Ramanisblog

Tag: LinkedIn

  • Americans and Social Media ,a Study.

    The urge to be gregarious seems to be reflected in this study.

    Communication problems with the members of the family and clash of values,gross materialism and the view that whatever is,is here to stay makes one forget the values of human bonding.

    Also too much of  analyzing Life and emotions deprive the charm of Living.

    Life is to be lived,not analyzed, reasons for everything will not be available and one should take Life as it comes and be happy with those near and enjoy company ,make others happy.

    Nothing can substitute the pleasures of personal interaction.

    The more faceless interaction, more lonely one becomes.

    Two-thirds of online adults (66%) use social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or LinkedIn.1 These internet users say that connections with family members and friends (both new and old) are a primary consideration in their adoption of social media tools. Roughly two thirds of social media users say that staying in touch with current friends and family members is a major reason they use these sites, while half say that connecting with old friends they’ve lost touch with is a major reason behind their use of these technologies.

    Other factors play a much smaller role—14% of users say that connecting around a shared hobby or interest is a major reason they use social media, and 9% say that making new friends is equally important. Reading comments by public figures and finding potential romantic partners are cited as major factors by just 5% and 3% of social media users, respectively.

    chart showing the motivational reasons for being on the social network sites.
    Motivation for using social sites.

     

    Those who say that keeping up with family members is a major consideration in their use of social networking sites are a demographically diverse group.  Two-thirds of all social media users cite family connections as a major reason for their use of these tools, and there are no major differences on this question in terms of age, income, education, race/ethnicity, parental status or place of residence. The primary difference on this topic pertains to gender, as female social media users are more likely than male users to cite family connections as a major reason for using these sites (72% vs. 55%).

    http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Why-Americans-Use-Social-Media/Main-report.aspx

  • LinkedIn Messages Empty Your Bank Account.

    Beware of messages in LinkedIn.

    Early on the morning of August 23 the spam monitors at Barracuda Labs started detecting a large number of emails claiming to be from LinkedIn.  The quantities were significant, tens of thousands an hour, and these were pretty convincing messages…

    Most of these sorts of spam attacks simply link to a malware file which the browser then downloads and offers to run. If an antivirus doesn’t intercept such a file then Windows will ask for permission to run it and it is easy enough to say no.

    But this attack is different and much more serious. Each of the malicious domains such as linkedin-reports.com or linkedin-alert.com hosts an exploit kit, a set of malicious payloads that quietly attempt to take advantage of weaknesses in the Web browser and its helper applications.

    Clicking on the “follow this link” hyperlink in the message doesn’t appear to have any effect. Nothing seems to happen; however there is a lot going on behind the scenes.

    Below is what the behind-the-scenes network traffic looked like.

    …As convincing as they may be these emails have nothing to do with LinkedIn.  The from address is fake and the “Follow this link” hyperlink leads to one of a set of recently registered domains deliberately set up to serve malicious content….

    This traffic capture shows a series of attacks against Internet Explorer (1), against the Adobe PDF reader plug-in (2) and finally against Windows Media Player (3).  Eventually these exploits result in the download of Trojan.Jorik (4).

    Trojan.Jorik is a password stealer which gets right to work, periodically checking in with its command and control server (5).

    After contacting the control server the Trojan contacts another server (6) for an interesting – and somewhat scary – configuration file…

    Barracuda Networks customers using the Barracuda Spam & Virus Firewall are protected from these emails.

     

  • Best Media Buttons for your Site.

    One can avoid multitude of Buttons and choose the best ones.

    There are now well over a hundred social media sites with more than one million active users. From microblogging to social bookmarking, to photo sharing, to business networking – the list just keeps growing. And most of them offer handy “share this on…” buttons that you can add to your site – all with the tantalising promise of sending you more traffic.

    But you can’t even put 10% of the buttons available on your site – unless you don’t mind having no content except for the buttons. So the question becomes, how do you choose?

    Here are some tips to help you make the right choice for your site:

    1. Fish where the fish are

      2. Buttons offer the magical promise of tapping into a huge new audience, but the reality is that unless a decent chunk of your readers are already using a social media site, the buttons are close to worthless. So spend some time finding out what the biggest social media sites are in at least the top 3 countries where your readership originates.

      In South Africa these answers are pretty clear already – Facebook followed by YouTube withTwitter and LinkedIn bringing up the rear. But if your audience is Brazillian you need to be focussing on Orkut, not Facebook.

      Another way to choose which networks to target is by using your own stats. Open up Google Analytics (which every site owner in their right mind should have installed) and look at which sites are referring traffic to you already. You might be surprised at who’s on top.

      Adding buttons from sites that are already sending you traffic sounds counterintuitive, but it’s all about reinforcing that positive feedback loop. Say a new reader clicks through to your site from that network, then clicks on a second article. Why make it hard for them to share back to the site they just left?

