 |
|||||||||||||
|
|
|
 |
|
||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
Hewie's Views and Reviews Welcome to this issue of Hewie's Views & Reviews. Be sure to visit Hewie's Favorites at http://www.hewie.net/ . Hewie's Quick Thoughts appear almost daily at http://www.hewie.net/weblog/ . In this issue : July, 2003 ++++ New Technology Brings New Fads I still haven't bitten the bullet and joined the masses with a cell phone. One of the latest additions to the technology is the ability to snap and send pictures. I just couldn't imagine why someone would use that feature after the first day of owning one. However, it's getting to be quite a fad. I am sure that the cell phone companies are loving it. Popularity of the photo-phone began in Japan. However, the US has become captivated with the creature as well. Weblogs have been popular for a while, but now I am seeing photoblogs. These may even be on free photoblog portals. One is http://photoblogs.org/list/ . That site states, "A photoblog is a type of blog that is regularly updated with photos. Some photoblogs focus only on photography, while others have photos in addition to other content. All photoblogs, however, consider photos to be an important part of their chronological blogging structure." I saw on a newscast, just last night, that many companies are banning the use of photo-phones by employees and customers or visitors. Companies are concerned with privacy issues, but especially business espionage, such as pictures of new products. June 2003 brought New York to pass their version of "Stephanie's Law." Among other things, it will make it a felony to snap pictures of such things as people in compromising positions or under ladies skirts from the floor or up a staircase. Apparently this is being done with no laws to prevent it. These voyeur photographers have been posting their photos on the Internet. Once I decide to get a cell phone, I will have to decide whether or not I will want to try this latest technological fad. So if you see mention of a photoblog on Hewie's Favorites, you know that I joined the masses. ++++ Spoofing Last month I wrote about spammers. < http://www.hewie.net/views/20030530.html > I receive messages from time to time that contain my email address as the sender. I contacted my hosting company and they told me that they have no way to prevent "spoofing." Spoofing is a technique that a spammer may use to make it look like a real email address sent the spam. Many of your ISP's have placed anti-spam methods in place, including checking the address of the sender. The spammers have found ways to fool this by spoofing with real addresses like yours or mine. The addresses are valid because they get the address from the same lists that are used to send the spam. You may receive an email that a message you had sent containing advice on making various parts of the body smaller or bigger that you sent didn't reach its recipient. Do not worry, someone probably hasn't hijacked your e-mail address. They simply are spoofing and using your address for sending the message. Umm, I wonder how many actually did get through with the recipient thinking that I sent it! ++++ When is a ZIP not a ZIP? Several years ago the late Phil Katz created a compression and packaging format known as ".zip". Until very recently PKWare, Katz's former company, provided the programming world with an open source of the format. Recent technology has dictated that the compression software contain some security and the latest version of PKZip 6.0 was released, but not the code. WinZIP, a competitor and the widest used zipping software for Windows is beta testing their own version 9 of WinZIP which contains encryption for security. The result is that PKZip and WinZIP may not be able to uncompress each other's files. Let's hope that this gets resolved or you will not know if the error when unzipping is truly an error or is just an incompatibility. Perhaps you use WinZIP, Stuffit!, or one of the other compressions programs. Since PKWare is not making its new code available, these programs may not be able to unzip a file created by PKZip and vice versa. Stay tuned. ++++ Scam Alert Our local sheriff's office has an e-newsletter which gives citizens the latest updates on criminal activity, updates on their website and more. In a recent Scam Alert from Donald F. Eslinger, Sheriff of Seminole County, Florida http://www.seminolesheriff.org came the following warning. Authorities in New Jersey tipped police agencies in Florida, Texas, Arizona and Nevada of this possible scam after it was learned that mailing lists, specifically containing single person households, ages 70-through-91, were purchased recently. It's believed the purchasers of these records may use the lists to contact senior citizens to get money from them via a "relative in distress" scam. In this scam, the perpetrator will call potential victims posing either as a relative, or as somebody in a position of authority. The caller asks the potential victim to wire money because the victim's relative has suffered some misfortune; an accident; an injury, or is under arrest, and money is needed for help. The Seminole County Sheriff's Office is urging citizens to always verify the identity of family members and the existence of an emergency. Failing to do so could lead to one becoming the victim of this scam. The Sheriff's Office is also urging citizens to check their credit histories, and if in doubt, have their credit information flagged by the credit reporting agencies as a potential target for fraud. [Go to http://clarkhoward.com/library/rolodex_credit.html for information on how to check your credit information.] If one believes that they have been a victim of, or potential target of, this scam, they are asked to call local law enforcement. Check your local law enforcement department's website to subscribe to an e-newsletter, if they have one. Keep informed. ++++ New additions to Hewie's Favorites FutureDial
|
|
|||||||||
|
|||||||||