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Category Archives: Alerts

Software: Internet Explorer 9 – Is now available

microsoft After a year of previews, beta’s, and release candidates, Microsoft has now released the latest version of Internet Explorer 9. Internet Explorer 9 includes the following (From Microsoft – LINK: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/internet-explorer/help/ie-9/whats-new-in-internet-explorer-9 (http://windows NULL.microsoft NULL.com/en-US/internet-explorer/help/ie-9/whats-new-in-internet-explorer-9) )

Notification Bar

The Notification Bar that appears at the bottom of Internet Explorer gives you important status information when you need it, but it won’t force you to click a series of messages to continue browsing.

Search in the address bar

You can now search directly from the address bar. If you enter a website’s address, you’ll go directly to the website. If you enter a search term or incomplete address, you will launch a search using the currently selected search engine. Click the address bar to select your search engine from the listed icons or to add new ones.

New Tab page

The redesigned New Tab page displays the sites you visit most often and color codes them for quick navigation. A site indicator bar also shows how often you visit each site, and you can remove or hide the displayed sites anytime you like.

Enhanced tabs

Tabbed browsing allows you to move easily between multiple open webpages in a single window, but there might be times when you want to look at two tabbed pages at the same time. Tear-off tabs allow you to drag a tab out of Internet Explorer to open the tab’s webpage in a new window, and Snap it for side-by-side viewing.

Download Manager

Download Manager is a powerful new feature that keeps a running list of the files you download from the Internet and notifies you when a file could be malicious. It also lets you pause and restart a download—if you have a slow internet connection—and shows you where to find downloaded files on your computer. You can clear the list at any time

Pinned Sites

If you visit certain webpages regularly, Pinned Sites allows you access them directly from the taskbar on your Windows 7 desktop.

Streamlined design

The first thing you’ll notice when you open Internet Explorer 9 is the compact user interface. Most command bar functions, like Print or Zoom, can now be accessed by clicking the Tools button, and your favorites appear when you click the Favorites button. Otherwise, Internet Explorer gives you the basic controls you need, and lets the web take center stage.

Download links for Internet Explorer 9 leaked a few hours early, as spotted by Winrumors.com (http://www NULL.winrumors NULL.com/internet-explorer-9-rtm-download-links-now-live/):

Windows  7 (x86 version (http://download NULL.microsoft NULL.com/download/C/3/B/C3BF2EF4-E764-430C-BDCE-479F2142FC81/IE9-Windows7-x86-enu NULL.exe))

Windows 7 (x64 version (http://download NULL.microsoft NULL.com/download/C/1/6/C167B427-722E-4665-9A40-A37BC5222B0A/IE9-Windows7-x64-enu NULL.exe))

Windows Vista (x86 version (http://download NULL.microsoft NULL.com/download/0/8/7/08768091-35BC-48E0-9F7F-B9802A0EE2D6/IE9-WindowsVista-x86-enu NULL.exe))

Windows Vista (x64 version (http://download NULL.microsoft NULL.com/download/7/C/3/7C3BA535-1D8C-4A87-9F1D-163BBA971CA9/IE9-WindowsVista-x64-enu NULL.exe))

*NOTE – Internet Explorer 9 is NOT supported on Windows XP.

Alert: AT&T Offers Wireless, Wireline Billing Relief for Consumers Calling and Texting Family, Friends in Japan

attlogo AT&T’s taking a strong initiative in making sure their customers can reach their family in Japan without effort or worry. Effective immediately, all calls to the land of the rising sun that was just hit with a major tsunami caused by a major earthquake are free. It’s not unlike what other telecoms did when Haiti was hit with a similar natural disaster. Read below for the full details courtesy of AT&T. [Engadget]

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AT&T Press Release from PRNewswire (LINK) http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/att-offers-wireless-wireline-billing-relief-for-consumers-calling-and-texting-family-friends-in-japan-117921489.html (http://www NULL.prnewswire NULL.com/news-releases/att-offers-wireless-wireline-billing-relief-for-consumers-calling-and-texting-family-friends-in-japan-117921489 NULL.html)

DALLAS, March 14, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — AT&T (http://www NULL.att NULL.com/gen/landing-pages?pid=3309)* today announced it has implemented international calling and texting support efforts for U.S. residential wireless and wireline consumers trying to connect with loved ones in Japan, following last week’s tragic earthquake and tsunami.

