Hotmail accounts get compromised!!

I received an email on a list and wanted to warn people:
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Dear friend,
i would like to introduce a good company who trades mainly in electornic products. Now the company is under sales promotion, all the products are sold nearly at its cost. They provide the best service to customers,they provide you with original products of good quality,and what is more,the price is a surprising happiness to you! It is realy a good chance for shopping.just grasp the opportunity,Now or never!
The web address: http://www.nekcn.com

Seems this is being sent from Hotmail accounts. There are a number of ways someone could be getting a hold of your email address. According to Microsoft forums this seems to delete your email contacts and also send out this in the same time. This seems to be a new spam campaign for this one company. I would guess someone bought advertising from this company and the advertiser is doing some really unmoral things.

There are several ways someone hotmail account could be sending out these emails. It could be a [intlink id=”2650″ type=”post”]phishing attempt like they did with Twitte[/intlink]r. They could of done a dictionary attack on each account to find the password, that I why [intlink id=”2646″ type=”post”]I suggest having a password generator[/intlink]. It could of been a virus, and if that is the case you would need to [intlink id=”2205″ type=”page”]check your system out for the virus[/intlink]. I would guess it is the first two, because I am unsure of if you can have pop3 account or not. I don’t use Hotmail but people seem to be using it.

If you recieve this email, I’d email the account responsible to let them know that they have sent this.  I would also like to know if it was a virus or how they account got compromised.   Remember only you can prevent from getting a virus, nothing else works better than yourself.

Setting the Record straight with Twitter and Cricket phones

I found this video online and thought I would post it:


[ad#cricket-samsung-u340]
As you can tell you won’t be able to use Twitter with Cricket phones but they are working on it. I however have been use [intlink id=”3065″ type=”page”]A600 Broadband Modem[/intlink] with Twitter without a problem. I have been using Tweetdeck as my platform of choice to use Twitter.

Although you can use the web based version Twitter, you won’t be able to SMS with Twitter just yet. I do hope they fix this really quickly, because I’d like to be able to use my phone to receive important updates.  I expect them to fix this in  the coming months when they bring out some new phones.  [intlink id=”3620″ type=”post”]Recently Cricket has let out the Smart Phones, with the Email capabilities[/intlink].   These phones, that have the email capabilities, can be used in conjunction with Twitter.  I talk about ways to use the newest phones to connect them with Twitter.

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Windows 7 Beta Second RC to be released in May

According to Arstechnica, the Next version of Windows 7 Beta will be Released In May.

[ad#cricket-right-ez]It looks like someone flipped the switch a little early. The Windows 7 Release Candidate download page on TechNet has made a premature appearance, much like the beta download page did before the beta was released to the public. The public RC will apparently be coming in May 2009, and not in April as previously rumored. The RC testing program will be available at least through June 2009, and the actual build will expire June 1, 2010. Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions will be available in English, German, Japanese, French, and Spanish.
[Via Arstechnica]

It will be available soon to download. According to Ars this will be good until 2010, I am guessing around February or March but that is just speculation on my part.

Remember:

  • This is a Beta and when it is over you won’t be able to use the OS anymore
  • This isn’t the complete OS, Knowing Microsoft this will be limited in some way to encourage your to buy the full version down the road.  Also they want to have some features for only Commercial Release.
  • There will always be security holes when it comes to Windows 7 so don’t use it exclusively, since this is a beta.  Microsoft will not keep it up to date until it goes Commercial!

I did a podcast on this OS and if you want to hear the two discussion we talk:

  1. Mike Tech Show Listener Round Table Topic:  Symantec issue, Security, Web Hosting, Windows 7 Beta
  2. Mike Tech Show Listener Round Table Topic:  Windows 7 Beta

Both of the podcast we had a really good discussion on features and what we thought of the OS.  In the future when The next RC comes out we will want to get back together to talk about what they did different.  Please join use and let us know what questions you have.  This will better help us connect with the listeners.

What will happen on April 1? Conficker discussion!

