EMAIL PHISHING FRAUD "HOT PROPERTIES"

Have you ever received an email with subject "Hot Properties"?  Well if you did, then this article would give you an overview of the dangers you’ve gone through.  If you haven’t, please read the article and use it to help you avoid being in the loop of being fooled.  

Basically, the purpose of this article is to help those who have already being fooled into giving out their private information to spammers.  However, it could also be useful for those who haven’t received this email yet so they are aware.

Firstly, let me make it clear that one of the most effective tactics used by spammers lately is the hijacking or theft of legitimate user’s email accounts for use in furthering spam campaigns.  I will explain further what that means as I explain through but let me start off with a recent experience.

I’ve recently received an email from a colleague with the same title.  I know for sure that this is a spam however I wanted to confirm before writing up an article on this and post it on my blog (http://pyalamu.blogspot.com/) so I clicked the link to read the header.  After confirming, I decided to complete this article for the sake of others who would not be in the better position of understanding the risk.  I have also forwarded the link to various emails particularly to those that are linked to the email I received.  If you are one of those who read this article, please forward the link to your friends to help them protect their private information, especially their email credentials.

The demonstration I’m going to do would be presented using Gmail however, it’s similar to other email listed in the article.   

Here’s how it goes;

First, you receive an email.  What you would have heard was, if you know the person who sent you the email, you can feel free to open it because it is probably not a spam.  However, spammers are smart.  They go around the other approach to get what they want.

Recently, there are emails circulating which have the subject “Hot properties” or similar?  The email comes from a known source or contact.  This, I mean from someone whom you know within your contact listing.  Considering the short brief above, you would realise that the person sending you the email is someone whom you knew.  Naturally, you would want to open the email because you knew the person sending you the email.  

Ask yourself, did you open the email?  If you said yes, that means you clicked on the subject to access the link.

Now, regardless of the exact subject and content of the email, clicking the link would take you to a site that requires your authentication to access their provided service once you sign in with your email account credentials.

I assumed you are one of those who have clicked the link.  If you haven’t received such email yet, you might probably receive one soon because it’s on its way to your electronic mailbox.

So, when you clicked on the subject “Hot properties” or similar, have you been taken to a page similar to the one below?

Have you tried to go further by clicking any of those email providers’ logo (Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, Other emails)?  If you did, were you prompted with a pop-up window like the one below?

 

I’m pretty sure for most of you, you probably would say, Yes, I did sign in for some unknown reason.  That is normal and it’s natural for most users.  I believe, a psychologist could explain further on this behaviour.

Normally, you would enter your details and press the sign-in button to log in assuming that the signing will grant you access to the provided service mentioned in the email you got.

The thing that is convincing after you sign would be the access to the site providing the proposed service.  For the case here, entering your user credentials would grant you access to the Re/ MAX listing site.  To you, it would be convincing because through signing in you gained access to the site however behind the scenes (from within the back-end) what happened was you provided your login details to the spammer through the script hidden within the source codes.

The spammers do know that you would come up with suspicions when things go wrong especially when you enter your login details and they do not log you in so they fake a login page that will redirect you to a page that tries to convince you that things are fine.  

Sometimes, the links take you to a fake site with the exact site name.  Other times, it takes you to a temporary page showing an error message and redirects you to go to the legitimate pages and sites using provided links.

Above all, the end result is that the spammer now had access to your email account whilst at the same time you are now carried away with exploring the RE-MAX website looking for these “Hot Properties” and you no longer bother about what you have done to yourself and all your friends, family or contacts in your contact listing.

Prove it yourself;
 You can try out this simple test.  
Click the email link "Hot Properties" within your email and get into the email providers' screen.  Click on Gmail and from the pop-up, try enter any thing into the email address and anything into the password field;  maybe something like, abc@def.com for email and test for password, then click Sign in.  You'll see what I mean.  If you do not fill the fields, it gives you a prompt to fill those in.  If you close the pop-up, it will bring you back to the email providers' screen.  However, if you again fool them by entering any address and password, you will definitely be redirected into a set page like I explained earlier.



