Visa Scam warning

[xswind]

Quote "but if you DO work in IT I'm guessing it's in an obscure and/or niche area like virtualisation or java development."

niche! not so much nowadays, keep trying.

[Stone Fox]

Quote "DSG group, (including tech guys)"

oh so maybe you are one of those PCworld experts, the geeks in the glass office messing around with customer PC's and steeling all the MP3's found on them.

If so you have certainly reached the heights of your career apart from a possible move to Group 4 and we all know what their security is like.

So what is your "EXPERT" advice to all on here?
How should we, the forum massive protect ourselves if firewalls and Antivirus programs are sh1t?

I know!
Lets disconnect our PCs from the internet forever?
Great way forward eh and pretty secure and no need for a firewall.
That will fix it, I will never receive another scam email again!

But how would we get to the forum with out the internet and how would you launch personal attacks against people you have no idea of their expertise.

Your comments about firewalls are so misguided and shows absolutely no knowledge of the subject at all. So please stop being so personal.

For your further career development, try looking up the words “egress” and “ingress” on Wiki and see what they mean.

I'm more like one of those microsoft certified professional types....

And all I'm advocating is getting decent software, tested and reccomended by professionals. And that number obviously doesn't include you.

As for the DSG group and the tech guys, they're only the single largest customer facing IT support service in the country. Jeez, thought you might have known that if you worked in IT.

You can check some of their stats online.

And what part of my description of firewalls was wrong then genius? I notice you didn't bother attempting to "correct" me?

Oh, and you started getting personal first.

[CheeZee]

"And now, a word from our sponsors"


All Security software has inbuilt failings, some are better than others but the end fact is solid ... " any evolving technology that has communication at its heart, will never ..ever...ever be secure. And the more complex the securities become to safeguard .. the easier it is to hide information to undo the safeguard. In short .. the military knew the failings of the internet when it was solely for their purposes but they sure as hell were'nt going to tell joe public those failings ..its worth too much to the suits in charge.

p.s

some of the best Trojans i have ever received were wrapped in update/renewal expiration packages from Norton ! and the same goes for McAfee !!

[xswind]

Maybe you should change your name to Mr attitude.
Why are you so defensive fella, feeling a little small and picked on are you?

Anyway my credentials are simple.
Go and look up CISSP and CISM on Wiki as I know you will never have heard of them before and then see if you have the qualifications to challenge me further?

Have you ever been published in the IT Security community, I do not think so.

Also you asked a specific question about where you are wrong about the purpose and function of firewalls, well this is where my comments about egress and ingress come in, go and read and if you are that cleaver it will be blatantly obvious where you were incorrect.

Can I suggest that if you do not have anything positive to say you be quiet as IT Security is clearly not an area you have much experience.

[xswind]

"And now, a word from our sponsors"


All Security software has inbuilt failings, some are better than others but the end fact is solid ... " any evolving technology that has communication at its heart, will never ..ever...ever be secure. And the more complex the securities become to safeguard .. the easier it is to hide information to undo the safeguard. In short .. the military knew the failings of the internet when it was solely for their purposes but they sure as hell were'nt going to tell joe public those failings ..its worth too much to the suits in charge.

p.s

some of the best Trojans i have ever received were wrapped in update/renewal expiration packages from Norton ! and the same goes for McAfee !!

Well said that man.

I bet the Trojans suituations you mention were not from the companies listed though.
This sort of suituation usually arises from being scammed into thinking they are updates from those companies.

[CheeZee]

I bet the Trojans suituations you mention were not from the companies listed though.

..no they were not!

They were attached by " ".. with pheonomenal, coincidental timing to the subject matter ..but maybe this is all just a mistake ..after all .. a virus is merely a program that has been written incorrectly and therefore possibly "just a mistake" ..ooops my bad.

I go by this rule .. "Security companies employ convicted burglars to tell them the strength and weaknesses of a property ..because who would know better of how to get around the security than them! ... this rule applies to many things in life ..including internet security.

The beauty of a security software company is this .. " they damn well know that the Security put in place to solve a problem leads to other problems that will need solving and so on and so on and so on!

And why do we think that Norton can catch viruses/spam that McAfee cannot ..and vice verca!?! ... or spambot will catch crap that adware cannot and vice verca ... " Show me a paranoid end user and i'll show you a pile of cash " !!!!

[xswind]

I bet the Trojans suituations you mention were not from the companies listed though.

..no they were not!

They were attached by " ".. with pheonomenal, coincidental timing to the subject matter ..but maybe this is all just a mistake ..after all .. a virus is merely a program that has been written incorrectly and therefore possibly "just a mistake" ..ooops my bad.