Effective beginning last week, March 11, and continuing through March 31, AT&T wireless postpaid customers will not be charged for:

  • International long distance usage from the United States and Puerto Rico to Japan
  • Text messages to Japan, originated from a U.S. wireless number

In addition, and also effective March 11 through March 31, residential wireline customers can seek credits for up to 60 minutes of direct dial calling to Japan:

  • Upon receiving their wireline bill, customers may call AT&T to receive adjusted calling for up to 60 minutes. In other words, no charges for up to 60 minutes of call time from the United States to Japan between March 11 and March 31.

For any of the above activity, customers will either see no charges reflected on their monthly statement, or they will see a full credit applied to their statement for activity between March 11 and March 31.

“We want to help our customers connect with loved ones in Japan in anyway we can,” said Mark Collins, senior vice president, Voice and Data Products, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. “Connecting with family and friends is most important at times like this— we want to make it as easy and worry free as possible for our customers.”

Still available, AT&T wireless customers can text “redcross” to 90999 to give a $10 donation to help the Red Cross with disaster support efforts in the area.  No text message fees apply.

And, TV Japan – the 24 hour Japanese news channel – is available for free through March 17 to all U-verse® TV subscribers, allowing viewers to follow the news and recovery efforts. TV Japan can be found on channel 3680.

*AT&T products and services are provided or offered by subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. under the AT&T brand and not by AT&T Inc.

Internet: (ALERT) AT&T to impose a cap on internet usage starting on May 2nd. (From DSL Reports)

computer  The following information comes this morning from DSL Reports (LINK) http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Exclusive-ATT-To-Impose-150GB-DSL-Cap-Overages-113149 (http://www NULL.dslreports NULL.com/shownews/Exclusive-ATT-To-Impose-150GB-DSL-Cap-Overages-113149).  If you are an AT&T DSL user, and you are a power user (Someone who downloads regularly, or uses services like Netflix) you may want to consider getting a new service provider. 

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(From DSL Reports)

Broadband Reports was the first to learn, and has confirmed with AT&T, that the company will be implementing a new 150GB monthly usage cap for all DSL customers and a new 250 GB cap on all U-Verse users starting on May 2. From March 18 to March 31, AT&T users are going to be receiving notices informing them of the change in the company’s terms of service. AT&T spokesman Seth Bloom confirmed the news to Broadband Reports after we initially contacted him last Friday concerning a leaked copy of the upcoming user notification. According to Bloom, the cap will involve overage charges. However, only users who consistently exceed the new caps will have to deal with these charges.

This is how it will work: only users who exceed the new usage cap three times — across the life of your account, not per month — will be forced to pay these new per byte overages. Overages will be $10 for every 50GB over the 150 GB or 250GB limit they travel.
AT&T claims their average DSL customer uses around 18GB a month, and these changes will only impact about 2% of all DSL customers — who the company states consume "a disproportionate amount of bandwidth."
"Using a notification structure similar to our new wireless data plans, we’ll proactively notify customers when they exceed 65%, 90% and 100% of the monthly usage allowance," AT&T tells us. The company also says they’ll provide users with a number of different usage tools, including a usage monitor that tracks historical usage over time, and a number of different usage tools aimed at identifying bandwidth-hungry services.
Regular readers will recall that this isn’t AT&T’s first experimentation with usage-based-billing. The company conducted trials of capped services and overages in Reno, Nevada and Beaumont, Texas in 2008 (http://www NULL.dslreports NULL.com/shownews/ATT-Metered-Billing-Trial-Hits-Second-Market-99389). Those trials involved users facing caps ranging from 20GB to 150GB — and per gigabyte overages up to $1 per gigabyte. The efforts were discontinued in early 2010 (http://www NULL.dslreports NULL.com/shownews/107012). In contrast to those trials, which involved capturing nearly all users in an overage net — this effort is aimed squarely at what AT&T considers consistently heavy users.

Facebook: Another scam alert – Fake Charlie Sheen Video scam

facebook (From the register)

(http://www NULL.theregister NULL.co NULL.uk/2011/03/07/charlie_sheen_facebook_scam/)

Charlie Sheen fake filth flick powers Facebook survey scam • The Register (http://www NULL.theregister NULL.co NULL.uk/2011/03/07/charlie_sheen_facebook_scam/)

www.theregister.co.uk (http://www NULL.theregister NULL.co NULL.uk)

Scammers have exploited actor Charlie Sheen’s increasingly bizarre antics as a lure for the latest in a long line of survey scams on Facebook.