Feel free to forward the link to your friends to help them secure their private information or post me comments if you have any queries.  Also, you can visit my website (http://www.artech.com.pg/ ) for other helpful tips and free tutorials.

Promoting Home-Made Products

There’s been growing number of locals producing various products for the local and international markets.  I have seen dozen of them around Port Moresby, promoting and selling their products.  I was on the toes when I found out recently that my very own people in the village, just few meters away from where my house is are actually part of the system. 

I called Granpa to the man who initiated the idea and he has two sons whom I call Paps.  The old man, Mr. Ibo Alu, in his 60s I believe, was a very creative person and he started this project few years ago.  All this time, I never knew that he packs and supplies his product, Bukawa Coconut, Noni & Frangipani Oil to his customers in the village and in town (Lae) as well. 

   

He heard stories that I was giving hands to various people and groups in the village so he approached me to discuss some things regarding his project – Bukawa Coconut Oil.  I heard his story and was so elated, especially of such an old man who despite circumstances push for some classic home-grown and home-made products to be packed in the village. 

 He wanted assistance to back him up in his small-scale-manufacturing project and wanted me to assist him find funding.  We had about two hours of conversation and then I assured him that I would assist where my arms can reach.  To cut the story short, I came back to work and started planning some marketing campaigns as well as doing research on various supportive assets to boost the efforts of this old man.  I can't at this stage elaborate further but hope that my future blog would give some outcomes.

Attached below is a quick poster I made with applied graphics and 3D modell to give an impression and maximize the sales of this natural product made by this old man and his sons.

Influencing Local Talents

I've prepared this page to post few of my works on 3D Modeling.  Though I am flexible with most of the artstuff and creative art pieces from fine arts, music, programming and of course IT (from the artistic perspective), I will only be focussing on the digital art in particular 3D Modeling.  Others would be posted in future if suitable.  

This post is somewhat indirectly associated with my blog's theme "Providing Digital Opportunity".  I believe; by showing some of my works, those of whom I've influenced and supported directly or indirectly would benefit from it by way of motivating them and encouraging them somehow.  This, I do not mean that the works are my master pieces however, they are the foundations of my 3D modelling and animation career.  Feel free to post comments for improvements.

My 3D career started in 2010 when I was introduced into 3Ds Max.  The first work I did was a 3D head of the famous Huli wigman.  The work included modeling, texturing, animation & rendering.  The below work is the original version of the piece.  I was given a two day due period to work on it and it was my assignment for the 3D Modelling course I took officially at Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne.  It is very simple however during that time, time was at my neck and I put my best effort to complete the project.  If you'd like to know about the difficulty level of such project, ask any 3D Modeler the following questions; (+) how difficult is it to model a human body (+) how difficult is it for a beginner to use a 3D program to model such and (+) how long would it take to complete all the modeling processes for a beginner.  That was how difficult I managed to complete the work and I call it my first 3D artwork.

My first 3D modelling using 3Ds Max - (C) P.Yalamu 2010

I have the other Character animation work on my YouTube page.  I actually tried the tools in Motion Builder to do two characters interacting with each other.  In fact the characters were actually fighting each other and I titled the piece "Self Defence".  Also, if you jump into YouTube, you'll see one of my 2D animation sketch I did in Adobe Flash about a legend titled "The Giant Snake".  

I have not done much afterward because of other commitments which have consumed a lot of my time.  However, there's other works I've done in the areas of 2D animation using Adobe Flash for commercials and CD ROMs which I do not have rights to put them up (owned by clients). 

Early this year, I did some quick model of various objects.  Mortein is one of those and this one is very simple indeed.  I've used Cinema 4D R11 to do that.  Nothing fancy here, just modelling and texturing plus a bit of lighting.

