May 14, 2020
Protect Yourself from Unemployment Benefits Fraud If you live in Washington, or anywhere else for that matter, there’s a high likelihood that someone has fraudulently applied for unemployment benefits in your name recently. Here’s an easy way to determine if this has happened to you and some steps on how you can prevent it. I went to the Employment Security Department website and learned that an account had already been…
March 14, 2019
Not literally, of course, but shutting off some of the lights, at least, and changing the color of others. Sometime since the first of the year, my cell number was added to a scammer mega-list, and my phone has essentially not stopped ringing. I’ve tried all the usual remedies and even went so far as blocking all incoming calls except those in my contact list, but it’s not been as…
February 17, 2019
In 1909, Professor Charles Eliot, then president of Harvard University, assembled what would become known as the Five Foot Shelf. A collection of volumes substantive enough, according to Dr. Eliot, “…to afford a good substitute for a liberal education to anyone who would read them with devotion, even if he could spare but fifteen minutes a day.” Over the years, the shelf stands as an excellent launching pad for someone…
December 29, 2018
Welp, like I said in the previous post, this CenturyLink outage would go one of two ways: either CenturyLink would resolve the problem and the hubbub would die down or it would go the route of hearings and investigations. Now we know which way it’s headed: DO IT FOR THE KIDS AND PUBLIC SAFETY!!!! Most bad things from the government come wrapped in pretty and shiny packages whilst calling for…
December 28, 2018
On and off for the last 24 hours, CenturyLink has been experiencing some technical difficulties. As shown in the image above, reports from Down Detector indicate the issue is widespread and affects a significant percentage of the USA, including my home in the Pacific Northwest, and extending to other communities such as Albuquerque, Boise, Chicago, Cincinnati, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Portland, and Los Angeles. I’m not entirely clear on the causing…
December 24, 2018
Merry Christmas, everyone. As the season of gift-giving approaches, we are sure to be bombarded with supersized savings on all manner of interconnected devices and toys. If you give or receive one of these fabulous devices, are you also prepared to defend yourself and your family from the spiderweb created by these things that are watching and learning about you? I cannot recommend self-smarting highly enough, and to that end,…
December 12, 2018
Recently, I’ve noticed a significant uptick in the number of phishing emails being received by my coworkers. The content has varied in both content and language, but nonetheless, there’s been an uptick. How do you keep curious people from clicking on nefarious email links or attachments, especially those sent from what appear to be familiar email addresses? It’s simple, you educate them. Ideally, we’d start with educating our younglings at…
November 8, 2018
Last June I was cruising through Twitter and saw a post by one of my InfoSec heroes, Jayson Street (@jaysonstreet). Turns out he was in Seattle and I was able to sit down and talk with him for a good 30 minutes at Top Pot Doughnuts before being joined by Barry Dorrans (@blowdart) These guys, both at the top of their respective fields, are straight-up inspiring with their energy and…
November 3, 2018
Had a project, needed some stuff at Lowe’s. Walked in the main entrance to find this: I continued in through the main doors and mentioned to the employees at the customer service desk that their server room was wide open. My statement was met with a blank stare and a shrug. Clearly uninterested I found what I needed, made my [cash!] purchase and on my way out went to check…
July 11, 2018
Welcome to McPayphone, may I take your order? Sadly there will be no more ordering of anything from these phones found outside a local McDonald’s. Where the second box went is anyone’s guess. Someone probably ate it.
