HP Introduces HP Sceptre X360 13 To Answer User Privacy and Security Questions

HP is used to raising the bar in the world of Windows computers, and the OEM has made yet another move towards making that happen. While they are no sluggers when it comes to specs, their new HP Sceptre x360 13 comes with an array of privacy tools to make the user experience even better.

How does the HP Sceptre x360 13 improve Privacy?

A common concern for computer users these days is how their webcams could be hacked to spy on them. The fingers are usually pointed at ill-meaning internet whiz kids alone, but even the government and your employer could be doing the same thing.

Yes – it is that serious.

This is not just amoral, but unethical too. It has, thus, led many people to resolve to the option of taping over their webcams. That won’t be necessary with the HP Spectre x360 13 though.

Coming with the laptop is a webcam kill switch which takes the webcam offline and works unlike anything else we have ever seen.

Of course, the webcam is supposed to be off when not in use. These hackers, however, can remotely turn it on without the knowledge of the user. What the kill switch does is disconnect the webcam from the other electrical components of the laptop such that it can neither be remotely accessed nor turned on on-site; unless the switch was flipped back off.

To put cream on top of that, HP also worked a dedicated mute mic button into the setup. This provides additional privacy support in the area of voice technology, preventing hackers from listening in on conversations being held in the background.

Finally, HP took the extra step of slapping a VPN onto the device. Normally, manufacturers would launch their units with antivirus software onboard, so this is surely a welcome addition.

Although it also comes on a free trial package, the partnership between HP and ExpressVPN for the HP Spectre x360 13 will set the pace for how important these pieces of software are to security.

For those who do not know much about the inner workings of VPNs, they help you:

●       Avoid data-monitoring – Your Internet service provider (ISP) and hackers can monitor your internet data, collect it and use if for their own purposes. This could include selling such data to third parties or sifting through it for some personally-identifying piece of information which could come back to haunt you. Via the 256-bit encryption tech which many VPNs run on today, it would take them hundreds of years to crack your security.

●       Mask IP addresses – You get a new IP address whenever you connect to the web. Again, that makes it impossible for a hacker to track you since you don’t give off a unique identifier.

●       Encrypt connections – Public Wi-Fi networks are very unsafe, and they could make you vulnerable to man in the middle attacks, malware attempts, etc. You never have to worry about any of that anymore if you have a VPN on your hands.

If you are truly concerned about your data privacy and security, both offline and online, HP has provided an answer to that.