Can you spot a fraud when you see one?
Posted on February 26, 2005
Filed Under Internet & Technology | 1 Comment
Recently, I switched the [SCOPES](http://www.scopesnetwork.org) email address to the woman who will be taking over the organization when I leave. A few days later, she forwarded me an email she received about updating records on some list somewhere. After 6+ years as a domain owner, I have learned from experience how to separate the legitimate emails from the ones that are spammed out to anyone in a whois record. I explained to her that she should ignore these requests.
But it made me think about the whole phishing thing and why these emails clog our boxes: they work. These things are tricky and you have to be so very careful on what you click on from your inbox.
For those that aren’t familiar (yes, Mom, I’m talking to you) phishing is when you get an email that appears to be from your bank or PayPal or your ISP asking you to click a link to update/verify your personal information on their site. These emails are carefully designed to look like the real thing. The websites you go to look just like the real website. The catch is that the <form> you fill out you doesn’t go to your bank or ISP, it goes to the scammers. Congratulations, you’ve just given thieves your passwords or your social security number or your bank account info. They now have everything they need to wipe you out.
Some of these scams practically scream “I am trying to rob you”. The English is poor, like they were written from some online translator (because they were). But some are mastery (in an evil way). This is a big business and these folks know what they’re doing.
[The Office Weblog](http://office.weblogsinc.com/entry/1234000523033085/) points to an online [Phishing IQ test](http://survey.mailfrontier.com/survey/quiztest.html). Click on sample emails and mark whether it’s legitimate or not, then check your results. Some are not as obvious as they first appear.
I got 10 out of 10 on the first try. 
If you want to protect yourself, here’s what you should look for:
1. Legitimate emails will usually include some personal information that can’t be gathered from your email address. It will say something like “for your account ending in 1234” (assuming your account actually does end in 1234) or they will include your account username.
2. I’ll emphasize the last point: PayPal will **always** include your name as you registered it with them in their emails to you. If it doesn’t say “Dear Your Realname” then it’s a scam. I’m sure the scammers will eventually figure out a way around this, but most only have your email address so they can’t guess this information. So they’ll address the email to “Dear member:” or “Dear client of Whatever Bank” If an email is asking for an action on your part and you don’t see anything in the email that is not uniquely identifiable to you, then ignore it or be safe and enter the URL for the site manually in your browser.
3. If an email appears to be a response to an action you took, such as changing your email address or preferences, and you did just do what the email said you just did then it’s likely legit.
4. Phishers are usually better than this, but look at the URL they want you to go to. A legitimate URL will be something like www.domain.com/something-specific-here. A fake domain will be something like www.domain-unsubscribe.com.
5. Phishers like to alarm you with a crisis. If the email is just selling you a feature of the service, then it’s likely just the service trying to sell you.
6. The last place you should look for validation of an email is the “from” line. I can send you an email that appears to be from anyone I choose to be and it takes 3 seconds of my time to change the setting in my email application. This is too easy to fake, and it’s the reason why you might be accused of sending spam that you didn’t send. If spammers can fake being you, then scammers can fake being Amazon or your bank.
7. Get familiar with how your legitimate businesses do their business. You already know how PayPal addresses their emails. Save a few legit ones from eBay or your bank and get a feel for their style and syntax. That way, when a fake comes in you’ll do a better job of spotting the differences.
8. If you have the slightest doubt about an email, err on the side of caution. Don’t click on anything. Instead, go to your browser and manually type in the main URL of the bank/service. Then navigate to the login link to get to the details of your account. Most legit businesses have set up email addresses, FAQs or even have real people assigned to deal with these issues so if you’re in doubt and you fear you’re being scammed get in touch with them and find out for sure.
Google Maps in Safari
Posted on February 25, 2005
Filed Under Internet & Technology | 1 Comment
Ya gotta love a company that says “We’re working on a Mac version” and they really are!
The fab [Google Maps](http://maps.google.com) now works in Safari!
I’ve been having some fun using it to get my bearings before the move. It’s 94 miles (about 1 hour 49 minutes) from our soon-to-be ex home in Stamford, CT to our new place in West Windsor, NJ. 104 miles (about 2 hours, 3 minutes) from my mother’s home. The good news is that our new place is all of 4 miles (about 8 minutes) from where we signed the girls up for summer camp, 2.6 miles (about 5 minutes) to the [nearest mall](http://www.quakerbridgemall.com) and just 3.0 miles (about 7 minutes) from where Emily will go to school next year, 3.5 miles (about 8 minutes) from Laini’s school. This school district has a separate elementary school for 4th & 5th grade which I’m not thrilled about, but since the kids will get a bus it won’t be so terrible.