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Tech Geek and More Note

As always scammers are looking to use human curiosity against you.  The want for the “latest train wreak”  is now and has always been one of the best ways for a bad guy to be trick you into falling for his/her trap.

Remember -

  • Keep your AV updated
  • Make sure you have a Spyware program or 2 installed on your pc. I recommend having both superantispyware and malwarebytes installed on your pc. You can find both at www.ninite.com (http://www NULL.ninite NULL.com) (Listed about mid-page, and both are free, even though both may ask you if you want to upgrade to pay versions.  The free versions are more than enough)
  • Always make sure they you update not only your Windows Install and Office install by going to Windows update in Control Panel (Vista and Win 7) or by Going to (LINK) http://update.microsoft.com/windowsupdate/v6/default.aspx?ln=en-us which is the Microsoft Updates page (Win XP and earlier) (http://update NULL.microsoft NULL.com/windowsupdate/v6/default NULL.aspx?ln=en-us)
  • DO NOT CLICK ON ANY link that you were not expecting, even if it appears to come from someone you know.  (This is the Red Riding Hood theory. )

Alert: For all my fellow WordPress bloggers – version 3.05 of WP is now available. (Highly recommended you upgrade)

WP  WordPress has announced the release of version 3.0.5 of the WordPress blogging software (LINK: http://wordpress.org/news/2011/02/wordpress-3-0-5/ (http://wordpress NULL.org/news/2011/02/wordpress-3-0-5/)). WP is reporting that this upgrade is highly recommended as it includes a number of fixes for the WordPress software.  (If your blog is hosted on WordPress.com then this update is being done automatically for you)

This security release (http://codex NULL.wordpress NULL.org/Version_3 NULL.0 NULL.5) is required if you have any untrusted user accounts, but it also comes with important security enhancements and hardening. All WordPress users are strongly encouraged to update.

Three point oh point five
Enhances security
Three point one comes soon

The release addresses a number of issues and provides two additional enhancements:

Two moderate security issues were fixed that could have allowed a Contributor- or Author-level user to gain further access to the site.

One information disclosure issue was addressed that could have allowed an Author-level user to view contents of posts they should not be able to see, such as draft or private posts.

Two security enhancements were added. One improved the security of any plugins which were not properly leveraging our security API. The other offers additional defense in depth against a vulnerability that was fixed in previous release.

Download 3.0.5 (http://wordpress NULL.org/download/) or update automatically from the Dashboard > Updates menu in your site’s admin area. Please update immediately.

image

Alert: Another Facebook Rogue app to look out for

facebook The rogue Facebook apps continue.  This time the warning is about an app labeled as haha or hahatoyourself.  It will appear on a page of someone you know, and may even include a direct message to you saying

Heyy (insert your name here), what are you doing in this video? LOL Embarrassing!

The scam may also list as

Look at you HaHa!

and look like a video post.

image

In both cases, DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK, the links will attempt to install a rogue app on to your account.  If you have clicked on the links already, you will want to do the following

- Remove the posts from your account

- Check the allowed 3rd party applications

You really need to check and see what 3rd party applications have access to your Facebook account. There are many apps in Facebook that people find useful, at the same time, many other Facebook apps are just there to steal your data, or use your account in ways that you don’t want.

To check your Privacy settings for 3rd party apps, click on account (on the top right of Facebook) and then click on Privacy settings.

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  • Now (in the lower left corner) select Apps and websites, where it says “Edit your settings”

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  • This will take you to the Apps and Websites page where you should remove any app that you either do NOT recognize or that you no longer use

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- *Run a full scan on your pc with Malwarebytes or SuperAntiSpyware to check your pc.

  • If you need to download either you can download them from www.ninite.com (http://www NULL.ninite NULL.com)

- *Run a full scan on your pc with your Antivirus Software.

  • If you don’t currently have an active Antivirus program, you can download a FREE Antivirus program from www.ninite.com (http://www NULL.ninite NULL.com).  (Tech Geek and More recommends Microsoft Security Essentials) If you have an old Antivirus program that is expired, you should remove it prior to installing the new Antivirus software.

(*Make sure you update the program prior to running it)

Alert: Flaw found on Amazon site – Changing your password recommended

Amazon Do you have an account on Amazon? Have you had it for a few years? Are you still using the same password that you set up when you opened your account? If you say yes to any of these, it is highly recommended that you change your password.

