Beware of the 90# Telephone Scam
I dialed '0', to check this out, and asked the operator, who confirmed that this was correct so please be aware of this telephone scam.
It applies to cell phones too.
You may receive a telephone call from an individual identifying himself as an AT&T or other telephone company Service Technician. They state they are trouble shooting problems on the lines and to complete the test he needs you to touch nine(9), zero(0), the pound sign (#), and then hang up.
What happens is that, by pushing 90#, you give the requesting individual full access to your telephone line, which enables them to place long distance calls billed to your home phone number. This includes the 1-900 sex lines and send text for charity lines.
This scam has been originating from many local jails/prisons.
DO NOT press 90# for ANYONE.
Verizon also said it was true for their cell phone networks, so do not dial 90# for anyone!!
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Electronic Security - Situational Awarness on the Phone
As a father, mother, or family guardian, we need to be more situationally aware of what we say over the phone around people. In this day and age of social networking with Facebook, My Space, Twitter, etc., we tend to air out a lot of personal information without reservation as well. It’s no wonder why criminals start eavesdropping, checking social network areas – as well as private corporations and the government for that matter. We as a society forget there is someone next to you listening in on your cell phone call, or placing private or situational schedules on social networks.
The following article caught my eye and I thought I should post it for your situational awareness.
Stay safe out there!
Cellphones, social networks make eavesdropping OK?
By Sharon Jayson, USA TODAY
David Smith has heard — or rather overheard — it all while on planes, including the sexual details of a stranger's hookup at a business meeting.
"It feels like you're eavesdropping, but in another sense, you're forced to share something that falls under the heading of 'too much information,' " says Smith, 54, of Austin, a retired consultant and frequent business traveler.
A century ago, when the first home phones were "party lines" shared by neighbors, "worrying you were being listened in on was a common feature of American culture," says sociologist Claude Fischer of the University of California-Berkeley.
Oh, how times have changed.
Now, we're not only unconcerned about overheard phone calls, we purposely broadcast our personal business to large groups of "friends" and "followers" on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.
SECRETS: Some people still keep a diary in age of Facebook and blogs
As a result, we're fast becoming a nation of casual eavesdroppers, where every day we tune in to a constant stream of updates on what others are saying and doing, from where they're about to eat lunch (complete with photos) to their conversations with others.
All this sharing, some experts say, may be feeding a tendency toward exhibitionism, and devaluing the very privacy that earlier generations so desired.
But not everyone says the rise of widespread social snooping is such a bad thing.
Eavesdropping is an "evolved human practice that is natural and often beneficial," says John Locke, a linguistics professor at the City University of New York.
"We teach people they should mind their own business," he says, but "that's extremely bad advice. It's dangerous because you won't see the terrorist next door making a bomb; you won't see the kids being abused, or the husband beating up a wife. If there wasn't any eavesdropping, if people minded their own business and ignored what they saw and heard, how would you prevent and how would you solve crimes?"
Locke, author of a new book, Eavesdropping: An Intimate History, says apes keep an eye on each other to maintain order, and we humans have neighborhood watch programs.
But eavesdropping is more than just listening in. It's glancing over at someone else's laptop screen to see what they're doing. It's peering into an apartment window as you walk by. It's catching a glimpse through a door that's slightly ajar. It's trolling Facebook to see what your friends are saying to others.
And yes, it's a bit thrilling, he says. "There is something quite tantalizing about this behavior."
But is it really eavesdropping if they're broadcasting and we can't help overhearing?
"I don't regard it at all as me eavesdropping," says Etti Baranoff, who has overheard plenty of cellphone conversations in 15 years of traveling twice a week as an associate professor of insurance and finance at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond . "We think no matter where we are, we are in our own living room, but we are not. We are walking with our phones as if we are in our own homes."
No keyholes needed
"It's a generational and cultural change," says W. Keith Campbell, a professor of psychology at the University of Georgia in Athens .
"That old image of sticking your ear to a keyhole — we don't need to do it anymore," Campbell says. "Our personal lives are much more open."
What's changed is that more private behavior, such as personal phone calling, happens in public today, says social psychologist Robert Kraut of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh .
It may seem like eavesdropping, but the "victim" is no longer the person being eavesdropped on, he says — it's "the overhearers, who can't get away. What had once been private behavior is now being shoved in their face."
Fischer, author of Made in America: A Social History of American Culture and Character, says it's ironic that "a cellphone call overheard while walking down the street is a throwback to (party lines) where everybody knew everybody's business."
