Azure Jane Lunatic (Azz) 🌺 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
azurelunatic) wrote2005-03-07 01:33 am
azurelunatic) wrote2005-03-07 01:33 am
Telephone Hackery
For most telephone service providers, pressing '90#' on the telephone will allow the person on the other end of the line to charge long-distance calls to your bill. If someone attempts to entice you into pressing this sequence, it's probably a scam. If you've fallen prey to this scam, contact your phone company.
In other news, I really hate it when people forwarding around assorted warnings about viruses, hacks, and so forth have the warning so badly formatted that it's hard to read. The alarmist nature of the language of most of this sort of warning is also annoying. I hate being talked to like I'm stupid, even though I know it's generally nothing personal. I'm just clueful. Joe & Jane Average User aren't. It's still annoying.
In other news, I really hate it when people forwarding around assorted warnings about viruses, hacks, and so forth have the warning so badly formatted that it's hard to read. The alarmist nature of the language of most of this sort of warning is also annoying. I hate being talked to like I'm stupid, even though I know it's generally nothing personal. I'm just clueful. Joe & Jane Average User aren't. It's still annoying.
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Only works on offices, etc depending on their internal phone system. Isn't a problem for residential phones.
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The original language of the warning was as utterly alarm-filled as the examples in the Snopes page, which was why I complained. Perhaps even more so.
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My favorite warning signs:
* What date was this warning released?
* Who released it? (If it was "the US Government", that's a bad sign.)
* Where is the URL to a more complete warning on their web-site?
If it doesn't have the first and third items, it's a hoax. Hands-down always. The only ones I've seen that had the first and third were either sent to me directly from the company in question (because I'm on their e-mail list), or by someone I know who is an expert on the class of problems described in the e-mail.
I like pointing people at the following sites:
http://www.vmyths.com/
http://www.snopes.com/
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html
(Sorry if I'm preaching to the choir.)
Oh - another nifty site - http://www.doxdesk.com/parasite/ - it's a great site for detecting and learning about malware (spyware, adware, etc.)
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