🔑 They didn’t need your password

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Happy Saturday, {{first_name | friend}}. Today, I’m thinking about one of history’s greatest positive oopsies. In 1968, a 3M scientist, Spencer Silver, set out to make the strongest glue ever created. He failed spectacularly, cooking up instead something so weak it could barely hold two pieces of paper together that could be peeled off without leaving a mark.

👨🏼‍🔬 3M filed the invention anyway and forgot about it for six years. Then a colleague named Art Fry got annoyed that his church hymnal bookmarks kept falling out during choir. He remembered Silver’s useless glue and a cash cow was born.

Can you guess how much the Post-it Note product line makes for 3M yearly? A) About $50 million, B) $200 million, C) $500 million or D) Over $1 billion. Take your pick, the answer’s waiting to be ripped off at the end.

🤦‍♀️ My sister Christine called me in a panic. Her hard drive died and took hundreds of irreplaceable photos with it. I tried every recovery trick I know. Nothing worked. Don’t let that be your story. Carbonite backs up your entire computer automatically and restores everything with one click. I use it myself. Get my exclusive 75% off World Backup Day deal right now. More below.* — Kim

📬 Someone forwarded this to you? Smart friend. Want it in your own inbox instead of waiting on them? Sign up here. It’s free, and I promise not to spam you.

⚡ TL;DR

📖 Read time: 3 minutes

My friend Lisa called me last night, voice shaking. Someone had cleaned out her PayPal. Then her Amazon. Then tried her bank. Three accounts in 40 minutes. The criminals never touched her passwords. They didn’t have to. They had her email.

Think about what lives in yours. 

Bank statements. Doctor results. Your retirement account, your mortgage company, every streaming service, every store you’ve ever bought anything from. And every single password reset link on the planet lands right there.

A criminal doesn’t need to hack your bank. They just need your inbox. One account. Every other door swings wide open. That’s not a flaw. That’s how email was designed to work. And most people protect it with the same password they’ve used for years and years.

Nope. Not anymore.

Hackers go to your bank’s website. Click “Forgot Password.” Type your email. The bank sends a reset link straight to your inbox. The criminal, already inside, clicks it, creates a new password and walks right in. Then they do it to your Amazon. Your PayPal. Your brokerage. Each one takes about 60 seconds. It’s less effort than ordering a pizza.

The FBI calls this account takeover fraud. And 81% of victims said they thought they were “pretty careful” about security beforehand. (Their words, not mine.)

1. Get a real password. Under 16 characters or reused anywhere? Change it today. Use NordPass* ($1.43/month) to generate the unguessable. You remember one master password. It handles the rest.

2. Turn on two-factor authentication. But not the text version. SMS codes can be hijacked through SIM swap attacks, where a criminal calls your carrier, sweet-talks a rep and transfers your number to their phone. It’s terrifyingly easy. Use Google Authenticator instead. Links and steps to use it here on my site. Done.

3. Audit every app connected to your inbox. Every “Sign in with Google” click handed that app a key to your email. Some read your messages. Some send emails as you. Do it now: myaccount.google.com > Security > Third-party apps with account access.

Your bank has a fraud department. Your credit card has zero-liability protection. Nobody is covering your email. That one is entirely on you.

Twenty minutes. Three moves. Lisa wishes she’d done it sooner.

👓 A sight for sore lies: Google’s prototype Gemini glasses can quietly rewrite a photo before you even pocket your phone. In a recent demo, they snapped coworkers in Silicon Valley, then dropped them in front of La Sagrada Família like they’d spent the weekend in Barcelona. No editing app. No effort. The glasses land later this year. Call it what it is: a frame job.

Amazon sent the post office a Dear John letter: Amazon plans to cut packages shipped through USPS by at least two-thirds before their contract expires this fall. That’s $6 billion a year in revenue. Gone. USPS lost $9 billion last year, and the postmaster general says they’ll run out of cash within a year. Rural ZIP codes will feel this first.

💣 Wartime Best Buy: The Iranian war has hit your tech wallet in a new way. Air freight disruptions are delaying chip deliveries across Europe, per CNBC. The ripple effects might take weeks to show up in product availability and pricing, but they will show up. If you’re planning to buy a laptop, TV or gaming console this spring, sooner is better than later. Here are the computers I like.

Tax thieves want you: Researchers spotted criminals trading stolen tax records on dark web forums now. Names, SSNs, income data, the whole package. If you filed early, good. If you haven’t filed, do it before someone sends a fake return in your name and steals your refund. File now. Or explain to your future self why a stranger in Detroit got your refund and a nicer TV.

☕️ Grounds for optimism: A 43-year study tracking thousands of adults found that people who drank moderate amounts of caffeinated coffee or tea had an 18% lower risk of developing dementia and showed better cognitive performance over time. Slow your horses, though. Researchers say two to three cups a day is the sweet spot. And if you replace your morning coffee with decaffeinated green tea, you lose up to 87% of what little joy you have left in your life.