    2. Pick the right horse(s)

      3. Volumes are always enticing, which is why everyone and their cat has Facebook buttons on their site, but always stop to consider whether a social media site suits your audience. Even though it’s in decline, MySpace has over 100-million active users. But that doesn’t mean it’s appropriate for your fly-fishing blog, or your Public Speakers Association site.

      Choosing a smaller but more appropriate network (see point 1) will pay off with more valuable traffic than simply going for the numbers. LinkedIn is an obvious example. Hardly any local sites feature its buttons, yet its userbase is of exceptional quality because it’s composed almost entirely of professional people. A bottle of champagne is worth more than a vat of cream soda.

    3. Less is more

      4. The temptation is always to hedge your bets by adding a dozen buttons, or to use a service like “Share this” or “Add this” that aggregates hundreds of buttons into handy little pop-ups. Now while I have nothing against those services in principle, I have yet to work on a major South African site which gets any kind of decent traffic from the likes of Delicious, Digg or Buzz. Your site may be different though – so check those stats.

      Every single button you add to your site sends a subtle message – it effectively says “we endorse this site.” By adding every button you can find, however elegantly, you’re saying “we’re hedging our bets – we endorse everyone!” Two or three carefully chosen buttons are easier to design around, clearer to user and place less strain on your site’s loading times.

      This principle also applies to the size of buttons. Most sites offer several different sizes of buttons, and the larger ones are attractive to site owners because they are nice and obvious. The only problem is that obvious can sometimes become loud – particularly with half a dozen of the competiting for airtime. Consider varying the size you use – the largest button for your most important network, followed by smaller versions from the other networks.

    4. Keep it together

      5. Wherever possible, try to group all your buttons together into a single, discrete area – somewhere obvious and prominent without being overwhelming. The top right corner of the content area is very popular and therefore quite familiar to most users, but the bottom left also works well.

      Whatever you do, don’t straggle them across the page, and don’t repeat them unless your pages are long enough to justify it. There’s nothing worse that a site that looks like a Christmas tree, with buttons that overpower the content with their sad-eyed pleas for “moar clickz pleaz!”

    5. Choose smart buttons over dumb ones

      6. More and more sites offer “smart” buttons that react when a user clicks them, and also display how many times a content item has been shared. The most obvious example is Facebook’s “Like” button, which immediately posts the link to Facebook without you even having to leave the site. All the major sites now offer variations on this theme, and the ones that don’t are working on it, trust me.

      The advantages of smart buttons are enormous. Firstly they are deliciously easy and interactive for users: Click, share, happy. Secondly they signal that a story is already being discussed. Humans are social animals with herding instincts and conversation is self reinforcing. Nothing drives clicks like the idea that someone has already clicked before you.

    6. Implementation is everything

      7. A lot of the biggest networks offer several different varieties of buttons, usually graded according to how difficult they are to install. In general the easiest ones are also the dumbest ones and the ones that add the most to your sites load times. Many sites still offer iFramed buttons for instance – these are to be avoided wherever possible.

      A case in point is Facebook’s “Like” button. The quickest thing to do is grab their standard iFrame code and plonk it on your site. But the javascript version, though more challenging to implement, has a lot of advantages including more accurate page targetting and more control over how the button behaves.

      Whatever button you choose, be sure to make the most of the customisation options offered. Facebook, for instance, gives you the option to translate the button into Afrikaans, as Huisgenoot has done. You can also choose how many extra features you want with the button – such as whether faces of the “likers” are displayed next to the button. But don’t get carried away – more features also means more space and more noise.

    What would I choose?

    In the end, personal preference and design aesthetics will also play a part in your choices. It’s your site, your vision and your audience. Don’t be afraid to make a choice because it feels right in your gut. To my mind, at least 75% of South African sites should be using some variation on this formula:

    • The slimmest Facebook “like” button (aka “button count”) – Javascript version.
    • Twitter’s own Tweet button – I favour the “horizontal count” version because it fits well with the Facebook button above.

    And then either:

    • The LinkedIn share button (again the horizontal version)

      • …or:

    • The Stumbleupon button (since it’s the only “traditional” sharing site in SA’s top 100)

    These are the plain vanilla choices because they are in the sweetspot of mainstream readers. Your site may be insanely popular with the DeviantArt or Bebo crowd – so remember to check first.

    What about all those other fancy plugins and widgets?

    You’re quite right, many sites now offer all manner of handy little boxes that pull, for instance, the latest tweets about your content onto your front page. They offer some fantastic opportunities, but also some real dangers.

    Until then, remember, common sense should always prevail. If the tail is wagging the dog, trim that tail down. Just bear in mind that a dog without any tail is a sad beast indeed.

    http://memeburn.com/2011/02/6-ways-to-choose-the-best-social-media-buttons-for-your-site/

     

  • Gingered Spam Salad.

    Salads, Go-withs,
    Yield: 1 Servings

    1 cn Spam, sliced matchstick size
    1/4 c Finely chopped ginger root
    1 ea Small red onion, finely
    Chopped
    1/2 ts Garlic powder
    1/4 c Freshly squeezed lime juice
    Zest of 1 lime
    1/2 ts Oriental dried chili powder
    1/4 c Chopped cilantro leaves
    8 ea Cherry tomatoes
    Thai bird peppers and
    Cilantro sprigs to garnish

    Combine all ingredients in a sealed glass or plastic container to
    marinate. Refrigerate at least two hours or preferably overnight.
    Stir or shake occasionally to evenly coat. One hour before serving,
    stir in cilantro. Serve on a bed of torn lettuce of your choice.
    Garnish with quartered cherry tomatoes, Thai bird peppers and
    cilantro sprigs.
    http://www.recipesource.com/main-dishes/meat/pork/spam/gingered-salad1.html

  • 7-Eleven Hack From Russia Led to ATM Looting in New York

    Flashback, early 2008: Citibank officials are witnessing a huge spike in fraudulent withdrawals from New York area ATMs — $180,000 is stolen from cash machines on the Upper East Side in just three days. After a stakeout, police arrest one man walking out of a bank with thousands of dollars in cash and 12 reprogrammed cards. A lucky traffic stop catches two more plunderers who’d driven in from Michigan. Another pair are arrested after trying to mug an undercover FBI agent on the street for a magstripe encoder. In the end, there are 10 arrests and at least $2 million dollars stolen.

    The wellspring of the dramatic megaheist turns out to be more prosaic than imagined: It started with a breach of the public website of America’s most famous convenience store chain: 7-Eleven.com.

    In his most-recent plea agreement, filed in court Monday, confessed hacker Albert Gonzalez admitted conspiring in the 7-Eleven breach and fingered two Russian associates as the direct culprits. The Russians are identified as “Hacker 1″ and “Hacker 2″ in Gonzalez’s plea agreement, and as “Grigg” and “Annex” in an earlier document inadvertently made public by his attorney.

    The Russians, evidently using an SQL injection vulnerability, “gained unauthorized access to 7-Eleven, Inc.’s servers through 7-Eleven’s public-facing internet site, and then leveraged that access into servers supporting ATM terminals located in 7-Eleven stores,” the plea agreement reads. “This access caused 7-Eleven, Inc., on or about November 9, 2007, to disable its public-facing internet site to disable the unauthorized access.”

    At the time, there were 5,500 Citibank-branded ATMs at 7-Eleven stores around the country. According to SEC documents, 7-Eleven ran its own transaction-processing server to handle 2,000 of them: advanced models called Vcom machines, manufactured by NCR. The 7-Eleven Vcoms support special functions like bill payment, check cashing and money-order purchases. For two weeks in September 2007, anyone who typed a PIN in one of these was exposed.

    Court records from the New York–area Citibank cases show how that single breach from Russia trickled over the internet and down to the streets of New York.

    The first break in the case had its roots in a Jan. 30, 2008, traffic stop. Westchester County police pulled a car over for speeding on the Saw Mill River Parkway in Dobbs Ferry, New York. The driver, 21-year-old Nue Quni, was driving on a suspended license, so the officers decided to have the vehicle impounded. While they waited for the tow truck, they conducted a routine “inventory search” of the car.

    Inside, police found $3,000 in cash, a laptop computer, a magstripe writer — which is used to reprogram cards — and 102 blank, white plastic cards. They also recovered receipts showing cash withdrawals from ATMs in Manhattan and the Bronx, and more showing wire transfers.

    Facing federal access-device-fraud charges, the passenger in the car, 22-year-old Luma Bitti, began cooperating with the FBI. She explained that she was hired over the internet in December 2007 to program cards with the stolen information, then withdraw money from ATMs and wire it to other people. With Bitti’s consent, an FBI agent took over her IM and e-mail accounts, and began corresponding with the person who hired her.

    Citibank ATM plunderer Yuriy Ryabinin is shown in a 2003 photo taken at a ham-radio convention.
    The FBI arranged in April 2008 to meet the man in Manhattan, supposedly to provide him with a magstripe writer. An FBI agent, still posing as a fraudster, showed up at the meeting with a magstripe writer in hand.

    But the man, who is identified in one court record by the initials “DK”, double-crossed the undercover agent, and sent two proxies in his place: 21-year-old Andrey Baranets and one Aleksandr Desevoh, according to an FBI affidavit. When the agent refused to hand over the magstripe writer, Desevoh took a swing at the agent, who ducked the blow and ran away.