Another step closer
Posted on February 24, 2005
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Our offer on the townhouse in New Jersey was accepted today. We had to compete with another buyer, but it appears that we won. New Jersey real estate is crazy compared to Connecticut. I’ll blog more about this once we’re firmly in contract.
We spent the day in Manhattan, taking Laini to [American Girl Place](http://www.americangirl.com). She had been begging for one of the dolls since forever, and we agreed to buy her the doll at the store for her birthday (instead of having a party). [The doll](http://store.americangirl.com/pls/ag/ag_agt_splash?catid=48533) is expensive, but it’s well made and very cute. I would have killed for one of these when I was Laini’s age. Laini named her brown-eyed, brown-haired doll “Daisy.” The store was packed. Three stories of American Girl, including a hair salon (you can get your doll’s hair braided for $20…more than I spend to get real haircuts for the girls!), restaurant, theatre and rooms and rooms of clothing, accessories and dolls. What a racket! But it was a fun day. Relatives knew this was an American Girl birthday year, so Laini’s aunt bought her doll-to-be an outfit and her cousins got her a gift certificate which helped offset some of today’s expenses.
Now we’re figuring out exactly how we’re going to manage the move. We’ve decided to sell 90% of our furniture before we leave. The style of the new place is very different and most of our stuff won’t “fit” physically or aesthetically. Plus, it will be cheaper to move less and start over there.
One down, one to go
Posted on February 23, 2005
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Home sale contract signings, that is.
Today we signed the contracts on the sale of this house. Mixed feelings. On the one hand, it’s going to be hard to leave in June (closing date June 20th). But on the other hand, it’s just a house. My priorities have changed. I’m truly looking forward to spending a lot less per month just to make it to the next month. Right now, I’m just thrilled that we don’t have to worry about showing the house anymore. It was actively on the market for 5 days, that was enough for me.
Our house hit MLS less than a month ago, and it’s already off the market. I didn’t expect we’d have too much trouble selling it, but I didn’t think it would be this easy. We spent yesterday in New Jersey looking at places. We placed an offer on a 3 bed/2.5 bath townhouse with a bonus room. Yes, serious downsizing. Still waiting to hear if the offer was accepted. The home is in a large, new development with swimming pool, tennis court, clubhouse and playgrounds. Lots of families live there. Very different quality of life and I can’t wait, Sidewalks, getting to know my neighbors, living near gorgeous Princeton, NJ. Even if we don’t get this place, I’m not worried. The spring market is just gearing up and I know we’ll find something in the next few weeks.
The beauty of a clean plate
Posted on February 23, 2005
Filed Under Design | Leave a Comment
I love this stage of work.
After a few hours working solely in Macromedia Fireworks, the layout of the client’s new site has been approved. Up until now, the client has been looking at PNG files and has been warned, “don’t try clicking on anything, it’s just an image.” The text files containing the site architecture have been roughed together and now it’s time to start turning that single image concept into something the client can click on.
It’s a blank slate. Near empty directory and blank files. This is the part of the project that I love doing carefully and slowly, thinking about every line of code and how it will fit in the “big picture” later. I rarely use templates and I always turn off “design” view in Dreamweaver at this stage of the game. I prefer to start with a blank document every time, roughing in the XHTML structure of the page. CSS (style sheets) come afterwards, and while I know I may need to add to the XHTML to accommodate the style sheets, working this way forces me to separate presentation from content and really think before I add code that’s purely presentational. Right now, I am only thinking of content and structure, even if I don’t know the exact words the content will say. After I have a clean, accessible XHTML document that contains all the elements that are required for the page in the site I’ll open a new file that begins to describe the presentation.
I could do this stage in a text editor, but Dreamweaver does help auto-complete basic HTML and I don’t mind that. I might pull up sections of code from other pages, such as the meta tags or a particular navigation technique, but every site has its own quirks and no assumptions should be made now. Two sites could appear identical, but starting from scratch lets me learn from previous mistakes and from what other web designers are doing. There is nothing but possibility now.
