Here’s two products you should use to get a lot of extra security without a lot of hassle.

Lastpass

Lastpass is a browser plugin that stores your online passwords.

It eliminates the need to remember usernames and passwords for your online accounts because it auto-fills the forms whenever you login.  Super convenient.

LastPass generates very complex passwords, which helps avoid having your password guessed by hackers’ programs.  You don’t need to remember them, because LastPass does.

LastPass has a great report that inspects all of your stored passwords.  It quickly shows you duplicate passwords you’ve used in two or more accounts.  And it rates each password for its strength.  Don’t like what it found?  Use LastPass to generate new ones.

LastPass runs on Windows and Mac PC’s as well as all smartphones.

LastPass also has a sister product Xmarks. It’s a bookmark manager and syncs across all of your devices.  This is great when you change devices, such as buying a new smartphone or PC.  One click and all of your bookmarks show up on the new device.

One drawback to LastPass: you must use a master password to access the LastPass repository that contains all the other passwords.  Even though they encrypt everything, you’ll need to choose (and remember) a sufficiently complex password to your LastPass account.  There’s some extra features that can make access to LastPass even more secure, if you’re so inclined.

AnchorFree

AnchorFree establishes a secure, encrypted connection from your laptop to a wifi network.  This is important if you use a public wifi network, and is useful even on a password-protected one.

Like LastPass, AnchorFree gives you a lot of security without a lot of hassle.  Once you install it, it auto-connects over your network connection.  You don’t need to remember to turn it on.

AnchorFree doesn’t noticeably slow down your connection, at least here in the U.S.  They have built out their global network over the years to the point that it should perform well from most countries.

Customers also purchase AnchorFree for two other reasons:

• it provides some anonymity due to IP address obfuscation and encrypted communications;  people living in countries where their internet use is subject to surveillance find this useful
• its IP address obfuscation also enables people living in one country to access online entertainment content in another. For example, streaming Netflix from a country other than the U.S.

One drawback: I had trouble using AnchorFree on my iPhone.  The Mac and PC versions work fine for me.