Whether eavesdropping is by choice or forced makes a big difference, Locke says.
"If someone is speaking low, people will lean in the direction of the message. But if people are speaking loudly on a cellphone, they'll back the other way. We resent the fact they are broadcasting personal information. We want the option of tuning in."
This dichotomy is evident in new research on public cellphone use. One study, to be presented to the National Communication Association in November, included 15- to 20-minute observations of 19,741 people using cellphones on a college campus from 2005 to 2008. Researcher Yi-Fan Chen of Old Dominion University in Norfolk , Va. , found that mobile devices "blurred boundaries between public and private spaces." Her 2009 survey found cellphones were most often used on the street, observers said, "in a loud or annoying manner."
Another study, in the journal Behaviour & Information Technology in 2004, found cellphone conversations "significantly more noticeable and annoying than face-to-face" at the same volume.
"There is an idea in social psychology that you can talk about intimate things to strangers because they are not part of your network and are not considered to be a risk," Campbell says. "If you're actually in public and clearly don't know people, it's almost seen as a private space."
Some say today's mix of easy information sharing and celebrity-driven media culture is making us more narcissistic. With Facebook and Twitter, we're more willing to showcase our lives for all who want to look or listen. We can tell our friends our innermost thoughts, but those who aren't so close also see.
"Go into an airport and you hear people talking in a particularly loud voice, so people think they're important or have status. There's a subset of people that ties in more with narcissism and attention-seeking that are using these channels to get attention," says Campbell , co-author of The Narcissism Epidemic.
Gleaning new information
But the fact that you can watch or listen on social networks without engaging "has some real advantages," says Keith Hampton, assistant professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia .
"It's exposure to little bits of information you would never otherwise have had access to," he says. "And little bits of information can be really important. You have access to new ideas, and not from very close social ties that know what you know."
Pop culture expert Richard Lachmann, a sociology professor at the University at Albany , State University of New York, says it's not just the idea of privacy that has changed. He believes the very nature of eavesdropping is up for debate, since people are willing to share more and more personal information.
"Everybody still has a notion of eavesdropping. It's somebody trying to hear something they haven't been invited to hear. What's changing is what goes in that category," he says.
"It used to be people had a real long list of things that were private and only heard by a few, and a short list of things that would be public. For many people, that's moved from one list to another."
The following article caught my eye and I thought I should post it for your situational awareness.
Stay safe out there!
Cellphones, social networks make eavesdropping OK?
By Sharon Jayson, USA TODAY
David Smith has heard — or rather overheard — it all while on planes, including the sexual details of a stranger's hookup at a business meeting.
"It feels like you're eavesdropping, but in another sense, you're forced to share something that falls under the heading of 'too much information,' " says Smith, 54, of Austin, a retired consultant and frequent business traveler.
A century ago, when the first home phones were "party lines" shared by neighbors, "worrying you were being listened in on was a common feature of American culture," says sociologist Claude Fischer of the University of California-Berkeley.
Oh, how times have changed.
Now, we're not only unconcerned about overheard phone calls, we purposely broadcast our personal business to large groups of "friends" and "followers" on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.
SECRETS: Some people still keep a diary in age of Facebook and blogs
As a result, we're fast becoming a nation of casual eavesdroppers, where every day we tune in to a constant stream of updates on what others are saying and doing, from where they're about to eat lunch (complete with photos) to their conversations with others.
All this sharing, some experts say, may be feeding a tendency toward exhibitionism, and devaluing the very privacy that earlier generations so desired.
But not everyone says the rise of widespread social snooping is such a bad thing.
Eavesdropping is an "evolved human practice that is natural and often beneficial," says John Locke, a linguistics professor at the City University of New York.
"We teach people they should mind their own business," he says, but "that's extremely bad advice. It's dangerous because you won't see the terrorist next door making a bomb; you won't see the kids being abused, or the husband beating up a wife. If there wasn't any eavesdropping, if people minded their own business and ignored what they saw and heard, how would you prevent and how would you solve crimes?"
Locke, author of a new book, Eavesdropping: An Intimate History, says apes keep an eye on each other to maintain order, and we humans have neighborhood watch programs.
But eavesdropping is more than just listening in. It's glancing over at someone else's laptop screen to see what they're doing. It's peering into an apartment window as you walk by. It's catching a glimpse through a door that's slightly ajar. It's trolling Facebook to see what your friends are saying to others.