I saw that F-secure has posted what a Question and Answer on the Conficker Worm.  I wanted to talk about this a little myself:

Q: I heard something really bad is going to happen on the Internet on April 1st! Will it?
A: No, not really.

Q: Seriously, the Conficker worm is going to do something bad on April 1st, right?
A: The Conficker aka Downadup worm is going to change it’s operation a bit, but that’s unlikely to cause anything visible on April 1st.

[Via F-secure Website]

[ad#cricket-right-ez]I am like everyone else, I really don’t know what will happen it is always going t to be media exposure when it comes to Worms, Viruses, or Trojans.  Virus Writers whoever “THEY” are, will always want to update there infected systems to keep the virus(Also worms, and Trojans) on peoples systems.   This is the way of security firms will always have to predict them, keep up with them, or just follow them.  This will never  change because as virus writers want to find even more ways to infect systems that is the necessity of Anti-virus Software.

I don’t know what will happen on April 1, you most likely will be fine if not you won’t know it until you try to update your system or update your anti-virus software.  One way you can find out if your infected is by trying to serf to security vendors like F-secure, Norton, and Kasperky.  If you Can’t get to those sites then you most likely have a Virus or Worm, and it could be this worm!!

  1. Make the worm harder to detect — This is a common practice they want to be able to hide the worm for as long a possible.  So they will always tweak it to make it that much hard to detect and remove.
  2. Make the Worm easier to infect systems —  This is another common practice, because without having systems there is no need for a Command and Control server.  The worm could do things such as Denial of Service, Or send out spam, or steal sensitive information.  This is the nature of why people make viruses, Trojans, or Worms.
  3. Easily update the virus software — as with any software the virus writers will come up with easier ways of updating the software, because the security will do whatever they can to prevent the update.  This is also the nature of why there will always be updating of the code.  They will put in more ways to keep the virus, worm or Trojan from being blocked.   Like the Conflicker has some Peer to Peer functionality, so if one company blocks the update another way it could get the update is Peer to Peer.  So you can’t block it very easily.

So what will happen April 1?  Who knows it could be a normal day, or it could be the biggest [intlink id=”3208″ type=”post”]April Fools joke[/intlink] ever.  That is why I put that in my last blog post.  With so much Media Frenzy the security firms don’t know what the Worm will do when it updates, all they can do is wait.   So let’s take a deep breath and relax, there’s nothing we can do just yet!!

The April fools Joke, You’ve got a computer worm!

Cluely’s blog talks about this and I thought I would talk about it a little myself!!

[ad#cricket-right-ez]This is the newest version of the Conflicker/Downadup variant of the little worm.  There seems to be people who are worried that April 1, there will be a major wake up in security no holds bar problems.

Some people have got rather confused as to what the April 1st deadline really means. The truth is that Conficker is not set to activate a specific payload on April 1st. Rather, on April 1st Conficker will begin to attempt to contact the 50,000-a-day potential call-home web servers from which it may receive updates.

[Via Graham’s Cluely Blog]

Now let’s talk about this a little, this worm won’t do anything else but ask for updates on April 1, and we don’t know when the virus writers will implement the update it could be a month down the line.  You could[intlink id=”3171″ type=”post” target=”_blank”] Backup[/intlink] your software and use the free program [intlink id=”2883″ type=”post” target=”_blank”]Autopatcher[/intlink] to help make sure your system is completely up to date with windows security.  You can’t forward the to that date to find out what will it call home to.    We don’t know what it will do when they update to the conficker.c program all we know it starts to try to call to certain domains on April 1, 2009.  So you should install [intlink id=”2205″ type=”page”]Anti-virus and Firewalls[/intlink] where you think it is needed.

I am sure though this will be an really big April Fools Joke from the Virus Programmers, they will be laughing at the hysteria of people trying to find out all the important information on April 1, and yet it might not start to happen until much later!!  You are the first line of defense from getting a virus or any malware.  So let’s keep our heads on straight and not go over board!  Only time will tell, and I am sure what happens on Apr 1, 2009 will be a new day.