Make a Difference
This monstrous pig was shot on a remote property in Western Australia three years ago. It weighed about 500lbs.
Hardly breaking news, but the photo has been around for a while, and a few people thought it was a fake. It’s not.
The property owner shot it while it was eating a dead cow.
Big Pig
Shades of Razorback
Yes I know that means I’m a hopeless bogan. I’m going to see AC/DC too.
In Sydney. No one else seems to have heard of it.
Sex worker Ivy McIntosh said people in her profession were being overcharged when they placed ads in local papers. “I’m paying too much for a measly two inches,” she said in a statement.
OK.
Meanwhile the Salvation Army has apologised for a newspaper advertisement for Red Shield Day. The ad featured a drug addicted prostitute who had been rescued by the Salvos and taken to rehab.
The assorted whores (their word) found the suggestion that someone might be forced into prostitution to feed a drug habit offensive.
In fact there are close links between drug abuse and prostitution. Annoying as this may be to ‘respectable’ sex workers, pretending otherwise does not help anyone.
The Salvation Army should not have apologised.
Two soldiers have been shot, one killed, at a military recruiting centre in Arkansas.
The suspect, Abdulhakim Muhammad, a person of no particular appearance or religious views, has been arrested.
Police found a small arsenal of weapons in Mr Muhammed’s car, including an assault rifle, a .22 calibre rifle, a .380 calibre automatic pistol and ammunition.
Leaders of the pro-life movement have always called for peaceful protest against the horror of abortion, and have consistently denounced the use of violence in any form. They also consistently condemmed the murder of George Tiller.
Some on the left have openly called for violence against members of the military, and especially military recruiters.
So where are the voices from the left, raised in condemnation of the murder of a young man whose job was to welcome new enlistees back to their home towns?
Just received this email claiming to be from the Commonwealth Bank:
We recorded a payment request from “HostGator -www.hostgator.com- Reseller Web Hosting” to enable the charge of $74.95 on your account.
Because the order was made from an African internet address, we put an Exception Payment on transaction id #POS PAYM7284 motivated by our Geographical Tracking System.
THE PAYMENT IS PENDING FOR THE MOMENT.
If you made this transaction or if you just authorize this payment, please ignore or remove this email message. The transaction will be shown on your monthly statement as “HostGator – Reseller Web Hosting”.
If you didn’t make this payment and would like to decline the $74.95 billing to your card, please follow the link below to cancel the payment :
Cancel this payment (transaction id #POS PAYM7284) (Warning – this is a phishing site – this warning was not in the email, obviously!)
NOTE: Because email is not a secure form of communication, please do not reply to this email.
The link takes you to a very plausible looking pretend Commonwealth Bank website, where you are invited to log in so you can cancel the unauthorised transaction. Once you log in, the owner of the fake site has your internet banking username and password, and can access all your online bank accounts.
Even if you think an email may be genuine, never follow links in emails to your banking website (or to PayPal, Amazon, or any other site where you have a password protected account).
Always open a new browser window, go to the official bank web site, and log in from there.
Over the last few months I have noticed an increasing number of computers infected with the virut family of viruses.
Some of these are very unpleasant. They can cripple your anti-virus software, replicate in various places on your hard drive, disable Windows updates, disable internet access, and delete or modify key Windows system files to the point where your computer becomes so unstable it cannot be used, or will not start at all.
According to viruslist.com, four of the top twenty malicious programmes infecting personal computers in April were members of the virut family. Nimda, a worm which disables your Windows desktop, is also high on the list.
I have also seen donwadup (conficker) infections, and script downloaders (also known as drive-by downloaders) which can infect your computer when you visit a malicious or infected website.
Some of these infections are extremely difficult to remove, because they make hidden copies of themselves. If even one is missed, the computer will be re-infected. Also, they can infect needed Windows system files in ways that cannot be disinfected without destroying the Windows files, so you can end with a clean computer , but a computer that will not start.
Once you are infected by one virus, the chances are that your computer security will be weakened and your computer will quickly have multiple infections.
Prevention
Use a good anti-virus/anti-spyware programme. For ordinary home use, the free versions of AVG or Avira are quite adequate. If you visit porn or gambling sites, or use p2p (file sharing) software, you will need a high end commercial anti-virus like Kaspersky or Vipre.
Keep your anti-virus software up to date. I have just fixed a computer infected with virut ce. This version of virut was only found in the wild for the first time in February. The computer had a good anti-virus programme, but it had not been updated since early February, so the computer had no protection against viruses developed since then.
Keep Windows up to date by allowing Windows Update to run automatically. Computers running automatic updates were at no risk from conficker.
No anti-virus software can protect your computer all the time, from every attack. The highest rated anti-virus products achieve detection rates of up to 97%.
You can still be safe on the internet if you are cautious.
Do not open files or run programmes if you do not know what they are or where they have come from. This includes email attachments. Take care with files from friends, school, and even commercial suppliers. Infections can come from CDs and flash drives as well as the internet.
Do not use p2p software. Or if you must, run a full virus scan after every download. Do not visit porn or gambling sites. Some people will anyway. If you do, make sure your antivirus is up to date beforehand, and run a full scan after you leave the site.
Run a full, deep or maximum security scan every week.
Do not, ever, respond to a pop-up on your screen telling you your computer is infected, and that you need to download or install an anti-virus product. Clicking anywhere on one of those pop-up boxes, including the ‘’No’ button, may give permission to install rogue anti-virus software which will cost you money, slow down your computer, cause lots of dire (but incorrect) warnings and achieve nothing.
Some fake security alerts are very convincing:
Fake Windows Security Alert
More fake alert pictures from Enigma Software.
Do not be fooled! Don’t click anywhere on such an alert. Shut your computer down, restart, and run a full virus scan.
If you are in doubt about whether your computer may be infected, and you still have internet access, visit and run Microsoft’s Onecare Live safety scanner.
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