One evening, I felt stressed of going through all those management stuff, writing reports, lessons and tutorials, etc etc so I fire up my Cinema 4D R13 and started modeling from a polygon.  I created some kind of abstract shape then soon moved onto modeling my study room.  Next day I got shots around one of the buildings and started modeling.  The building I modeled was Ullie Beier, located at the University of Papua New Guinea  and caters for the creative arts courses.  Here's the picture below;

These are just the few of my samples touches, not real touches but quick touches.  I might post the real stuff soon, that depends.

Web Design from a Creative Perspective

We have a lot of home grown talents and skills in the field of Digital Media that are closer to world class or even some equivalent to world class.  They've got the capabilities but those are like broken pieces that awaits assembling and it definitely would take some time to be perfected.  I've known some by name but still got to meet them and others I've exchanged emails and comments with on Facebook, YouTube and Gmail.  

The thing common with a lot of those active participants are that they've built their skills from inspirations and self determination.  Most of whom I've silently monitored are under the category "Self-Thought".  I've used the term because that is what they call themselves and some years back, I was also one who claim to be that sort.  

I've seen potential digital designers who have displayed passion for what they do not just as a hobby but as a profession.  I am still trying to establish the reason why a lot of them seem to be in their shells.  I've used the term shell because, we (and I'm referring to most of them) like to work in isolation.  Recently, I've created a group on Facebook called PNG-GFX Designers to bring together ALL of those designers who work in isolation so they can share some of their experiences with fellow designers and even learn some tips and tricks in various design programs that have been designed.

Participants of the Web Design Training for Graphic Designers

On Saturday the 13th of October 2012, we had another FREE Training to encourage and promote graphic designers of all levels participate and share their experiences with each other.  So far, we have only conducted training for the members to enhance their skills.  In our future training  we would invite professionals and experience personals to come and share their experiences with the members.  Areas are broad and covers various aspects of digital design including but not limited to Web Design, 3D Design, Graphic Design, Interactive Media Design, Graphity Design, and any other design are to be accommodated in those training.  

The recent training for the Graphic Designers went successful this time with increased number of participants.  We've had 6 participants in our first training and the recent one attracted 16 participants.

Participants busy with the coding enhancements

The next training for the group is scheduled for November 2012.

Video Tutorials in Pidgin for Computer Trainings

Ever thought of acquiring basic knowledge in computing for FREE? Well, you might find this option somewhere in PNG but more than that, ever thought of learning the knowledge in a local dialect, say Pidgin?  There is a place where you can find this and it is here at ArTech where FREE video tutorials have been created, designed to bridge the digital divide in Papua New Guinea.  Participants attending the APEC Digital Opportunity Center are getting this CD for FREE to boost their learning process and not just that but the tutorials are very instructional, step by step and gives participants a chance to learn at their own pace.   

The training CD contains two video trainings plus electronic notes for the FREE computer training courses offered at the APEC Digital Opportunity Center at UPNG.  The way the CD is used is also different especially with the accessing of CD contents.  The D drive (default CD/ DVD Drive) do not contain the contents however contains algorithms that creates a virtual drive which then holds the training files.   The files are then access through this virtual drive.  More information on how to use the virtual drive of the trainings can be found on Help section of ArTech's website.

Here's an overview of the Training CDs Interface;

The Main Interface of the CD ROM

1. Customer Support Button       - For help and assistance 
2. Close Button                               - To exit the interface 
3. Contact Button                           - For more information or further assistance 
4. Copyright Notice                        - Legal/ Copyright Information 
5. VLC Player setup file                 - Permission given by VideoLan to distribute to the users 
6. Electronic Notes                         - PDF Files 
7. Video Tutorials                            - Video Files 
8. Creator’s Website                       - online directory of various other creatives

To access the videos, the user would click the Video Tutorials button (7) to get in.  When they click the button, it takes them to the video tutorial page (figure below).  The use can then play the respective videos from the list provided.  For this Version, there are two videos.  The Basics in Computing Part 1 and Basics in Computing Part 2.

The interface for Video Tutorials

The interface for Electronic Notes