And yes, it's a bit thrilling, he says. "There is something quite tantalizing about this behavior."
But is it really eavesdropping if they're broadcasting and we can't help overhearing?
"I don't regard it at all as me eavesdropping," says Etti Baranoff, who has overheard plenty of cellphone conversations in 15 years of traveling twice a week as an associate professor of insurance and finance at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond . "We think no matter where we are, we are in our own living room, but we are not. We are walking with our phones as if we are in our own homes."
No keyholes needed
"It's a generational and cultural change," says W. Keith Campbell, a professor of psychology at the University of Georgia in Athens .
"That old image of sticking your ear to a keyhole — we don't need to do it anymore," Campbell says. "Our personal lives are much more open."
What's changed is that more private behavior, such as personal phone calling, happens in public today, says social psychologist Robert Kraut of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh .
It may seem like eavesdropping, but the "victim" is no longer the person being eavesdropped on, he says — it's "the overhearers, who can't get away. What had once been private behavior is now being shoved in their face."
Fischer, author of Made in America: A Social History of American Culture and Character, says it's ironic that "a cellphone call overheard while walking down the street is a throwback to (party lines) where everybody knew everybody's business."
Whether eavesdropping is by choice or forced makes a big difference, Locke says.
"If someone is speaking low, people will lean in the direction of the message. But if people are speaking loudly on a cellphone, they'll back the other way. We resent the fact they are broadcasting personal information. We want the option of tuning in."
This dichotomy is evident in new research on public cellphone use. One study, to be presented to the National Communication Association in November, included 15- to 20-minute observations of 19,741 people using cellphones on a college campus from 2005 to 2008. Researcher Yi-Fan Chen of Old Dominion University in Norfolk , Va. , found that mobile devices "blurred boundaries between public and private spaces." Her 2009 survey found cellphones were most often used on the street, observers said, "in a loud or annoying manner."
Another study, in the journal Behaviour & Information Technology in 2004, found cellphone conversations "significantly more noticeable and annoying than face-to-face" at the same volume.
"There is an idea in social psychology that you can talk about intimate things to strangers because they are not part of your network and are not considered to be a risk," Campbell says. "If you're actually in public and clearly don't know people, it's almost seen as a private space."
Some say today's mix of easy information sharing and celebrity-driven media culture is making us more narcissistic. With Facebook and Twitter, we're more willing to showcase our lives for all who want to look or listen. We can tell our friends our innermost thoughts, but those who aren't so close also see.
"Go into an airport and you hear people talking in a particularly loud voice, so people think they're important or have status. There's a subset of people that ties in more with narcissism and attention-seeking that are using these channels to get attention," says Campbell , co-author of The Narcissism Epidemic.
Gleaning new information
But the fact that you can watch or listen on social networks without engaging "has some real advantages," says Keith Hampton, assistant professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia .
"It's exposure to little bits of information you would never otherwise have had access to," he says. "And little bits of information can be really important. You have access to new ideas, and not from very close social ties that know what you know."
Pop culture expert Richard Lachmann, a sociology professor at the University at Albany , State University of New York, says it's not just the idea of privacy that has changed. He believes the very nature of eavesdropping is up for debate, since people are willing to share more and more personal information.
"Everybody still has a notion of eavesdropping. It's somebody trying to hear something they haven't been invited to hear. What's changing is what goes in that category," he says.
"It used to be people had a real long list of things that were private and only heard by a few, and a short list of things that would be public. For many people, that's moved from one list to another."
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Internet Security - 6 Things You Should Never Reveal on Facebook
Article from Kathy Kristof, MoneyWatchBnet.com
The whole social networking phenomenon has millions of Americans sharing their photos, favorite songs and details about their class reunions on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and dozens of similar sites. But there are a handful of personal details that you should never say if you don't want criminals — cyber or otherwise — to rob you blind, according to Beth Givens, executive director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
The folks at Insure.com also say that ill-advised Facebook postings increasingly can get your insurance cancelled or cause you to pay dramatically more for everything from auto to life insurance coverage. By now almost everybody knows that those drunken party photos could cost you a job, too.
Your Birth Date and Place
Sure, you can say what day you were born, but if you provide the year and where you were born too, you've just given identity thieves a key to stealing your financial life, said Givens. A study done by Carnegie Mellon showed that a date and place of birth could be used to predict most — and sometimes all — of the numbers in your Social Security number, she said.
