An Internet Marketing Tutorial for the rest of us

Life is Fresh!
Mood:  bright
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
What an awesome title, huh? Well, it's also the title of my newest blog-renter's blog. The author, Jack, is a software engineer that enjoys gardening in his spare time and shares his insights with you.

Please visit him in the box to the right! Also sign up for our newsletter and visit our fine sponsors! Thanks a lot!

CIAO for now,
Randy

MySpace not such a Safe Place
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
WCBS-TV reports that two teens from Long Island - Shaun Harrison, 18, and Saverio Mondelli, 19 - hacked MySpace and stole personal info from users.

MySpace quickly booted them from the site, at which point they held MySpace at "ransom" for $150,000 by threatening to distribute the code they used to steal personal info.

Both got arrested when they went to LA to try to get the payoff. Both face charges of illegal computer access, sending a letter threatening extortion, and attempted extortion. The penalty for these charges is more than four years in state prison.

Personally, I am not a great fan of MySpace. Many people lie about their personal details, and there have been a few cases I know of where predators have used MySpace to attract victims. Also, I think the charges against the two teens are way too lenient. ID theft and ID fraud should have much stiffer penalties.

CIAO for now,
Randy

Symantec is a Hacker's Best Friend
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
According to Security Pro News, "A flaw in Symantec's Antivirus and Client Security products could leave the machines they are protecting subject to exploitation.

Symantec, for its part, is unaware that any consumers are affected, and also offers the following advice:

Restrict access to administration or management systems to privileged users only, with additional restricted access to the physical host system(s) if possible.
Keep all operating systems and applications updated with the latest vendor patches.
Follow a multi-layered approach to security. Run both firewall and antivirus applications, at a minimum to provide multiple points of detection and protection to both inbound and outbound threats.
Be cautious visiting unknown or untrusted websites or following unknown URL links.
Do not open attachments or executables from unknown sources or that you didn't request or were unaware of. Always err on the side of caution. Even if the sender is known, the source address may be spoofed.

EEye.com has been instrumental in pointing out this serious flaw. Hackers could take control of your computer without you doing anything. To be fair, only two Symantec products have been investigated: Client Security 3.1 and Antivus Corporate Edition 10.1. Also, no Norton products are involved. Symantec is currently working on a patch to fix the problem.

So here's the BOTTOM LINE: don't rely solely on software providers to provide security for your home or business PC. Hackers are frequently former employees of some of the software companies and know how to disable the products better than the engineers working on the patches. Practice safe surfing - avoid suspicious emails from unknown people, don't fall for any Nigerian Scams, be careful about whom you share your email with!

Please sign up for our newsletter, visit our advertisers and tell a friend about "An Internet Marketing Tutorial for the rest of us!" Just tell your friends to click on the link at internetmarketing4.us!

CIAO for now,
Randy

Go Directly to Jail - Do Not Pass Go - Pay $57,000
Mood:  loud
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
This just in from VNUnet:

A 21-year-old got 21 months in prison and a $57,000 fine for his phishing scam. Jayson Harris from Iowa targeted MSN subscibers with an e-mail that directed them to a fake MSN site in order to steal their personal information.

Microsoft worked with the FBI to track Harris' criminal electronic trail as far away as Austria. Microsoft won a default judgement of $3 million in December '05, but the amount was reduced as Harris' only source of income is his Blockbuster job.

To further educate my readers, please take the phishing IQ test, to see if you can recognize a phishing e-mail.

Please sign up for my newsletter, visit my advertisers, and have a great day!

CIAO for now,
Randy

How to Prevent Identity Theft
Mood:  energetic
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
Today I would like to review a wonderful website I encountered called How to Prevent Identity Theft. He covers wonderful topics like the Nigerian scam, the lottery scam, the free gas scam, as well as giving incredible advice on protecting yourself from cybercriminals and knowing how to identify criminal types you might meet online.

One additional example of ID theft I heard about this week is the government worker this week who went home with military records (a violation of policy) which were stolen by a thief the next day. This is definitely a dangerous world today, and I appreciate the fine work Mr. Hamilton does on this site to educate, inform and prepare us for such potentialities.

So please visit How to Prevent Identity Theft! I would also appreciate it if you would visit my advertisers, and sign up for my newsletter!

CIAO for now,
Randy

South Korea Killed the Zombie
Mood:  loud
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
According to the latest from Sophos.com, South Korean officials have just arrested a man accused of running a Zombie botnet of some 16,000 compromised computers.

The man sent out 18 million spam emails a day to 133 countries. Most of the spam was related to loans.

My best advice, is to regularly empty your junk email. You'll want to look through the junk mail, though, because sometimes the junk email filter sends legitimate emails to the trash heap (i.e., comments to my blog and notice of guestbook entries sometimes get put with the junk).

Don't click on any offers from anyone you don't know. If you don't recognize the sender, don't even open the email. Doing so opens your computer to attack and the possibility of becoming a zombie.

If you need a loan or some other service that you see advertised in a spam email, use a legitimate search engine such as Yahoo, Google, or MSN to find it. Be smart shoppers and if it seems to good to be true, it probably is.

CIAO for now,
Randy

The 5 Credit Myths
Mood:  lucky
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
The article today is courtesy of Lexington Law, one of my Shareasale partners, whose aim is to demolish the 5 Credit Myths and to help consumers regain favorable credit ratings.

MYTH #1

There are only three official credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian, and Transwoeld), and these essential American orgaizations keep accurate, up-to-date records on each American citizen.