I go by this rule .. "Security companies employ convicted burglars to tell them the strength and weaknesses of a property ..because who would know better of how to get around the security than them! ... this rule applies to many things in life ..including internet security.

The beauty of a security software company is this .. " they damn well know that the Security put in place to solve a problem leads to other problems that will need solving and so on and so on and so on!

And why do we think that Norton can catch viruses/spam that McAfee cannot ..and vice verca!?! ... or spambot will catch crap that adware cannot and vice verca ... " Show me a paranoid end user and i'll show you a pile of cash " !!!!

lol

[CheeZee]

p.s

should you ever be targeted by an individual/company/organisation that is directing a purpose made attack on your cyber securities (for whatever reason!) .. you will normally be notified within a few months that you have 'fleas' by the originator. This in normally due to the fact that their cyber ego is far greater than their personal human ego could ever be.

The mistake most hackers make is this ... although they may have superior cyber communications knowledge ...this generally leads them to display their own inadequate knowledge of human nature and pyscology through their own dillusion of grandeour, and should the recipient be of stunning awareness of human nature and pyscology ..then he or she will be able to i'd the perp' in a very short space of time

[pat42]

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

[xswind]

Great stuff Cheezee,

[CheeZee]

lol.. i've accquired quite a few fleas over the years! ..most are harmless yet annoying, some are quite ingenious with their scamming and others are plain old information gatherers for organisations. Stealing cash is soooo last season ... information is where its at because there is no timescale that it has to be used/abused within! ...information is the ideal trading product!! but hey, we all know this jive ...mobile phone conversation & text databasing is well known as is keyword alert recognition...

sooooo ... i'll have 20,000 kilos of your finest agricultural fertilizer please shop-keep ...oh and do you have a copy of this years governmental stealth laws to hand?...or maybe i'll just kick back and wait for that high powered speed boat to drop off my 2 metric tonnes .... of scone mix!!



Oooooh im getting scratchy ....

[CheeZee]

Virus found in this message, please delete it without futher reading

Cities made impenetrable, o king, by the creator that knoweth
no end. They that desire their own rests upon sacrifice,
and sacrifice rests upon.

oh smartass!! .. i've had two of these today, the first came after my first post regarding hackers etc (above) and then this one after my second posting above ...some fleas are quite intelligent ya know !

[Stone Fox]

Maybe you should change your name to Mr attitude.
Why are you so defensive fella, feeling a little small and picked on are you?

No, and sorry for getting so agressive, but your defence of one of the worst pieces of bloated software on the market irritated me!

And given some of your statements like that "anti-virus is by nature restrictive" I have trouble believing you've even sat in the same building as a CISSP.

[xswind]

Cool.

Just one correction and some clarrification.

I actually said "Firewalls and antivirus programs by their very nature have to restrict in order to be effective"

A firewall is a gateway guard if you like, which interrogates traffic and communication requests for which It then makes a decision on whether to allow or deny access, so my statement of restrictive is appropriate.

The best firewall setup is one that both filters inbound and outbound traffic, the reason for filtering outbound traffic is in case you have been infected or hacked and it stops such things like keystroke loggers sending their recorded logs of your activity back to the hacker, this is why firewalls can cause problems.

Your front door is a classic example, you lock it to keep people out but some locks are more effective than others, the best locks are those that when locked disallow both outgoing and incoming people.

Say a burglar climbs up the drain pipe and through a window, if you have a door lock which does not lock the door from the inside the burglar can just walk out the front door with your Telly or PC unrestricted, I would like to see him shimmy down the pip with your telly.

So you see it is good sometimes to restrict or filter outbound traffic.

But security is a balancing act between restrictiveness and usability
Clearly the best solution and “the holy grail” is to only allow what is needed and to have this automatically tailored for each user but this is so easy to say and so very difficult to implement as everyone is different and has different requirement so this does mean hassle for the users sometimes.

As I said Norton or MacAfee may not be the best but are the easiest for a normal user to purchase and if for any one reason alone it is better to have something rather than nothing.

I agree with your comment about bloated software but this is pretty well true of any piece of software especially if it is aimed at a Windows platform, well Microsoft Windows is a classic example of Bloated software.

Regarding AV the same could be true, the program examines and makes a decision whether to allow a file to open or whether to block it.

The problem with AV is that to be effective it must restrictive.
What I mean is that to be effective it does need to interrogate each file that is opened and make descissions, this causes a delay and therefore is restrictive to the application requesting the opened file and restrictive to the user as it causes slower response.

AV scanning is not full proof, there is not one product, free or purchasable which is 100% effective, especially nowadays when malware is morphing after almost every infection.
This is the inherent drawback of rule and signature based virus scanning techniques.