Vacation Plans
There may be a better way to say "Rob me, please" than posting something along the lines of: "Count-down to Maui ! Two days and Ritz Carlton, here we come!" on Twitter. But it's hard to think of one. Post the photos on Facebook when you return, if you like. But don't invite criminals in by telling them specifically when you'll be gone.
Home Address
Do I have to elaborate? A study recently released by the Ponemon Institute found that users of Social Media sites were at greater risk of physical and identity theft because of the information they were sharing. Some 40% listed their home address on the sites; 65% didn't even attempt to block out strangers with privacy settings. And 60% said they weren't confident that their "friends" were really just people they know.
Confessionals
You may hate your job; lie on your taxes; or be a recreational user of illicit drugs, but this is no place to confess. Employers commonly peruse social networking sites to determine who to hire — and, sometimes, who to fire. Need proof? In just the past few weeks, an emergency dispatcher was fired in Wisconsin for revealing drug use; a waitress got canned for complaining about customers and the Pittsburgh Pirate's mascot was dumped for bashing the team on Facebook. One study done last year estimated that 8% of companies fired someone for "misuse" of social media.
Password Clues
If you've got online accounts, you've probably answered a dozen different security questions, telling your bank or brokerage firm your Mom's maiden name; the church you were married in; or the name of your favorite song. Got that same stuff on the information page of your Facebook profile? You're giving crooks an easy way to guess your passwords.
Risky Behaviors
You take your classic Camaro out for street racing, soar above the hills in a hang glider, or smoke like a chimney? Insurers are increasingly turning to the web to figure out whether their applicants and customers are putting their lives or property at risk, according to Insure.com. So far, there's no efficient way to collect the data, so cancellations and rate hikes are rare. But the technology is fast evolving, according to a paper written by Celent, a financial services research and consulting firm.
The whole social networking phenomenon has millions of Americans sharing their photos, favorite songs and details about their class reunions on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and dozens of similar sites. But there are a handful of personal details that you should never say if you don't want criminals — cyber or otherwise — to rob you blind, according to Beth Givens, executive director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
The folks at Insure.com also say that ill-advised Facebook postings increasingly can get your insurance cancelled or cause you to pay dramatically more for everything from auto to life insurance coverage. By now almost everybody knows that those drunken party photos could cost you a job, too.
Your Birth Date and Place
Sure, you can say what day you were born, but if you provide the year and where you were born too, you've just given identity thieves a key to stealing your financial life, said Givens. A study done by Carnegie Mellon showed that a date and place of birth could be used to predict most — and sometimes all — of the numbers in your Social Security number, she said.
Vacation Plans
There may be a better way to say "Rob me, please" than posting something along the lines of: "Count-down to Maui ! Two days and Ritz Carlton, here we come!" on Twitter. But it's hard to think of one. Post the photos on Facebook when you return, if you like. But don't invite criminals in by telling them specifically when you'll be gone.
Home Address
Do I have to elaborate? A study recently released by the Ponemon Institute found that users of Social Media sites were at greater risk of physical and identity theft because of the information they were sharing. Some 40% listed their home address on the sites; 65% didn't even attempt to block out strangers with privacy settings. And 60% said they weren't confident that their "friends" were really just people they know.
Confessionals
You may hate your job; lie on your taxes; or be a recreational user of illicit drugs, but this is no place to confess. Employers commonly peruse social networking sites to determine who to hire — and, sometimes, who to fire. Need proof? In just the past few weeks, an emergency dispatcher was fired in Wisconsin for revealing drug use; a waitress got canned for complaining about customers and the Pittsburgh Pirate's mascot was dumped for bashing the team on Facebook. One study done last year estimated that 8% of companies fired someone for "misuse" of social media.
Password Clues
If you've got online accounts, you've probably answered a dozen different security questions, telling your bank or brokerage firm your Mom's maiden name; the church you were married in; or the name of your favorite song. Got that same stuff on the information page of your Facebook profile? You're giving crooks an easy way to guess your passwords.
Risky Behaviors
You take your classic Camaro out for street racing, soar above the hills in a hang glider, or smoke like a chimney? Insurers are increasingly turning to the web to figure out whether their applicants and customers are putting their lives or property at risk, according to Insure.com. So far, there's no efficient way to collect the data, so cancellations and rate hikes are rare. But the technology is fast evolving, according to a paper written by Celent, a financial services research and consulting firm.
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