A flaw has been discovered on the Amazon site that

allows users to log in with passwords that resemble, but do not match, their actual password.

Read the following post from Huffington post (with info from Wired) concerning the flaw on the Amazon site.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/20…11/01/29/amazon-security-flaw-password-problem_n_815634.html (http://www NULL.huffingtonpost NULL.com/20 NULL. NULL. NULL.11/01/29/amazon-security-flaw-password-problem_n_815634 NULL.html)

Alert: Facebook – Tagged Picture used to spread “Fake” links and Malware. (Plus How to Untag yourself)

facebook Since Facebook is the BIG FISH currently, and most users on Facebook seem to “trust” what they see, the bad guys are now targeting Facebook with more daily scams.  From Rogue apps, to fake links, to hacking accounts, to now Fake picture tagging on profiles.  The following was something I came across yesterday

image

the tagged picture was on the profile of someone I know.  I did confirm with that person that they don’t know “Julie” (either by name or picture) the person on the tag.  Of course Julie has a link on her tag.  If you happen to click on the link (even if just by mistake) what you get is sent to a website that will download malware on your pc.

So as always having a Facebook account means that you need to pay attention to what is happening on your account.  If you run into a situation where a picture is tagged to you that you don’t want showing on your profile, here are the steps to Un-Tag yourself from the picture.

How to Untag yourself –

  • From your Facebook home page, locate the blue bar at the top of the screen. It says Facebook, Home, Profile, Friends, and Inbox. Click on “Profile”. Now you will be sent to your profile page.

image

  • On your profile page, look underneath your profile picture that is located at the top left. Under it, you will see “Photos”. Click on Photos

image

  • Now in the middle section of the page toward the bottom you will find the “Photos and Videos of you” section.

image

Look at the pictures below this section.  Any pictures tagged will appear in this area. Click on the picture you would like to remove.

  • Now look under the picture for the section that says “In this photo”.  Next to that you will find “Remove tag”.

image

Click remove tag. The photo will not show up on your profile anymore

(From the PrivacyChoice Blog) Alert: Be careful about the MyLife ad’s

In the continuing effort to both alert and educate readers of Tech Geek and More, here is a post that comes from the Privacy Choice Blog (LINK) http://blog.privacychoice.org/2010/11/30/consumer-beware-mylife-look-ups-are-a-lousy-deal/ (http://blog NULL.privacychoice NULL.org/2010/11/30/consumer-beware-mylife-look-ups-are-a-lousy-deal/) . The blog post mentions MyLife ad’s on Facebook, however, I have seen these ad’s on other sites (like Yahoo Mail).

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Consumer beware: MyLife look-ups are a lousy deal

Posted on November 30, 2010 (http://blog NULL.privacychoice NULL.org/2010/11/30/consumer-beware-mylife-look-ups-are-a-lousy-deal/) by Jim Brock (http://blog NULL.privacychoice NULL.org/author/admin/)

(http://blog NULL.privacychoice NULL.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/mylife-ad2 NULL.jpg)You’ve probably seen the Facebook ads for MyLife (http://www NULL.mylife NULL.com), which pitch you to enter your name to see what’s publicly available about you and who’s been looking for it. When you click through, they ask for not only your name, but also your age and location. Once you enter all of this information (but not before), they show you bogus blurred photos of people who they say are looking for you, and then solicit your email address if you want to actually see anything more. (You can even let them connect to your Facebook account, if you’re feeling really brave.) Once you’ve given them your email address, you learn that, in fact, no more free information is actually forthcoming. Instead you need to pay $15.95 to see your own profile.

Here’s the kicker: anything you enter as part of this process apparently becomes part of the profile they can connect with your email address in their database. This was confirmed in a note from their customer service department: ”If the site is asking you to provide a email address in our sign up that means you are creating a free user profile, in that event yes you would be added to our database.” This doesn’t jump out at you from their privacy policy, and certainly isn’t prominently disclosed anywhere an unsuspecting consumer might see it.

It gets worse. In their privacy policy (http://www NULL.mylife NULL.com/privacy-policy), MyLife even reserves the right to share your email address with “third party co-marketing partners if we believe they have an offer that would be of interest to you.” Swell.

In short, MyLife asks you to build their database about you while giving you nothing in return unless you pay. Doesn’t sound to me like a very good deal.

PS I sure wish Facebook would make some effort to police these deceptive ads, particularly since they thrive on curiosity about your own Facebook profile.

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