Category: Fight Back

Gmail Customised Emails

There are various online services that let you create disposable email addresses. These are for times when you want to use an email address once then delete it or be able to delete it if spam emails start arriving.

For example:

  • If you want register to download a document or brochure etc. but don’t want to get follow up sales emails
  • To register on a website where you think they are likely to sell your contact details to spammers
  • For someone you don’t really trust
  • To be able to track which services sell your contact details

Google doesn’t offer this disposable email address service but Gmail does have a facility  to create customized emails that you can then automatically delete that you can use to identify senders and filter incoming emails, so it is a little similar to disposable email addresses.

Step 1: When asked to input your email in an online service, you add a tag to your email address e.g. instead of fredbloggs @gmail.com you could use fredbloggs+uselessemail @gmail.com

Whatever is after the + sign will be ignored by Gmail.

Emails sent to that address will appear in your inbox alongside all of the others, but with that specific tag on the end of the address, they are very easy to eliminate or block entirely.

Step 2: You can setup Gmail filters to move such emails to another folder or to delete them if you wish.

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How to Make Your Website Trustworthy

The first steps in having your website trusted are the obvious ones – make sure there is nothing that would concern people e.g. selling items of dubious or inconsistent quality, excessive advertising, advertising of business such as gambling, over promising on products or services then being unable to meet those promises, poor customer service, excessive profit margins, inaccurate advertising, poor quality website etc.

You have to provide good products at the right price and back that up with excellent customer service.

Once you have eliminated anything that could put people off then you’re left with two basic things – building a good reputation and hoping for great online reviews by your customers.

These both need a lot of time and effort to happen. Good reputations don’t happen overnight and people will only add great reviews when your sales process, quality of products and services, customer service etc. are top notch.

Note that Marketing cannot increase the trustworthiness of your web site.

There is another way to increase trust and that is to become accredited by the various relevant bodies for whatever industry you are in and also to be accredited or registered with the various bodies that review websites.

Recent research shows that most customers don’t understand security on the Internet but they do trust various organisations and hence trust their judgements on trustworthy websites.

To the question “Which badge gives you the best sense of trust when paying online” the results show

  • Norton 36%
  • MacAfee 23%
  • TRUSTe
  • BBB

Other badges did also register but these four were the most recognised and trusted by far.

To get Norton accreditation – you simply buy a Symantec SSL certificate and implement that on your website.

The other companies listed above require more than an SSL certificate.

As well as the trusted badges, in assessing a website, consumers report that they look for qualities including

  • up to date information
  • fresh content
  • easy ways to contact the business
  • honesty about any problems
  • negative customer comments as well as positive ones are evidence of honesty
  • where appropriate – pictures of the management.

Make your website trusted for genuine reasons – don’t shortcut.

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Simple Cyber Life

The website at www.simplecyberlife.com is about helping families to be safe online.

They say their mission is to empower parents with the ‘know-how’ to protect their families from online threats through video tutorials, step-by-step instructions, a discussion forum and personal coaching calls.

Jonny Pelter, the founder says “Today’s advice for how parents can protect themselves and their kids online is far too complicated, resulting in poor security for almost all families”. He says he got fed up and created SimpleCyberLife.com to fix that.

This site does charge for the personal assistance. Premium membership is £45 per year and VIP membership is £180 per year. There is a free membership available for people who are more technically savvy and the paid memberships are very much targeted at parents.

The paid memberships offer video help, phone support, access to private forums, coaching etc. even paid home visits are possible.

No way to tell if this is a successful business model yet but they are giving it a good shot.

It’s an interesting site and you may find it useful if you need direct assistance on keeping safe online and in particular keeping your kids safe online.

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How to Report a Bad Website

It can be very simple and quick for people to create websites – good websites and bad websites.

What can you do if you encounter a bad website?  Who can you tell?

Bad in this case doesn’t mean something you don’t like but a website that is a scam or misleading or steals your personal information or is a copy of someone else’s website etc.

You can report the bad website to the search engines, blacklists, review sites and the Authorities.

Search Engines

Google, Bing and the other search engines want to know about bad websites so they can direct traffic away from them and where relevant will report the sites to the Police or other Authority.

Report to Google at https://safebrowsing.google.com/safebrowsing/report_badware

Instructions for Bing at  https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/930167/how-to-report-a-phishing-web-site

For Internet Explorer; If you are running IE and are still on the site in question, then  click on the Safety icon, which is on the toolbar go to “SmartScreen Filter” and select “Report unsafe website”.

Blacklists

Many organisations maintain lists of ‘bad’ websites called blacklists. This is to enable services such as Web of Trust, Trustwave, Brightcloud, numerous anti virus and anti malware companies such as McAfee, Sophos and many others to block access to those sites.

