An Online Scam That Can Ruin Your Life...
by Christopher Wright

Right now, you could be involved in the distribution of child pornography and not know it. This is because two things you're familiar with - computer viruses and spam - are the tools international criminals are using to secretly ensnare unwitting victims in their illegal activities.

It's probably not too surprising to anyone with an e-mail account that spam has reached epidemic proportions. In fact, it's been reported that more spam was intercepted in July, 2003 than in all of 2002 combined, and now accounts for 50% of all e-mail received!

The prevalence of virus and virus-like attacks has also increased dramatically. On average, viruses are present in about one in 166 e-mails! (Source: Click here )

So, what does the current spam epidemic and the rise in e-mail delivered viruses have to do with child pornography?

In this scam, Trojan horse attacks are of particular concern. If you don't know what a Trojan horse is and exactly how it can integrate itself into your computer then you are extremely vulnerable. You can read a simple and concise explanation here: Click here

Trojan horses, through some of the methods you read about in the article, are being used (right now!) to literally hijack personal computers in order to remotely relay ads for pornographic web sites.

But, because the pornographic images are not actually written to the hard drive, the owner of the PC never even knows what's going on...yet porn ads are being transmitted (spammed) to thousands of e-mail addresses from his/her IP address!

Porn is BIG business on the Net, raking in billions of dollars annually, and one of the most effective ways to advertise the thousands of internet porn sites is by spamming millions of people day after day.

Hijackers use the victims' computers to vastly increase the scope of their spam campaigns. An additional benefit is that if a victim's ISP terminates their Internet account because of spam complaints, the hijackers are unfazed because they have hundreds or thousands of additional computers doing their dirty work for them.

The hijackers couldn't care less if you lose your Internet account. And porn, as distasteful as it is to many people, is legal in most places. But, when hijackers turn into cyber-criminals and begin using these methods to profit from the very illegal trade of child pornography and exploitation, you could get caught in a very dangerous situation.

In one recent case "a man accused of storing child pornography on his computer was cleared after it emerged that his computer had been infected by a Trojan horse, which was responsible for transferring the images onto his PC."

But before he was cleared of the charges, "Julian Green, 45, was taken into custody...after police with a search warrant raided his house. He then spent a night in a police cell, nine days in Exeter prison and three months in a bail hostel. During this time, his ex-wife won custody of his seven year old daughter and possession of his house." (Source: ZDNet® UK/August 1, 2003)

As you may know, simply being accused of involvement in child pornography is enough to destroy reputations and relationships, even if the accused is ultimately cleared of the charges. It's almost always a lose-lose situation.

And for all those who like to share files, it's been reported that Peer-To-Peer networks, including the music site Kazaa® are currently being investigated in the US for pornography swapping.

As these types of attacks increase, they're likely to expand from the realm of pornography peddling and child exploitation into other illegal activities.

Think about it: a criminal anywhere in the world could remotely (and without your knowledge) use your home or office computer for money laundering, extortion, pyramid schemes...even terrorist network communications. All traceable back to YOUR IP address by domestic and international law enforcement agencies, putting you at extreme risk while the real criminals operate anonymously and safely.

An active and updated virus program and personal firewall can give you some measure of protection. Being aware of the danger and knowing how to AVOID trouble before its too late is the other and equally important half of your defense.

Spam-filtering software is also something to look into, but realize that most of these programs don't do a very good job yet of distinguishing between spam and the e-mail that you really want or need.

For example, because of spam filters, some major ISP's and email providers mistakenly filtered out between 17% and 38% of WANTED e-mails in the first half of this year." That's a huge percentage. (Source: Washington Times/August 18, 2003)

So, it's a constant balancing act between taking the necessary protective measures and continuing to use the Internet to its fullest potential. But ignoring the threat isn't an option. Automated e-mail harvesters are stripping e-mail addresses from millions of web sites and ISP data bases this very minute...and this scam is just one among hundreds victimizing thousands of people everyday...

