reduction in system performance. cool

If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein