Facebook Information Can Be Used by Hackers

Most of the time when ever I do phone transaction (banking and other such alike) the call agent would ask a question to verify my identity and the most common question I encountered are "What is your date of birth?" and "What is your mothers maiden name?". Did you know that is information could be easily access by a hacker thru you facebook account? Thus resulting for the hacker to trick any agent over the phone and can post as you. From there the hacker could stole you identy and make phone transactions in your name. The hacker would just check your facebook profile to see your date of birth and from there the hack could also do an investigation to find out who is your mother and try to check her profile too to find out her maiden name. Everything would be easy for him unless raise your security settings.

Here what you need to do.
1.On the upper rigth corner click "Accout" Tab and choose "Privacy Setting" from the drop down menu.
2.Click "Custom" then "Customize Settings".
3. On Family you may choose to be seen by "Friends Only" If you know all you friend and you trust all the friend that you would accept but if not just change it to "Custom" and set it to "Only Me". In this case there will be no direct information from facebook that will be available to the hacker to trace who is your mother.
4.Do the same for your date of birth, I bet you'll choose only me unless you want everybody to know your date of birth.

These are just specific examples but the general rule it keep your personal information private.

Identifying Spam Mail

Spam mails are now getting smarter because they are improving their methods so that they can get away of the spam filters. Although we have spam filter to protect us there are still a few spam mails that get thru. Some of them are just annoying but there are dangerous ones too. The dangerous ones have virus, spywares and key loggers. If the spam mailers are getting smarter, we the targets should be smarter than them. Here are a few smart ways to stop it and avoid being victimized. (This is only for the spam mails that get through the spam filter I post later how to avoid getting spammed).

1.    It is from someone you don’t know. Unless you are expecting someone will send you an e-mail for the first time don’t open it.
2.    In case you have opened a spam mail it and it has something on it that says click here to unsubscribe. Better not to because you are only confirming that you are an active spam reader and they will target you more. The only exception is if the mail is not a spam. To stop receiving from this sender just block it from your mail or add a filter that it will be sent directly to the spam folder or the trash folder.
3.    Obvious spam mails that get thru sound they have a legitimate business with but don’t because they are just selling stuffs that you are not interested (Viagra, penis enlargement and etc…) If your mail program has an option to report a spam mail, use it to report the mail then delete it.
4.    Spam mail trying to outsmart the spam filter usually has funny characters on the Subject or intentionally miss-spelled words so they can get away from the spam filters watch out for this, report and delete them immediately.

Fake Facebook Profile

There are lots of Fake Face book profiles. It is more than 50% of the Face book profiles are Fake means there is no real person behind the name that was registered. These Fake Profile are created for several reasons like, to keep an identity secret or it was just an alternate account for playing games. But be aware that sometimes Fake profiles are also created with malicious intent, it could be to impersonate someone and destroy the reputation of the real person or to spy on the activities to the real persons friends.

The only thing that we can do about this is to report it.


Before taking action check if you have mutual friends with the impostor, if you do contact them and tell them about the impostor, ask them to report also.

Take these steps to file the report.

Go to the Fake profile, on the lower left click "Report/Block this person" then choose "Fake profile". On the drop down menu choose the profile of the real person. Also check the box of "Block this person".

High Risk Places on the Internet and How to Avoid Them

The most dangerous places on the internet are on the places you don't expect the most.

Website that let you watch video instantly, well not Youtube off course because it is the most popular and highly respected site it, they are have an establish system that protect they users. I am talking about websites that ask you to download codec or a play to be able to watch their video. Don't be tempted specially if it is free, because if it is free they probably have a catch why they are doing it for free, it could be on the cost of your security. If you download anything ( a codec or and EXE file) you are giving them an opportunity to stage an attack to your computer. So beware most of these websites are very tempting because they are even offering the latest movies that are not even released on DVD and CD in short it could be a leaked copy.

Fake websites, these are copy cats of the original website. I cant think of any good intention why someone would fake another website. The least is they want to clinch on the popularity of  the original but most of the time they have a malicious intent. With the fake website they can lure people to log in with they password, hence capturing it for they own use. To detect this fake website is easy because it probably wont provide with the service of the original website but some it is already too late because you already punched in your user name and password. To re-secure your account, immediate go to the original site and change your password and if you could notify them that you suspect that you have been targeted then do so. To avoid fake website, bookmark the original website and open it through it.Do not log in to websites if they we're opened through links from e-mails, chat etc...

I'll just add some more, they are a little bit obvious but just so in case your not still aware. File sharing site like torrent and others a like. From here you can download movies, music and other files but since your just getting these files from untrusted sources you have no way of knowing if there are any malaware, virus and other threats that was injected on the file. Porn sites, if you still don't know and you have habit of watching it then your computer is at risk. Most porn site are not secured for what ever reason, I haven't done any research why so I can give any advise how avoid being attacked while going the porn sites. What I can say is just don't go there.


