Activity Internet Marketing Report, Scams, Frauds

Either Google or I mixed up their birthday date.  In my last newsletter I had it down as September 7th. It seems I was wrong. Google says its September 27th. (I like the day 27, as it is my birth date). But they need another 70 years to catch up to me.

Check their birthday page out, go to;

http://www.google.com/tenthbirthday/

WEB PAGE TRANSLATION
This feature is particularly helpful if your search has non-English results.  Google offers a facility to auto-martially translate a page for you in English.  Currently, Google supports Italian, French, Spanish, German, and Portuguese languages.

CURRENCY

It’s fairly easy to work out a price for your item in another currency. For example if you sell chairs for $35 each in the US and you want a price in British pounds, simply type ‘35 USD to GBP’ and Google will give you a rate.

WARNING FROM HOLLAND

Do not open any message with an attachment entitled ‘POSTCARD FROM HALLMARK,’ regardless of who sent it to you. It is a virus which opens A POSTCARD IMAGE, which “burns” the whole hard disc C of your computer. If you receive a mail called’ POSTCARD,’ even though sent to you by a friend, do not open it!

This is the worst virus announced by CNN, Microsoft and the most destructive.  This virus was first appeared in July of this year and there is no repair yet for this kind of virus. This virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disk.

CLIPBOARD

Your Clipboard can be seen by any hacker.  For your protection you should not copy passwords, credit card numbers or other sensitive information. To prevent this from happening go to: Internet Explorer: Click Tools, Internet Options, Security tab, Internet section. Go down to the Security level box, and click the Custom Level button. Scroll down to Scripting, and find the entry, “Allow Programmatic clipboard access” or “Allow paste operations via script”. Click Disable or Prompt. Click OK.

LIGHTSIDE

A service call

Customer: “Can you give me Jacks phone number please”?

Service department: “I am sorry I don’t understand who your talking about”.

Caller: “on page 1, Section a, of the user guide it clearly states I need to unplug the fax machine from the AC wall socket and telephone Jack before cleaning. Now can you give me Jack’s number? 

Avoiding Counterfeit Prescription Drugs

Closely examine the packaging and lot numbers of prescription drugs and be alert of any changes from one prescription to the next.

Product promotions or cost reductions and other “special deals” may be associated with counterfeit product promotion.

Use caution when purchasing drugs on the Internet. Do not purchase medications from unlicensed online distributors or those who sell medications without a prescription. Reputable online pharmacies will have a seal of approval called the Verified Internet Pharmacy Practice Site (VIPPS), provided by the Association of Boards of Pharmacy in the United States.

SECURITY PROGRAMS

Looking for a picture of your star on the web? Be very careful; make sure your security programs are up to date.

Scammers and hackers are using popular stars to their website, and infecting their PCs’. If you search for pictures, wallpaper or screensavers of famous stars there is a good chance you will land on a hackers website.

ANOTHER Email scam 

For the last little while, emails have been circulating with a Subject Line that reads something like “Your Internet access is about to be suspended”.

If you open it, the email accuses you of downloading copyrighted stuff illegally.  It says your ISP is aware of your activities, and has a record of them.  To see it, you are asked to click a link or open the attachment.  You are strongly warned to cease these activities or else.

This is spam.  If you click on the link within or try to open the attachment, your computer may be infected with malware.  You should always type in the URL yourself, and do not unload any attachments unless you know for sure who is sending it, and you are expecting it.

Avoiding Internet Auction Fraud

Understand as much as possible about how the auction works, what your obligations are as a buyer, and what the seller’s obligations are before you bid.

Find out what actions the web site/company takes if a problem occurs and consider insuring the transaction and shipment.

Learn as much as possible about the seller, especially if the only information you have is an e-mail address. If it is a business, check the Better Business Bureau where the seller/business is located.

Examine the feedback on the seller.

Determine what method of payment the seller is asking from the buyer and where he/she is asking to send payment.

If a problem occurs with the auction transaction, it could be much more difficult if the seller is located outside the USA, Canada, because of the difference in laws.

Ask the seller about when delivery can be expected and if there is a problem with the merchandise is it covered by a warranty or can you exchange it.

Find out if shipping and delivery are included in the auction price or are additional costs so there are no unexpected costs.

There should be no reason to give out your social security number or drivers license number to the seller.

The Internet Crime Complaint Center or IC3, a partnership of the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center, in 2007 released its latest annual report on victims’ complaints received and referred to law enforcement.

Among the results:

“Internet auction fraud was by far the most reported offense, comprising 44.9% of referred complaints. Non-delivered merchandise and/or payment accounted for 19.0% of complaints. Check fraud made up 4.9% of complaints. Credit/debit card fraud, computer fraud, confidence fraud, and financial institutions fraud round out the top seven categories of complaints referred to law enforcement during the year.”

For the full report, go to the IC3 webpage on statistics.

DROP SHIP, WHOLESALE

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