TRAPPED IN ‘NET’

Sometime back I was searching for some flash games in net for my nephew’s.While surfing I happened to see this game and I was surprised and shocked when I came to know what type of game it was. I heard about toon sex and all a lot, But never thought even in my wildest dream it will present\available in a kids site (later I found that there was not one but many which initially looked harmless but very nasty which is good enough to pollute\damage those innocent minds). I just don’t understand what traffic, what income they need by polluting and exploiting these innocent minds. My nephews (9 and 6 years old) often surf Google for games but the very thought of this – just one click can take them to most explicit site which is beyond imaginable scared me.

Now day’s kids are fast and they easily grasp things. But unfortunately same can’t be told, when it comes identifying what is right or what is wrong. And also can’t blame them for that because they don’t know that is bad and they are innocent or not big enough to identify good\bad. Unfortunately if we failed to find it out or notice it, probably they will consider it as not a big deal and also it will adversely affect or say damage their personality, finally the aftereffects will be disastrous I guess(they will believe what they see or their friends, more than there parents or other elders).
It is not only kids who are vulnerable but unfortunately our teenagers too. There are countless pages \ groups in social networking sites like Face book, my space, orkut which serve forbidden fruit ,that is easily accessible to anyone at anytime. And we don’t need the help of any surveys to guess that how many teenagers\minors visit, join all these (Common Interest – Sexuality) kinda groups. Another dangerous thing is chat rooms. There are lots of psychos (pedophiles) who are looking especially for minors for exploiting those (few years back a school girl is seduced by a group of guys through orkut in Delhi and killed by the same later is one example.). If they fall for them once, it will affect them mentally or make them feel guilty about it and finally it may result in serious consequences. Then another one is web cam, which is good enough to make anyone porn star in seconds or strong enough to make you regret for a lifetime for making a small mistake.
I’m not trying to say all the technologies, everything is bad or something likes that. If we take some small care or safety measures it will be wonderful things that will enhance the quality of life. If you follow the points mentioned below, I think that is more than enough to keep your kid\little brothers\sisters from trapped in ‘net’ (to a big extend).

• Always keep your computer in common room like master bedroom or main hall. And no laptops for juniors (especially with webcam).It is known fact that even engineering \ management students(almost 90 %) use there pc\laptop for watching movies, playing games, IM or surfing unless during study holidays ,exams or project time(for studying purpose). I don’t think school kids has to do anything more than that
• Install a good firewall\filter like net dog (one of the best software to block porn websites) or Trusted filtering etc. Also recommended to use – Safe eyes (let you track your kids instant messaging and social networking)
• Teach them that never share their(or there parents) personal information or pictures in the web(plenty of cheap software’s are available in net which can easily manipulate pics)
• Make them aware about traps in net (don’t wait until they become victim). When I was in school, every year they used conduct awareness program\workshops\plays about the ill effects of using drugs, alcohol, smoking. Now it is high time to add cyber issues also along with them.
• Before you gift your kid (school kid) a cell phone, just think for a second that, is that really necessary for him\her. If it is necessary ,it is recommended to use software’s from websafety or safekids (which block them from sending receiving inappropriate messages\pictures\videos).But remember that it will give protection from cyber traps only not from psychos in real world.
• Last but not least, try to be in the friend list of your kid’s social networking sites. So that at least you can monitor them, with whom all they are communicating and what they are doing.

All the parents believe there kids are best and they can’t be\won’t be bad. But that doesn’t mean we can give\guide them license\opportunity\show the way to be bad

P.S : Many of the young parents are technology-illiterate to there kids .But it doesn’t mean they can outsmart you, i.e. always try to be smarter than them .

Beware of Lottery Scams

                         Now days many of us are getting lot of emails(with or without  subject “Congratulations winner.”) which tells that you have won a lottery that worth millions. Many of these mails are coming from reliable(misleading) email id like info@pepsi.com or info@lottery.co.uk. There are some of them even claim they are from MSN or Pepsi and all. I’m giving a sample mail here.

                              In case if you replied to this mail, you will get another email which has been asked to send some money as a “service fee” to receive their jackpot. If you are good enough to believe them and pay that money, then you will be receiving another letter, claiming to be from the Gaming Board of Great Britain or something like that and with a forged signature of a board member, asking for €20,000. if you pay that and you will be asked to send a courier fee to send your winning cheque.Once you try to claim the money with that cheque, you will understand you become another victim of Lottery scam.
                As per the record , so far at least 65,000 people have lost there money. Many of the people won’t complain about it because of the shame 
               So when u get a mail like this next time just delete it or report spam. When ever you get scam mails like this (like inheritance, lottery, job employment, Love, real estate), check that with sites like http://www.snopes.com or hotscams.com (It is a good website which frequently gives updates and details about latest internet scams, fraud and all. Here I’m mentioning some of the general security tips for internet security
1.Don’t share your personal details in Internet (especially in social     networking sites like face book, orkut, myspace etc)
2. Install a good antivirus and firewall and update it frequently
3. Never share your password with anyone or never keep your     password (stored in WordPad or notepad) in a shared computer.
4.Never bother to reply a spam or mail from an unreliable/un                  trustedperson. And don’t even click the unsubscribe link 
5. Don’t do money related dealing in Internet through a unreliable       source or with a unknown person (Very important)
6..Always type URL directly (Don’t click URL links from email)
                        Always keep in mind that ‘there is no free lunch’.So think twise before you act.
        If you want to know more details about lottery scams, then check this website http://www.hoax-slayer.com/email-lottery-scams.html#email-lottery-scams

PS: I know now a day’s most of them know about this and all. Still I’m writing about this because there are lots of innocent peoples are there, and hopefully some of them will get awareness about this and get benefited by reading this.

          

Beware of new variations of Storm Worm / Trojan email threats

We all used get lot of spams or junk mail in our inbox. eg : FBI bypasses Facebook to nail you ,ecards,F.B.I. vs. facebook, viagra with the lowest price or some advertisements about medicines,replicas etc(latest addition to this is “CNN.com daily top 10” which is a poisonous virus downloader (screenshot of email and malware scanner result here)).Don’t click these links.because they may be highly dangerous viruses ,malware ,trojans or storm worms.So next time when you get these mails,simply trash it.

Clicking on these links downloads malware into your PC and causing it to become infected with the virus

Here are some tips to protect your PC

 

• Do not share your personal or financial detail through internet
• Do not  click links or reply to junk/spam/unknown/suspicious e-mails.
• Be careful of e-mail claiming to contain pictures in attached files, as the files may contain viruses. Only open attachments from known senders.
• Validate the genuineness of the organization by directly checking or goggling the organization’s website rather than directly following an suspicious link to the site.

Check this link if u wanna know more about this(like about latest worms ,how to protect Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternet Explorer4 your PC from the Storm Worm. etc)

http://www.wizcrafts.net/blogs/2007/08/beware_of_new_variations_of_storm_worm_email.html

Visit this URL to get the updated details of subjects of the spam email messages, IP address.website address http://garwarner.blogspot.com/2008/07/fbi-facebook-storm-worm-gets-it-all.html