I Must Be the Luckiest Person on Earth!

This morning I am the winner of not one but two lotteries and a sweepstakes. I won the Netherlands lottery of 1 million Euros, a Hyundai sweepstakes for 500,000 pounds in England, and I won 2,500,000 GPB's in the Canadian Lotto Promotion.

Not bad for a nights sleep. Is it just me.........no, that is getting all these lotto, sweepstakes, and miscellaneous phishing emails? I cannot believe how much more phishing emails I am receiving now over six months ago.

I wonder how successful these scams are. Are people really responding to them and give all their personal info? Well, I am going to turn a positive to a negative, and say that I must be lucky!

So Far So Good...No Virus Here!

It is almost 10:00 PM, I have just turned on the news and..... not one story about the Conficker Virus! What's up with that? I thought that almost 30 percent of the Window's PC that have internet access are affected and the time was today to do the damage.

Oh well, another diaster narrowly missed. Can I say that? I guess it is like when you were a little child and there was a threat of a snowstorm coming. For a couple of days before the ETA we would all get excited about the chance of a natural diaster. Of course the stores would run out of everything consumable and schools would be off the day before so we could get prepared and then the storm would never arrive.

I hope that that is what happens with Conficker. It is fun to think about the diaster. but not much fun if you are in it.

I guess we will have to wait a few more days to find out.

Conficker's ConSmicter, or whatever.......No it is not PCI

Here we go again another virus to be worried about! The "Conficker"! I was listening to the news today and the newscaster said that I would be okay if I just downloaded the latest Windows Patch. Which one would that be??

I don't know how to download Windows patches onto my Mac. Should I be worried? Oh No!

This sounds like an opportunity to sell more AV software and raid the grocery store to clear the shelves of all the bread and milk..... oh yeah, and beer! There must be a disaster coming...

Well, I guess I'd better start trying to figure out how to get the latest Microsoft Patch onto my Mac...

And of course Good Luck with Conflicker!

Well..... One Outa Three... No PCI, No IDS, No Networking!

Okay, I didn't make it to the Radiators Friday night. What can I say Al. I got caught up at the neighbors house. Sorry!!

Anyway, I did make it to the Jupiter Dog beach yesterday to take pictures of the kite boarders. I am starting to meet the key players and now they are starting to know that the pictures I am taking are for sale. We also went to the kite boarding store. Pretty amazing the following that is starting to build with this fairly new sport. I think it is about 12 years old.

Here is a shot at the beach, and of course you can always go to the Palm Beach Post web-site, and go to the "PHOTOS" on the menu bar and then choose "POST PIX" and search on "mancini" you can see the great beach shots here in Florida.

Today I am working on straightening out the photo library in Aperature, Apples' photo editing tool. It is similar to Adobe's Photoshop. It is pretty boring work. It is supposed to rain today so maybe I can stay focused.

Have a great day!

What's Next..... Ransome, What Did you say Ransomeware?

I just finished reading an article in InfomationWeek, "Scareware Morphs Into Ransomware", by Tim Wilson. It never ceases to amaze me what is going on in the dark shadows of computing. Now we have "ransomeware".

I guess I was sleeping last June or thinking about NAC, when the news broke on the new type of malware which encrypts your hard drive and provides you with a pop up letting you know that you can purchase a key that will unlock your data if you want to get it back.

It is quite a ploy. Thank God for TimeMachine! Hopefully, Macs are not possible targets? It seems that this nasty bug is a variant of Gpcode which, I do not have a clue about other than it has been around for a while and the author is getting smarter about how to prevent removal.

I must give kudos..... no way beyond kudos to Kapersky and FireEye who are offering free removal for the poor souls who's computers might become infected with this. According to the information that I have taken a look at, we are are not likely to see this here in the United States, only Eastern Europe and Russia; however, is this what's coming?

Sometimes, I have to wonder where you have to surf to or what you have to do to get some of these incredibly obtrusive bugs. I guess I am fortunate. I have had friends who's computers were locked up with virus's. I hate to talk about it but the closest I have come is a warning that an email had been infected.

That being said, I still try to use every precaution possible to prevent the newest worm from wrecking havoc in my life. But who can be so careful as to never fall for the latest scam. I just finished my taxes a couple of weeks ago and I received a Phishing email disguised as from IRS. I looked at it, and of course my jaw dropped to the floor. However, it said that I was due money, so of course, you immediately let your guard down. Now how many unsuspecting people might follow it through and provide their personal information?

Well, not meaning to be so down on a Friday afternoon, but it did make me scratch my head and think............what's next?

Gotta go. Off to see the Radiators tonight! and it is Pictures of Kite Boarders... AKA: DOG Beach, in the morning and then horses in the afternoon!

Have a good one!

A Day At the Beach, My Other Job......

It being slow on the cold calling front, I am "forced" to other activities that will augment my income. So today, with camera in hand, I had to head north to the dog beach in Jupiter just north of Palm Beach. There I have been supplementing my income with photographs of kite surfers.

The last few days have been very windy here, so the waves are high and surf is rough. Last Saturday while I was taking pictures, one kite surfer was almost blown to the road. I caught most of it on camera. Lucky for him, he stopped just before the sea grapes.

If you are interested in looking at the other work I have been doing you can check out the Palm Beach Post the local news paper here in West Palm Beach. Many of my pictures have been posted there as well as a few that are featured this week.

Tomorrow it is another day at the horse show and then that is over for the season.

Until next time.

Enjoy every minute!

In the Wake of Our PCI Discussion......... Once Again!

I was forwarded an article recently from a friend regarding a very interesting data breech for Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Solo, Switch, Delta and Maestro/Cirru. In an article in the Australian IT publication, iTNews, Aussie stumbles on 19,000 exposed credit card numbers, the author describes how an innocent search on Google turned up 22,000 credit cards with all the attached necessary pieces of information...... name, address, CVV's, exiration dates..... also listed were the last transactions on the card!

I guess we are making some really fine progress with our PCI regulations. It appears to be working well..... NOT! Maybe it is time we give PCI a closer look to see what is working and what is really not and make some changes before the whole industry comes completely crashing down.

I think the biggest problem that is perpetuated by PCI is the false sense of security. The technology that is implemented in financial/PCI regulated establishments is prioritized by what fits the necessary requirements for PCI, not by what is needed in the business that will help to secure the posture of the organization.

It might be time to rethink where we are going with this, because the system is still not working.

As Earl Pitts says, "Wake Up America"!