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WARNING: With a single click of your mouse, an online scam can ruin your life. Get your FREE 7-Part Scam Alert Course by sending a BLANK e-mail to: click here

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Christopher Wright, an expert in online scam prevention, is the author of SurferBeware!. For more information go to: Million Dollar Resources

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Is your self confidence based on what you accomplished inthe past?
by Charlie Badenhop

I recently heard from a friend, about a Japanese business man that has created a highly successful business with hundreds of stores throughout the country. At first I thought my friend was going to be telling me about the "how to" of business success, but instead the story took quite a different path than I was expecting. What follows is my version of an inspiring story.

The man in my story had actually failed at numerous businesses over the years. He started out with a large and successful family business, but he ran that business into the ground and eventually went bankrupt. After his bankruptcy he said, "Even though my business had failed, I did not feel like I had failed. I still had confidence in myself. I still knew that I could do something good. I didn't try to figure out all the details of what I had done right or wrong, I didn't try to understand whether I was a good business man or a bad business man. I just continued to believe in myself, and the vision that I had."

After his bankruptcy he searched around and managed to borrow some money for a new business. In a reasonably short amount of time he ran this business into bankruptcy as well. Afterwards he said, "Even more so now, I still had confidence in myself. I had seen some flashes of brilliance, and I knew that I could do something good. Once again, I didn't try to figure out right or wrong, good or bad, I only concentrated on how I could borrow more money and start all over again."

So, he manages to borrow some more money, and starts another business, and of course this business also goes bankrupt, or I wouldn't be telling this story! After his third bankruptcy he said "I knew I was getting closer to getting it right." What a fantastic spirit this guy has! He has huge confidence in the face of big time short term failure.

Back out on the streets he went, and this time he only managed to borrow a rather small sum of money. Not being able to start a "real" business with such a limited amount of cash, he rented a small Japanese pick-up truck. (The small ones are REALLY small. Sort of like a bonsai version of an American pick-up truck).

With little money to spend he shopped around in various wholesale markets and wound up deciding to only buy things that he could sell cheaply with no seeming connection to the various products, except that they were inexpensive and of reasonable quality. He loaded his goods into the back of his tiny pick-up truck and parked illegally on a busy street where he hawked his wares to the passersby, and the launch of a new retail phenomena had begun. Over time he parleyed the success he had with his one tiny truck, into a chain of highly successful stores.

When asked to what he attributed his success, he replied "Believing in myself, and not picking apart all of my pluses and minuses." He said, "Right from the beginning I knew that I could be successful. When I failed the first time I suddenly had a lot of free time on my hands since I no longer had a business to run. I figured that I basically had two choices in regard to what to do with my time:

1. Do a lot of thinking about what went wrong and try to correct my many mistakes in the future.

Or: 2. Take the time to relax and gain a new perspective on life. I of course chose the latter. From a relaxed state I was able to understand things that I was not able to understand when I was running around trying to be successful. I knew that dissecting what I had done right and wrong would eat up a lot of time and energy, and most likely not give me the formula for success. I knew that the formula for success was already inside of me, and that my job was to find a way to allow this formula to be expressed. I didn't try to understand what to do, I tried to get myself to the point where I was already doing what I needed to do."

To me this story offers a great deal of inspiration. Continuing to believe in myself regardless of the challenges to be faced, is a gift that I have often struggled to give myself. It is wonderful to be presented with such a fine example to learn from. The faith this man has in himself can be a gift to all of us. And at the same time I can't help but chuckle when thinking what a business consultant might say about this man's method for conducting business.

This story also reminds me of an article I read in a business magazine a number of years ago. The story told of the careers of a number of highly successful business people, all of whom had "failed" at least three or four times along the way. Each person in their own words said the following "I could not be the success I am today, had it not been for all of my previous failures!"

Do you have some "failures" in your life that possess the seeds of future success? I am guessing that we all do.

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Charlie Badenhop, the originator of Seishindo, a licensed instructor of Aikido, a long term practitioner of Self-relations therapy, Ericksonian Hypnosis, and the Japanese healing art of Sei Tai. Has students throughout the world. Contact Charlie at seishin@seishindo.org and subscribe to his free newsletter "Pure heart, simple mind" at click here!

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