Something odd happened a few days ago. I was looking for something to watch on Amazon Prime Video and saw an Australian TV series that drew my attention. It showed that it had been viewed up to and including part of the sixth episode, but I was 99% sure that I had not watched the previous five. So, I clicked on the first one and, sure enough, I had not seen it, but the whole series was showing as having been viewed.

I clicked on my account to check my subscriptions and was horrified to find that over forty devices had access to my account. I think it said forty-six, but I was in shock and I quickly changed my password and logged out before I committed the number to memory.

I checked with my children to see if I had given them access at some point and had forgotten about it, but they both confirmed that they were not using my account. So, then I started to wonder who might have access to either my Amazon account, my wi-fi, or my password. I live in an apartment building, and it occurred to me that others might be using my wi-fi, but that seemed unlikely because it, too, is password-protected and, besides that, it cuts out a lot.

Then it dawned on me that I keep all my passwords in LastPass and immediately changed the master password for that application.

The other possible connection is that I had a new television delivered a few weeks ago and it was set up by the installer. I messed up the installation when I unplugged it to hide the dangling wires behind cord covers that I then painted over. That meant I had to phone the installers and have them talk me through how to program the TV again. Apparently smart TVs aren’t smart enough to know who they were before they were unplugged. Now I am wondering if, by hiding those cords and reprogramming everything, I inadvertently gave access to digital intruders.

Whatever or whoever was using my video streaming account has really messed up my record of shows watched, but they seem to have similar viewing tastes to me, which is interesting. I’m going to work my way through the “watched” series that I don’t remember watching to see if they are my cup of tea. Regardless, the freeloaders have now been locked out. I have been checking every couple of days to ensure that the only devices given access are my TV, my phone, and my laptop.

So, friends, this is a “heads up.” You might want to check to see how many devices have access to your video streaming account. If your number exceeds the number of devices in your home, you should probably make some changes.