    The two men gave chase through the streets of Manhattan, before they were grabbed by other FBI agents who’d been watching the scene. In pleading guilty last February, Desevoh said DK had told him to “take this device using force.”

    Federal prosecutors in New York had by then charged three more people in the ATM-cashing conspiracy, including 32-year-old Ukrainian immigrant Yuriy Ryabinin, aka Yuriy Rakushchynets, and 30-year-old Ivan Biltse.

    In addition to looting Citibank accounts, Ryabinin had participated in a global cybercrime feeding frenzy that tore into four specific iWire prepaid MasterCard accounts, issued by St. Louis–based First Bank, in the fall of 2007. On Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 — just two days — the iWire accounts were hit with more than 9,000 actual and attempted withdrawals from ATM machines around the world, resulting in $5 million in losses.

    At the time of the ATM capers, FBI and U.S. Secret Service agents had been investigating Ryabinin for his activities on Eastern European carder forums. Ryabinin used the same ICQ chat account to conduct criminal business, and to participate in amateur-radio websites. The feds compared photos of Ryabinin from some of the ham sites to video captured by New York ATM cameras in the Citibank and iWire withdrawals, and determined it was the same man — right down to the tan jacket with dark-blue trim.

    When they raided Ryabinin’s home, agents found his computer logged into a carding forum. They also found a magstripe writer and $800,000 in cash — including $690,000 in garbage bags, shopping bags and boxes stashed in the bedroom closet. Another $99,000 in cash turned up in one of the safe-deposit boxes rented by Ryabinin and his wife, Olena. Biltse was also found with $800,000 in cash.

    Ryabinin’s wife told investigators that she witnessed her husband “leave the couple’s house with bundles of credit cards in rubber bands and return with large sums of cash,” a Secret Service affidavit (.pdf) reads.

    Two of the ATM scammers arrested by the FBI filled in the bureau on the details of the operation, explaining how, beginning in December 2007, they began working with a ringleader in Russia, who provided them with ATM account numbers and PINs. The deal was straightforward: They’d use the information to encode fraudulent ATM cards and withdraw cash, sending 70 percent of the take to the Russian and keeping 25 percent for themselves. Another 5 percent went for expenses.

    The duo initially used Western Union money transfers to get cash to their boss in Russia, according to an FBI affidavit. Later, they exploited a relationship with 30-year-old Ilya Boruch, an “exchanger” for the site WebMoney, a PayPal-like internet-payment system.

    Exchangers are normally legitimate businesspeople who swap cash for WebMoney’s internet currency. But according to the feds, Boruch had gone bad and become a money-laundering service for the Citibank ATM heists, transferring hundreds of thousands of dollars to the ringleader in Russia, without reporting the transactions to the government, as required by U.S. law.

    Through his business, Bidding Expert, Boruch allegedly funneled as much as $80,000 to $100,000 a week on behalf of the two fraudsters, who delivered the cash to Boruch in person, sometimes by tossing envelopes into an open window in his car.

    One of the FBI informants, identified as co-conspirator 1, or CC-1, in court documents, held this instant-message exchange with Boruch on Jan. 10, 2008, according to the FBI. (Punctuation is added).

    CC-1: Need more wm [WebMoney] …

    Boruch: How much?

    CC-1: 60 [$60,000]

    Boruch: Wow. OK. Listen, is everything OK?

    CC-1: So far. Why?

    Boruch: Well, you need so much wm! It’s just kinda strange

    CC-1: We’re working

    Boruch: OK. Drop it off all in 100s …

    CC-1: When can the wm be ready?

    Boruch: Don’t know

    CC-1: Approximately

    Boruch: If you pay an additional 0.5 percent then it’ll be ready tomorrow

    CC-1: And if not?

    Boruch: Then I don’t know. I can buy it from my people, but they’re expensive

    Boruch was charged last year with conspiracy to launder money.

    The final known arrests in New York came on May 8 of last year. Citibank noticed that a large number of the fraudulent withdrawals were coming through its 65th Street branch, prompting them to put the location under surveillance. When the Citibank official staking out the spot got a call alerting him to a theft in progress, he crossed the street to peer through the vestibule glass, and watched as a man in a baseball cap, jeans and a sports coat put a thick envelope into a briefcase and moved from one ATM to the next.

    The official flagged down two nearby NYPD officers who’d already been briefed on the fraud, and the cops arrested 28-year-old Aleksandar Aleksiev. With his consent, they searched his bag and found six ATM-deposit envelopes stuffed with cash, and 12 blank cards with stickers on them and a different PIN code written on each.

    http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/12/seven-eleven/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+wired/index+(Wired:+Index+3+(Top+Stories+2))