The final thing I can say is keep your security programs updated (anti-virus, anti-malware and firewall).

Fake Facebook Pages.

Beware, there are uprising FAKE Facebook page. Some are just a die hard copy cat some are with malicious intent. It is very easy to anybody to create a Facebook page for somebody else even wthout the permission. This is being exploited by people with malicious intent to destroy someone’s personality. The victim will have no control over the fake book account, because it was made by somebody else.

Beware, there are uprising FAKE Facebook page. Some are just a die hard copy cat some are with malicious intent. It is very easy to anybody to create a Facebook page for somebody else even wthout the permission. This is being exploited by people with malicious intent to destroy someone’s personality. The victim will have no control over the fake book account, because it was made by somebody else.

To find out if there is fake account is to search for the original account (the only way you can tell is if you know the original account) on the Facebook search bar and view the result to check it.
The fake account is usually made by the haters of the victim or a freeloader to the popularity of the victim. The freeloaders are people wants to drive visitor to their site or to cature attention. In both cases it is damaging to the victim, the haters is posting hate contents and fraudulent contents and the freeloader is capture visitor the supposed to be searching for the victim.

What to do with fake Facebook accounts? Go to the impostor profile and click "Report/block this person" at the bottom of the left column. Check the "Report this Person" box, choose "Fake Profile" as the reason, and add "Impersonating me or someone else" as the report type. Be sure to add a valid web address (URL) leading to the real profile so that Facebook can review the information.

Some impostor are just creating Facebook Page, just do the same , go to the fake Facebook page  and click "Report/block this person" at the bottom of the left column, check the appropriate report on the menu that will popup.

Protect Your Facebook Account

A stolen Facebook account is like a stolen identity, it is difficult to recover it. I bet you don't want to spend time informing all your friend that you Facebook account was hacked and stolen. There is a lot of damage a hacked account can do, the least is it will be used to send spam message to all of your friends. Once your account is stolen, it can be use to steal another account from your friends, it can damage your reputation if the hacker start posting offensive material (violence, Porn and etc). If you have personal and private information it may not stay private and personal any more.

To protect you Facebook account


1. Avoid using it on public computers and networks.


2. If your not a public person keep your profile private. Click the "Account" tab and on the drop down click on "Privacy setting" change all of the setting where in only your friends can view.


3. Never add someone you don't know. But also be aware that sometime stalker may create a fake Facebook account just to get accepted to be your friend on Facebook. If you know you are a target of someone, besure to verify the friend request in person before accepting it.


4. If your really want to keep information private NEVER put them in Facebook.


5. Never use your credit card on Facebook, no matter how tempted  you are on any of the offers even it is to good to be true (if it is too good to be true and most probably it is not)


I would like to keep this updated, please leave a comment or a question below and I will try to update this article.

Protecting Yahoo Messenger Account from Hackers

Are you using your Yahoo Messenger to attend confidential conferences? Then you are probably a target from hackers who want to break in and sniff into the conference.

There are lots of reason why a hacker would be interested in hacking your yahoo messenger account. I  could only  name a few but the bottom  line is the hacker is up to something bad.

here are is a guide line to avoid accounts being hacked.

0. Have an alternate Yahoo ID, so you wont use the same ID that you are using to attend confidential conferences.

1. Avoid using your account to public computer and networks

2. In case your using a public computer or network don't forget logout.

3. Don't be fooled by rogue website. Rogue websites are copycat of the original website tricking you to login so they can capture your user name and password. The hacker would usually send you a link thru chat or email of this rogue website so to avoid this never login if the page was opened via link instead make it as a hobbit that you open a new browser window manually and type in the yahoo URL by your self.

4. Don't be fooled by someone pretending to be an administrator and asking you to verify your account. better yet if you want to verify your account just log in to Yahoo's official website http://www.yahoo.com/

5. Never open e-mails from unknown senders.

6. Never open links from spam mails, even if it came from your friend.

7. If you receive an email from your friend that looks suspicious his account might be hacked, dont open any links inside it it might lead you to a site that would hack your yahoo account.

8. Have a strong password, but be sure not to forget it. Strong password means it is more than eight character, combined with symbols and numbers i.e. d!ff!cult2r34d


Just be smart enough not typing your user name and password into anything else but the official website of Yahoo and official Yahoo Messenger.

If you suspect that your account has been hacked, immediately change password, update and run virus and malaware scan on your computer. Ask one of your techie friends to immediately assist you if you have trouble.