First off, these three exist today because of corporate greed as they have continually bought up the smaller companies over the years (think the old Ma Bell). There is nothing essential about these "privacy-busting companies."

Also, there are many newer credit bureaus, such as Innovis, Lakeside, and NCTDE. In fact, anyone could start up their own credit reporting agency by collecting info on their friends + neighbors and finding a buyer.

So, basically, there are no "official" credit bureaus. Additionally, the credit reports have no legal standing and are routinely filled with errors.

MYTH #2

Creditors, insurance agencies, and employers carefully screen credit reports to qualify applicants.

At one time, this was true. But with the immense explosion of credit to potentially millions of applicants, technology has taken over, and has not advanced to screen individual records.

MYTH #3

If you disagree with an item on your credit report, you can ask that a 100-word statement be added to balance the file.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act of the 1970s gave consumers the right to do this. But this was when credit reports were read individually, and the 100-word statement could actually make the difference in getting a mortgage.

These days such a statement could actually hurt you. If you want to repair your credit later on, what could be worse than a statement like "My payment was late because I was laid off. It won't happen again." You admit your guilt, and your "extenuating circumastances" are seen by the credit bureaus as lame excuses. This could make you seem like a bad credit risk.

MYTH #4

Negative items stay on your credit report for 7 years.

The credit bureaus want you to believe this so they can more effectively control you. The truth is that no one is forced to tell anything about anyone for any minimum amount of time to anyone else. The Fair Credit Reporting Act only LIMITS how credit credit bureaus can behave.

MYTH #5

Helping someone straighten false credit reports is illegal.

The fact is that each of us has a fundamental right as citizens to representation when someone else, whether a newspaper, TV station, or credit bureau, e.g., accuses us of some wrongdoing.

Credit bureaus know this, too, and attempt to frighten consumers by sending official-looking letters, hoping that consumers will back down.

Lexington Law is dedicated to helping you repair your credit report, get you back on your feet, and get more out of your life. 80,000 clients can't all be wrong! Please click on the link below for more information.

Women Diary
Mood:  celebratory
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
Welcome to our newest renter, Yulia, who proudly presents Women Diary! Be sure to visit her by clicking on the box to the right. She has a number of things to offer on her site. Recent posts include Baby Names, Celebrity Gossip, Dead Sea Skin Care, and a rant about the injustices on American Idol. She frequently updates her blog and has put it together quite nicely.

You might be asking, what does Women Dairy have to do with the content of this blog, which has an altogether different focus? Well. not only do we in the blogosphere have to suport each other, but also, Yulia (oops I almost wrote Yamin - still stuck in the American Idol track) also has a couple of other blogs that are more pertinent to Internet Marketing!

Namely, MySpace HTML Codes Guides Tutorial, My Webmaster Experience, and Cool Music Lyrics Collection. The titles are pretty self-explanatory, but please visit her at any of those sites, especially the one on the right.

Right now, I'm "baby-sitting" my teen- and tween-age daughters in a posh motel room in Orlando while mom goes to a conference. Talk about expensive baby-sitters! But it's all good. The girlies are sound asleep after staying up most the night. I just hope I can rouse them in time for checkout!

Please join my mailing list, give my great sponsors some attention, and join me next time as I drag my kids out of here kicking and screaming!

CIAO for now,
Randy

Update on unrapped.org
Mood:  energetic
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
Just wanted to provide all of you with an update on my other site, unrapped.org. I believe I have mentioned my other site before. It's a Christian resource site with daily Bible verses, daily devotions, WebTV/Radio, Bible searches, a Gospel Podcast message, and updates of some things I have recently done with the ministry. I also am trying to raise funds for missions trips via Paypal donations and sales in the Gospel Store, which currently features some Mother's Day gifts.

You may be asking, "Why is he trying to shove religion down our throats?" While it may seem that way, I actually am not. I want to offer my experience with the web sites as an example of the pros and cons of Internet Marketing.

First off, I was recently investigating a guaranteed search engine inclusion program for $50. I did some checking of the search engines they listed, and both of my sites were already in all the search engines listed, except for dmoz. That's all by using the "blog and ping" method I recommend here: create a free blog, post often, and each time you do, send a ping to Pingoat or any of the other pinging services I list on the right. Don't bother with the "Get on Google Overnite" scams that are out there. If you've got a podcast, be sure to use freshpodcasts.com.


Second, another program was charging $250 for top 10 listings on the search engines. Sounds good, but it was only for a certain number of guaranteed top ten listings. This site already has a Google PageRank of 4, and I'm currently working on unrapped.org to get a decent ranking. If you want to see what I've done, go to unrapped.org and click View => Source on the various pages. Feel free to link to this site or to unrapped.org. I'll gladly swap links with any well-made non-adult-oriented site.

CIAO for now,
Randy

Authorities Crack Down on Spammers
Mood:  suave
Topic: Create + Promote Blogs
This just in from Sophos.com: "Spamford" Wallace has been ordered by a NewHampshire court to pay more than $4 million for his illegal internet practices.

Wallace's Smartbot.net downloaded software onto computers without users' permisison. Smartbot.net then altered users' search engine features. All this activity subsequently led to computer slowdowns, CD trays opening randomly, and similar computer problems.

Let's hope this fine and admonition by the FTC to cease his illegal practices actually stick this time. In 2004, "Spamford" - oops Sanford - was also ordered to stop. Maybe Ol' Spammy should serve some jail time? In a nice quiet little cell WITHOUT internet access!!! Maybe he might even get a girlfriend? Now that just wasn't nice o' me.

Leave me a note - what do you think we should do with folks like Ol' Spammy Wallace?