⚡️ 3-second tech genius: Speak easy. Your phone keyboard has a mic and it’s been judging you while you hunt-and-peck. On iPhone and Android, tap the mic icon and talk. Grocery lists, quick replies, texts while your hands are full. Say “period” or “comma,” and it punctuates for you. Feels ridiculous for about 30 seconds. By day three, you’ll wonder why you ever typed anything longer than your name.

You’ve been using Mac Spotlight wrong: Hit ⌘ + Space, and most people type a word and hope. Don’t. Add a slash before your file type instead. For example, /pdf, /folder, whatever you need. Press Enter, then type the first few letters of the file name. It finds it in seconds. Same search, wildly better results. Pretty neat, huh? 

Stop losing your cursor on Windows: Open Settings > Accessibility > Mouse pointer and touch. Pick a style, white, black, inverted, or go custom and choose any color. Drag the size slider up while you’re there. Bonus: Toggle on Mouse indicator, and pressing Ctrl pings a circle around it, so you can always see it. Should’ve done this sooner.

🤓 Newer Kindles let you turn pages by tapping the back: Works great for one-handed reading or if steam in the bath stops the screen responding. (Been there.) Open All Settings > Device Options and toggle on Double-Tap. Alternatively, tap the three-dot menu while reading and hit Disable Touchscreen. Taps won’t register, but swipes will still flip pages.

💲 Check your phone bill right now: If you see a number over $100, you’re overpaying. The big carriers charge you a premium for the exact same 5G signal. Consumer Cellular uses the same towers for way less. Switch today and get $25 off with code KIM25. If you’re 50 or older, get one unlimited line for $35.*

🔊 Smart speakers can secretly listen to another room without anyone answering: Set up two devices and say "Alexa, drop in on [device name]." It connects like an intercom instantly. Useful for checking on the kids or parents without calling. Slightly unsettling for everything else. Go to Alexa app > [your device] > Communications > Drop In to turn it off if it freaks you out.

📻 My national radio show is on this weekend. More than 510 stations across the country, which means there’s almost certainly one near you. Find it fast with our station locator map. Or skip the dial entirely and listen commercial-free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Love the show? Tell your local station! Hit their Contact Us page or send a social media shout-out. Your 30 seconds keeps the tech talk coming to your city. Thank you!

🔒 Your texts aren’t private. Silicon Valley legend (and my pal) Guy Kawasaki says Big Tech reads your messages. His new book, Everybody Has Something to Hide, makes the case for Signal, a free app that locks your texts so only you and the recipient can read them. Listen to our convo. Send Guy an email at [email protected], and he'll give you a copy of his book for free!

Don’t just listen! Check out the show on my YouTube channel. So cool. 

Your aunt matched online with a rugged outdoorsman. The problem? He looks obviously AI, but you can’t prove it, so you outsource the investigation to Reddit’s favorite unpaid detectives.

Enter the lumber experts. The job site? Looks like it was assembled by a drunk IKEA forklift. The logs? Pointing in different directions. Truck setup? Zero mechanical sense. Standard safety? Looks like OSHA took the day off. Oh, and real log trucks don’t freestyle-stack timber like Jenga towers.

Convincing until you think for three seconds.

Share this now:

🔜 Tomorrow: Identity theft isn’t just about draining your bank account anymore. A stranger can use your insurance, rack up bills and even leave the wrong allergies, diagnoses or blood type in your medical file. I’ll show you how this happens, why it’s so dangerous and what to check before the damage follows you into the ER. That’s coming in your inbox tomorrow.

The answer is D) Over $1 billion a year. And counting. Silver’s glue sat in 3M’s idea vault, then a bookmark problem changed everything. 3M nearly killed it twice anyway. The first test market in 1977 flopped completely. So 3M handed samples out free in Boise, Idaho. People were hooked once they tried them. 

I guess you could say Spencer Silver’s career really stuck. Proof that in science, the best discoveries sometimes won’t let go. Note to self: Never throw out a failed experiment.

💾 Your laptop is replaceable. Your files aren’t. iCloud is not a backup. It syncs your files, so when something goes wrong, they’re gone everywhere simultaneously. Carbonite keeps a completely separate copy of your entire computer safe, no matter what. I use it myself and sleep better because of it. Celebrate World Backup Day and get 75% off right now.*

🥹 Remember you’re the boss of your life, not the other way around. You got whatever comes your way today. — Kim

Kim Komando • Komando.com • 510+ radio stations • Trusted by millions daily

🏆 THE KIM CHALLENGE: Forward this to ONE person who needs to hear it today. Pick the person who popped into your head while reading. You know who it is.

Photo credit(s): Gemini, Aurzen, Reddit u/cowgirl_lawyer_0328

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