Something is better than nothing whatever you say, especially if you are not PC savvy and arguments like this just cause further confusion to the normal non tech savvy PC user.

Why not post your suggested alternative products for all benefit from? Na lets just put this to bed shall we?

[Stone Fox]

Cool.

Just one correction and some clarrification.

I actually said "Firewalls and antivirus programs by their very nature have to restrict in order to be effective"

A firewall is a gateway guard if you like, which interrogates traffic and communication requests for which It then makes a decision on whether to allow or deny access, so my statement of restrictive is appropriate.

The best firewall setup is one that both filters inbound and outbound traffic, the reason for filtering outbound traffic is in case you have been infected or hacked and it stops such things like keystroke loggers sending their recorded logs of your activity back to the hacker, this is why firewalls can cause problems.

Your front door is a classic example, you lock it to keep people out but some locks are more effective than others, the best locks are those that when locked disallow both outgoing and incoming people.

Say a burglar climbs up the drain pipe and through a window, if you have a door lock which does not lock the door from the inside the burglar can just walk out the front door with your Telly or PC unrestricted, I would like to see him shimmy down the pip with your telly.

So you see it is good sometimes to restrict or filter outbound traffic.

But security is a balancing act between restrictiveness and usability
Clearly the best solution and “the holy grail” is to only allow what is needed and to have this automatically tailored for each user but this is so easy to say and so very difficult to implement as everyone is different and has different requirement so this does mean hassle for the users sometimes.

As I said Norton or MacAfee may not be the best but are the easiest for a normal user to purchase and if for any one reason alone it is better to have something rather than nothing.

I agree with your comment about bloated software but this is pretty well true of any piece of software especially if it is aimed at a Windows platform, well Microsoft Windows is a classic example of Bloated software.

Regarding AV the same could be true, the program examines and makes a decision whether to allow a file to open or whether to block it.

The problem with AV is that to be effective it must restrictive.
What I mean is that to be effective it does need to interrogate each file that is opened and make descissions, this causes a delay and therefore is restrictive to the application requesting the opened file and restrictive to the user as it causes slower response.

AV scanning is not full proof, there is not one product, free or purchasable which is 100% effective, especially nowadays when malware is morphing after almost every infection.
This is the inherent drawback of rule and signature based virus scanning techniques.

Something is better than nothing whatever you say, especially if you are not PC savvy and arguments like this just cause further confusion to the normal non tech savvy PC user.

Why not post your suggested alternative products for all benefit from? Na lets just put this to bed shall we?

peace.

I think we both got a bit carried away with that one.

Personally I use Grisoft AVG & Spybot S&D.

I tend to find with clients PC's a swift scan with the above will show up quite a lot that Norton misses. (And they're free, and I'm cheap when it comes to software, hence my most used bookmark being thepiratebay.org)

Also, in this day and age with most Routers containing very effective firewalls having a software firewall like Norton (especially one which malfunctions as much as I've seen Norton) seems a bit silly.


I wasn't at any point advocating not using protection. Connecting a pc to the internet without security software would be like shagging an ageing african prozzy without any rubber - i.e downright suicidal.

All I was trying to do was say that using the innefective, bloated 'total security solutions' like McAfee & Norton was a waste of money when there are much better, much cheaper more streamlined solutions.

While they're old (2004) two very good articles on the subject of security:

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000 ... 867,00.htm

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/leader/0,100000 ... 144,00.htm

[xswind]

good old AVG a good choice indeed as is Spybot.
Another good one is AD-Aware SE

The main problem with Router firewalls are that a lot of them still do not have it enabled by default for example the BT Voyager is insecure by default.

[xswind]

If you get a new PC at Christmas, please remember this.

Do not leave your PC packing boxes out for the bin man, recycle them or take then to the tip.

At this time of year Burglars often wait to see what packing is thrown out to gauge if anything is worth nicking from your home.

Why advertise you have a nice shinny PC in the house?

[CheeZee]

At this time of year Burglars often wait to see what packing is thrown out to gauge if anything is worth nicking from your home.

... cracking bit of advice there for all, especially at chrimbo time.

Good posts XS' and Stone'r ..a little heat doesnt hurt! .. you both have covered some important internet security issues.

Something is better than nothing whatever you say, especially if you are not PC savvy and arguments like this just cause further confusion to the normal non tech savvy PC user.

..i'd go with the above .. to most the internet security issue either leads to confusion or paranoia.. and then confusion lolol ..anything is better than nothing when you first get out into the big wide www

[Stone Fox]

Ahem.... cough cough.

Can I have everyones attention please!



I'd just like to thank you all for coming to this award ceremony, where I recieve the "Stroppy twat of the week" award.



This tropy will of course be adminstered as a supository...!





.