UnNeighborly Security

I recently ran into some unneighborly security. It happens all the time to those of us who know how to build, upgrade, secure, and troubleshoot hardware and software.

I’m over at my neighbor’s house and he says, “Hey, you work with computers, so can you take a look at mine?”

There goes the afternoon.

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Important update regarding your LinkedIn password = SPAM?

A friend of mine received the following email on Friday, 2 full days after the LinkedIn attack was made public, titled “Important update regarding your LinkedIn password”. Here’s the text she received, addressed to her by her first and last name:

[see UPDATE below]

Master List of Blogging Tips and Articles

I occasionally blog about blogging, so to make these posts easier to find (and link to), here’s a list (index) of all the blogging posts on this blog, in alphabetical order, and by most popular.
I’ll add other posts as they are written.

Why People Get Scammed

People get scammed every 22 seconds with a typo-infested email or otherwise stupid hyperlink tricks for the following reasons:

1. Texting and chat have so corrupted the grammar and spelling of so many people that many don’t remember how communication skills were cherished prior to the birth of Al Gore, the Internet, and mobile devices.

Are U Fooled by This Spam Technique?

Akismet flagged a comment as spam and I had not seen the spam technique used before, so I was fooled. I reviewed the comment and approved it, but the name, Michael G. Redmond, made me wonder a bit more (Redmond, WA is the home of Microsoft). So I goggled it. Oops. I remarked the comment as spam. Why?

Stupid Spam Comments 2

Like most bloggers, I get really stupid spam comments. Fortunately, the spam filter or widget, Akismet, has caught everyone one I’ve received so far. As a result of the filter, I was able to make my blog more comment-friendly (I’d love to tell you all about it, but that would only invite more spam, and I like bacon a bit more).

More on Spamming Blogs

I just found a great spam comment in my Akismet filter. Check it out in Blogging: Spammers under the heading, Update 3 — 8/7/10.

Quote of the Weak (Trojan=Password)

I’ve been absent from the blog lately due to a number of pressing projects, one which was rebuilding a friend’s Windows XP box after a trojan massacre (and I thought only auditors stabbed the wounded — you should have seen the legions on that box).

When I delivered the newly minted OS and applications, my friend informed me that another set of email spam was sent from her Hotmail account at 3:20 am that morning. She asked me whether I was working on the PC at the time. I told her that not only was her PC turned off at that time, it was unplugged.

Blogging: Spammers

I get a kick out of some of the things that spammers leave as Comments in hopes that you’ll provide them with a link back to their site. I’ve posted a few of the newer ones that I’ve received.