Archive for the ‘Alerts’ Category:
Spam Dropped Last Week. Are You A Victim?
You may or may not have heard the news last week, but spam traffic dropped by 50 to 70 percent last week after two Internet Service Providers (ISPs) cut off Internet access for hosting company McColo in California last week.
If you’re not familiar with these terms, a hosting company provides computer service and equipment for other companies and individuals. A hosting company typically offers storage service for email and web sites. An ISP provides companies and individuals with access to the Internet.
In last week’s case, McColo, a hosting company with locations in Delaware and California, was providing hosting services to several companies and individuals who used the McColo’s computers to distribute viruses and spyware via spam and harmful web sites. Many of the sites and messages dealt in pharmaceutical drug sales and child pornography. These companies were paying McColo for the use of their computers, and despite the illegal activity McColo ignored it.
McColo’s host computer center in San Jose, CA was connected to the Internet via several Internet Service Providers. Two of the providers took it upon themselves to deprive McColo of Internet access and shutdown the Internet connection. Within seconds the level of spam traffic worldwide dropped by 50% to 75% according to several spam watchdog services such as Spamhaus.
Consumer Risks: “XP AntiVirus Protection” and “AntiVirus 2009″
If you downloaded either of these two programs then you can probably count yourself among the victims of this incident. “XP AntiVirus Protection” and “AntiVirus 2009″ were fraudulent programs distributed by several companies and individuals who were provided hosting services by McColo.
 AntiVirus 2009 |
 XP AntiVirus |
Help Yourself, Help Your Computer
If you downloaded either of these programs you should remove them immediately. To do so:
- Click Start > Conrol Panel
- Click or double-click “Add/Remove Programs”
- Locate and click each of these programs on the list and click “Remove”
After removing these programs, go to http://pack.google.com and download, install, and run “PC Tools Spyware Doctor” and “Norton Security Scan” to remove any traces of these programs and the harmful software they may have added to your computer. Users of Lavasoft’s Ad-Aware 2008 software may want to run an additional scan of their system for through cleaning. You may need to scan your system three times to fully clean out these programs.
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Subscribe to the comments for this postSpecial Offers from TigerDirect.com
Hello, readers! I’m not sure but this may very well be my first ever weekend post. So it’s got to be something special to get me to post an article just after midnight on Sunday morning.
TigerDirect.com is one of my favorite web sites for ordering computer components. I’ve been shopping there for more years than I can remember (accurately). I want to guess five, so there you go, five.
I’ve found a bunch of special offers on computers and other electronics selling for some great prices at TigerDirect.com. TigerDirect is offering these items as part of their “Early Black Friday Deals”. Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving when retailers start their holiday shopping season.
Some items of note which won’t be available after today (Sunday, Nov. 9):
- HP 550 Intel Dual Core Notebook PC SOLD OUT
- Acer 22″ widescreen monitor for $169.99
- A refurbished Hewlett-Packard AMD Quad Core Desktop PC with 6GB DDR2 RAM, 750 GB hard drive, a TV Tuner, and Windows Vista Home Premium (64 bit) for $399
- Toshiba 32 inch LCD HDTV for $499 (Save $150)
- Panasonic 42 inch Plasma HDTV for $699 (Save $300)
Here’s a few more items to check out on the link:
- Seagate 1.5 TB (that’s 1,500 Gigabytes) hard drive for a ridiculously low $149
- Garmin Nuvi GPS for $199 (Save $100). This is a great gift for the person who always gets lost or never wants to pull over to ask for directions.
- My favorite is the Hanspree 8″ digital photo frame for $79 with exchangeable frames.
You can also check out the small selection of overstock and liquidation items: TigerDirect Overstock/Liquidation - Limited Time Only!
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Computer Voters Be Mindful
As you know, there are many states now using computerized voting terminals. Many of these use touchscreen technology. Anyone who uses touchscreens frequently know that the screens can be either “too sensitive” or “not sensitive enough”. Think of those ATMs, for example, that didn’t detect your touch, or the ones that typed a character 2 or 3 times, when you only hit it once.
Check The Confirmation Screen Carefully
Be mindful when using computer voting terminals, and make sure you check the confirmation screen to see that it recorded each vote option you selected. Don’t confirm your vote until you’ve made sure your every choice was recorded. If something was missed, you can correct it, but once you click “OK” or “Confirmed” you might lose your chance to fix it.
A very well-known media personality pointed out that when they went to early voting last week, and they almost missed the fact that the terminal didn’t record their choice for president.
Post Comments or Questions with the link below. Keep up-to-date with Skylarking: By Email or RSS Newsfeed or on Twitter. You can also send questions with my email form.
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