We’ve been busy here lately, but we caught something while recycling a machine for one of our clients. It seems that a “competitor”, who has since changed his business name, was shaving the OEM stickers off machines so that he could re-use the license to charge the client more money while spending none of his own. The client had XP, the machine says “Vista” but the sticker says “XP” as well – typically not a problem, until you read which type of license he used.

What to watch out for... Arrows show the differences in sticker vs actual Manufacturer. Circles show damage from "shaving" the sticker.

If you have a machine custom built, or ordered through a local company, always inspect the stickers. This machine was a ACER and it had an eMachine’s XP sticker on it. I’ve attached a picture so you can see what I’m talking about. The circles point to the sticker damage from this individual removing the sticker. If you see something like this, don’t buy the machine – period. Microsoft has every right to disable Windows, and does so. For Windows Vista and 7, this becomes more of an issue because they both check in with Microsoft every 6 months to ensure that your license hasn’t been copied/installed somewhere else.

Note: A Vista/Windows 7 machine sticker looks like paper, with a hole, that has a security thread through it.

I take great pride in knowing that we provide some of the highest customer service scores in the area (Angie’s List Honor Roll, plus all our other reviews). I cannot stand it when individuals like this take advantage of customers to save a buck here and there. There are other ways to save money, and we do it all the time with customers. If it eats into our profit margin, so be it – the customer is happy and that’s what matters.
Justin

Yesterday, when I woke up, I heard about a new project that was trying to cause turmoil for FaceBook, MySpace and other “Social Networks”. At the time, I had never heard of Diaspora, but I watched the videos and it made sense. The New York Times covered it, then a few other sites, including one called Slashdot, covered it.

These four teens in New York set up a donation request on Kickstart, asking for $10,000 to fund a summer full of coding. They hoped to get the majority of the framework done so they could start helping the masses with privacy fears and such. Well, they reached that goal by mid-day 8. I hit Kickstart on day 10 and it had just hit $20,000… Ok, so there are a lot of disgruntled people out there that really dislike what Facebook is doing – good, I’m not the only one. Well, I watched that number sky rocket yesterday, then it kept going and going and going. This morning, upon waking up, people around the world have donated over $95,000 to this project (edit – OVER $100,000!!!), and that number is still going up. Oddly, right now, the average donation is $42 and change. It’s interesting because according to a great book (later a movie), and an older inside joke with geeks, is that 42 is the meaning of life…

If you’re interested in seeing how what Facebook has done with your privacy, check out this handy little page (click on the different years to see how your profile has leached out). If you’re interested in contributing to a global cause that thousands of other people agree with, check out their donation project on Kickstart.

If this project doesn’t have Facebook worried, they’ve made the first mistake in the art of war: Know thy enemy.
Justin

That’s right, again.

Facebook has had several issues with sharing private information and this is no exception. Imagine going to a website and they know who you are… On top of that, the website knows who your friends are, where you’re located, etc. Facebook is doing this right now.

To fix this, Go to Account > Privacy Settings > Applications and Websites > Instant Personalization and uncheck the checkbox at the bottom of the page.

This “Personalization” feature sets a cookie for other websites to grab that allows them to authenticate to your profile, as though you have them as a friend.

Justin

I get asked all the time how to hide what people are doing online. Some people want to download music without getting caught (Sorry, won’t help there), but a lot of people just want to be private on what they do. There isn’t a problem with that…

A common misconception that stands out is about IP addresses. Many people think, mostly due to TV shows and Hollywood, that IP addresses can be tracked instantly – all the way to your address. False. Unless you’re doing something illegal, there is no reason to worry about your IP address.

An IP address is the address given to your internet connection while you are connected to the internet. These days, typically your modem or router for your broadband has an IP address attached to it, then each type of computer on your internal network has another address, and so on. Anything connected to a network or the internet has an IP address. There are also two types of IP addresses. The old version: 235.135.191.100 or the new version: 2001:0db8:85a3:08d3:1319:8a2e:0370:7334

Another common misconception is that everything you do online is anonymous and can’t be tracked. Far from it… Everything you do online, unless you use special tools and have the know how, is tracked and kept in the history of your computer, your router/modem, your ISP and on any type of web or email server you “touch”. Think of it just like your fingerprint – when you go about your normal day, you leave your fingerprints all over the place.

Well, things just got worse. It seems that someone leaked that Yahoo had a virtual “menu” of what law enforcement could request from them, along with pricing, to get information on people’s email, account activity, etc. They provide pricing, a sample warrant so the police word the warrant correctly to receive information from them as well as exactly what information they need to find the account that law enforcement is interested in – oh, and how long they keep that information.  Unfortunately, this is not just an issue with Yahoo, but other companies as well. Verizon is being named in a Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) request for the same “price sheet”. Verizon, however, is not providing it as they would be ridiculed for the practice. If you’re interested in this topic, feel free to check out the Wired story here.
Justin