When you navigate to a blacklisted  listed website, your anti-virus or anti malware software will warn you and stop the browser opening that site.  Which such software protection you choose is up to you, but they all try to offer a good service.

PhishTank is a collaborative clearing house for data and information about phishing on the Internet. It maintains a blacklist used by software services.

Review Sites

There are various review websites that allow you to enter information, reviews, comments on websites and businesses – to help others make informed choices.

Which one you pick to report a bad website to depends on the nature of the website

e.g. for travel reviews – use Trip Advisor at www.tripadvisor.co.uk

Some of the largest of these review sites are Consumer Report, Four Square, Better Business Bureau, Angie’s List and there are lots more.

The Authorities

You can report websites to Action Fraud if there is evidence of criminal activity.

You can report online scams and rip-offs to Trading Standards via the Citizen’s Advice Consumer Helpline on: 03454 04 05 06

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The Disrespect Nobody Campaign

DISRESPECT NOBODY

“There’s a person attached to every body, respect both”.

You may have seen some strange adverts on the TV and on posters in city centres. This is part of a campaign called Disrespect Nobody and it’s aimed at teenagers.

The Disrespect NoBody campaign helps young people to understand about healthy relationships, re-think their views of controlling behaviour, violence, abuse, abuse and what consent means within their relationships.

It aims to challenge attitudes and behaviours amongst young people that abuse in relationships is acceptable.

The campaign is targeted at 12 to 18 year old boys and girls and aims to prevent them from becoming perpetrators and victims of abusive relationships.

There are four TV adverts

  • A talking bra
  • Talking underpants
  • Talking eyes
  • A talking hand

Some Key Lines from the Campaign

  • “Healthy relationships are all about respecting each other. You should feel loved, safe and free to be yourself”.
  • “Relationships can be confusing and it can be difficult to understand what is and isn’t normal behaviour”.
  • “Disrespectful and unacceptable behaviour can come in many forms. It isn’t limited to just physical behaviour; it can also go way beyond that”.

The UK Government backed and funded the “Disrespect NoBody” campaign.

The campaign has been criticised as it video doesn’t acknowledge that men can be the ones experiencing abuse in a relationship and uses key phrases like “Do you turn to violence when your GIRLFRIEND disagrees with you”

There are documents on the website for teachers and group leader to use in discussions with teenagers

https://www.disrespectnobody.co.uk/

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CIFAS Identity Protection Registration

Cifas is a not-for-profit company working to protect businesses, charities, public bodies and individuals from financial crime. They have more than 25 years of experience in fraud prevention and financial crime, working with a range of UK organisations to protect their customers and the public.

https://www.cifas.org.uk

Cifas Protective Registration is a defence against identity fraud. It’s not for everyone – only those who have  good reason to think they’re at risk, for example:

  • people who have recently lost personal documents, or had them stolen
  • customers of organisations that recently lost or leaked sensitive data
  • anyone who has been advised by the police that they’re at risk.

What is identity fraud?

Identity fraud happens when a fraudster pretends to be someone else and uses their credit card or account to buy products or services in their name or takes out a loan in that person’s name.

Victims may not even realise that they have been targeted until a bill arrives for something they did not buy or they experience problems with their credit rating. To carry out this kind of fraud successfully, fraudsters usually have access to their victim’s personal information such as name, date of birth, address etc. Fraudsters get hold of this in a variety of ways, including through phishing emails, fake websites, hacking and data loss, as well as using social media to put the pieces of someone’s identity together.

How Can CIFAS Help?

When you request Protective Registration, they place a warning flag against your name and other personal details in the National Fraud Database. This tells the hundreds of organisations that use Cifas data to pay special attention when your details are used to apply for their products or services. Knowing you’re at risk, they’ll carry out extra checks to make sure it’s really you applying, and not a fraudster using your details.

What to do if you’re a victim:

ACT FAST if you think you have been a victim of identity fraud

If you receive any mail that seems suspicious or implies you have an account with the sender when you don’t, do not ignore it. Phone one of the major credit reference agencies to report your concerns.

Get a copy of your credit report as it is one of the first places you can spot if someone is misusing your personal information – before you suffer financial loss. Review every entry on your credit report and if you see an account or even a credit search from a company that you do not recognise, notify the credit reference agency.

Individuals or businesses who have fallen victim to identity fraud should report this to Action Fraud at www.actionfraud.police.uk.

It pays to be careful with your identity and never give out confidential information unless you are sure of who you are giving it to.

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-wasters do let me know – go to the About page then Contact Us.

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