Free reminder service: Memo to Me

Memo to Me is a free reminder service that sends you e-mail messages to remind you of birthdays, anniversaries, appointments, etc.

Microsoft launches news site

I really like Google News. You can read my earlier column about the features that I like.

Now Microsoft has launched a similar service: MSNBC Newsbot. Looks good.

Top 9 e-mail scams

Fun article on MSN about the top 9 e-mail scams.

The "Wayback Machine" is cool

The Wayback Machine lets you view old versions of web sites--for example, Yahoo as it looked in 1996.

Here's a description from the site:

"Browse through 30 billion web pages archived from 1996 to a few months ago. To start surfing the Wayback, type in the web address of a site or page where you would like to start, and press enter. Then select from the archived dates available. The resulting pages point to other archived pages at as close a date as possible. Keyword searching is not currently supported, but there are some researcher tools that perform similar functions (see the researcher tool section)."

Stop spyware with the free Spybot

In my July column I suggest the free version of Ad-aware to protect yourself from spyware.

Reader Bob Klauber points out that the free version doesn't work in "real-time"--that is, it checks for spyware once it's on your computer.

He suggested Spybot, which I've mentioned in the past. It works in real-time, so it notifies you if anything is going after your machine as it happens and lets you kill whatever it is.

Spybot can be downloaded from this page of ad blockers on PC World's web site.

More reasons not to use Internet Explorer

I really value the free Scambusters e-mail newsletter.

Here's part of their latest issue, which goes into detail about the serious security flaws in Microsoft Internet Explorer and their recommendation of Firefox as an alternate browser:

Internet ScamBusters (tm)
http://scambusters.org/
By Audri and Jim Lanford
C o p y r i g h t (c) Audri and Jim Lanford.
Issue #84 July 14, 2004
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Security Alert -- Microsoft Internet Explorer:
Should You Continue to Use It?

As many subscribers already know, Microsoft Internet
Explorer has significant 'holes' or vulnerabilities that
scammers and virus creators can easily take advantage of.
This is certainly not new.

In fact, judging from the number of viruses and Trojans sent
to us by subscribers each week, we know that many
subscribers are currently infected by one or more of these
viruses and Trojans.

What may be new is that the security problems for users of
Windows Microsoft Internet Explorer are becoming even more
serious and severe.

In the past couple of weeks, a new Trojan was detected that
is particularly malicious. It installs itself when you visit
a website -- without your knowledge -- and without your
having to do anything. In other words, you don't need to
click or accept anything -- this Trojan installs itself
anyway.

It is delivered through a pop-up ad that loads a file called
"img1big.gif" onto your computer.

This Trojan is a 'password sniffer.' That means that it
looks for certain kinds of information, such as user names
and passwords, and relays them back to the scammers.

Once it's installed, this Trojan pays attention when you
visit a secure webpage, and it looks for specific banking
sites, including Citibank, Deutsche Bank and Barclays Bank.

If you visit one of these sites and type in your user name,
password, etc. to log in, despite the secure connection, it
still watches your keystrokes and sends them back to the
scammer. (Security experts believe this scammer is in
Russia.)

The scammer then has access to your account information --
and you didn't even know any of this had happened!

What this means: Trojans like this one can give scammers
access to your banking information so they can steal money
from your bank account. Further, these kinds of viruses and
Trojans can be used to gain credit card and other personal
information, again to steal your money -- or your identity.

This is serious stuff.

If you want to read a technical article that contains more
information about this Trojan, visit:

==> http://scambusters.org/a/news2.html

The Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Computer
Emergency Readiness Team has gotten so fed up with these
Microsoft Internet Explorer vulnerabilities, that they
recently recommended that consumers switch to a different
browser.

You can read about the storm they touched off with this
recommendation at:

==> http://scambusters.org/a/news3.html

We happen to agree with this recommendation to switch
browsers. There are just too many security holes in
Microsoft Internet Explorer for Windows. Whereas it
certainly is true that no browser is completely secure, we
no longer feel that using Microsoft Internet Explorer is
worth the security risks.

Our current favorite browser for Windows is Firefox. Visit:

==> http://scambusters.org/a/firefox.htmll

Note: Microsoft did release 7 patches yesterday after this
article was completed. You should definitely run these
patches if you use Windows. However, this doesn't really
change the general points made in this article.

Great article on "geolocation"

Hi, I'm back from vacation.

I really enjoyed this article on geolocation. Maybe "surprised" would be a better word. I had no idea that in some cases, the web content that you view depends on where you're located.

Importance of alternate web browsers

The news this past week that Internet Explorer has a serious vulnerability to a virus has led experts to suggest that people try alternate browsers.

I've tried some of the free, open-source browsers and am very impressed.

Go to http://www.mozilla.org/.

I'm just getting into this, and in some ways it can be a little confusing, because there are so many Mozilla variants.

It seems that Mozilla and Netscape are identical, and are previously released stable versions of this open-source technology.

You can get a more cutting-edge version of this open-source software by trying Firefox. Also,
while Mozilla has e-mail and html-editor components, Firefox is just the browser portion.

I'm very impressed by its implementation on my Macintosh. And it's way way faster than Internet Explorer, and has more features.

Also try Camino.

When I go to these URLs, I get a Macintosh-specific page, but I think that's because it simply recognizes my OS and gives me the appropriate page.

Thanks to Eric Vautier for introducing me to this world of alternate browsers.

Jim