HACKER ATTACKS VIA ORKUT- BEWARE

Beware of hacker attacks via Orkut

If you belong to the generation of net savvy Indians, beware of browsing social networking sites for long as your PC or laptop could easily fall prey to cyber attacks from hackers. As per the 2007 Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR) compiled by anti-virus and security solutions major Symantec, social networking sites have become the latest target of hackers to attack home and enterprise computers.

“With the web emerging as the seamless medium of communication, information and interaction, online users are prone to get infected by engaging in social networking and browsing frequented websites due to malicious online activity in the form of worms, bots, viruses and Trojans,” Symantec India managing director Vishal Dhupar said.

Some of the popular social networking sites on the worldwide web are Bebo, Facebook (70 million registered users worldwide), Flickr (9.6 million users), MySpace (1.1 billion users) and Orkut. About six million Indians are actively involved in social networking and spend nearly an hour of their online accessing websites providing such networking activity.

“The use of social networking websites in phishing attacks is symptomatic of the trend towards targeting people rather than their computers or laptops because users are the weakest link in internet security. As a result, personal information, confidential data or corporate dossiers stored insecurely face the risk of being corrupted or stolen,” Dhupar noted, citing the report.

Phishing is an e-mail fraud method by which a hacker sends out legitimate-looking e-mail in an attempt to gather personal and financial information from recipients. Typically, the messages appear to come from well-known and trustworthy websites.

The report found that 65 percent of malicious attacks in India were through computer worms as against 22 percent globally due to lack of a fool-proof security patch or failure to install updates of anti-virus software in time.

High proliferation of viruses in India due to malicious code propagation vectors such as file sharing or executables has made net surfers or browsers vulnerable to cyber attacks.

“Unlike in the past, when netizens became victims by visiting malicious sites or clicking on deceptive e-mail attachments, hackers operating underground economy are targeting popular websites, accessed for a host of interactive services ranging from chat, messaging, e-mail, video, voice chat, file sharing, blogging to discussions,” Dhupar pointed out.

“Of late, Indian consumers and enterprises are subject to savage attacks in the form of phishing and botnets that choke the mailboxes. The study, conducted from July-December 2007, revealed India had a whopping 32,502 bot-infected computers and over 60 command and control servers, which is an increase of 50 percent over the previous study in 2006,” Dhupar recalled.

According to the report, there were 345 phishing URL (universal resource locator) links with IP (Internet Protocol) addresses hosted in India. Even reputable Indian banks were not spared, as about 400 phishing attacks were detected in the second half of last year.

Among Indian cities, Mumbai had the majority of bot-infected computers (56 percent), followed by Chennai (16 percent) and Delhi (14 percent).

News Source: The Daily Telegrams, Port Blair.

"COMPETITION" - AN ANALYSIS

COMPETITION

A competitive world has two possibilities for you. You can lose. Or, if you want to win, you can change.

- Lester C Thurow

In the globalized world, big and small coexist, but the smaller one always lives in the fear of being gobbled up by the big. But can the mighty ones take their survival for granted?

The intensity of competition has increased so much that no matter who we are, all of us are under constant threat. For every success, there are ‘n’ numbers of aspirants who constantly work to displace the leaders.

Most people treat competition as a threat. We tend to forget that sometimes the threat posed by competition is a necessity to bring us out of our complacency and to hone up our survival instincts. Until the eighties, Bajaj Auto had only one brand in the two-wheeler segment: Chetak. However in the last decade, it has introduced more than six original designs and brands in the motorcycle segment alone, and has again started doing exceedingly well, so much so that, now it is one of the strongest contenders for the top place in the Indian two wheeler industry. Hero Honda is the world’s largest producer of motorcycles and TVS group is renowned world over for quality products and services. India’s two wheeler industry has come of age and is competing with even the best in the world. Nobody is complaining.

However, someone has rightly said, “Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people.”

Darwin’s theory of “survival of the fittest” suggests that man is basically selfish. He wants everything for himself first, and will go to any extreme to fulfill his selfish interests. As resources like food, land, career opportunities are limited, human beings inevitably see other human beings as threats and enemies. The results are war, hatred and jealousy.

We live in a competitive world. It doesn’t mean that for us to succeed, others need to fail. It is also wrong to treat life always as a Zero-sum* game.

EVERY MORNING in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. it knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle- When the sun comes up, you’d better be running. - inspirational sign on an office wall

* In a zero-sum game, win for one necessarily means loss for another and the sum of all wins and losses is zero. When two people gamble with each other, it has to be a zero-sum game.

Role of Human Psychology In MLM

ROLE OF HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY IN MLM

The amazing business of MLM is all about dealing with people. It’s about meeting people, interacting with people, learning from and teaching the people, convincing people, motivating people, reasoning with people, and above all, managing people to build, lead and expand a successful organization of MLM under your belt. This business is essentially about inspiring people to strive to materialize their dreams and ambitions with the help of the truly fruitful business opportunity that they are equipped with in the form of MLM. In a nutshell, this business is about human psychology and its intricacies.

Hence, one of the most important traits that are required to succeed in Multi Level Marketing is a practical understanding of the human psychology. In fact, it is indispensable if one is serious about making a career out of MLM and really making it big, and for part timers too, a little knack of understanding the way the human brain acts and reacts is a must for achieving the desired results in this immensely rewarding yet highly competitive business.

In order to understand, explore and learn about this fundamental phenomenon comprehensively, we, at Zillion 2^nd Innings initiate a series of significant related topics, herewith, wherein the readers/users are welcome to post their comments/articles on the different aspects of the subject being analyzed i.e. the ROLE OF HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY IN MLM. The selected comments/articles would be published in this Blog together with the name of the author.

To start with, let us take a look at a very basic form of amusing yet highly educative comparison between a young boy and a young girl’s psychology, which often outwits a trained psychologist by its very practical nature. Go through the following pictorial analysis:

Now, go through the Girl’s mind:

The obvious conclusion that one can arrive at would be that there is a great deal of difference between how a young boy and a young girl’s mind react to each other. No two brains are similar. Hence, people often react differently to a given situation. They may agree with one point but be at loggerheads with the other. The very human nature is the basis of this profound study on human psychology. It’s not due to the difference in the two sexes, but due to the difference in the two minds that a boy’s actions and reactions are typically straightforward in contrast with that of a girl.

Hence, it’s important to understand the situational behavior of the people with different mindsets. Observe the following example carefully:

THE STORY OF 4 PEOPLE (Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, Nobody) There was an important job to be done and Everybody was asked to do it. Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about it, but it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody would not do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when actually Nobody asked Anybody.

Everybody has his/her own point of view and a different attitude towards things. It’s very human for people to love being in COMFORT and ease. In fact, that’s what everybody works hard for. Hence, shouldering responsibility and to lead by example is the trait of the rare breed. And ironically, that rare breed is the one that is most likely to view things with a positive attitude and, hence, most likely to succeed. Nobody likes to work hard yet everybody has to do exactly the same in order to achieve what he/she wants.

Hence, it is a very fundamental lesson that since people love comfort, you show them how to achieve the same with the least amount of effort. And that can be done not by WORKING HARD (they hate it) but by WORKING SMART with the help of the much tried and tested business of MLM.

Picture source: Funtoosh.com

EARN HEFTY POCKET MONEY BY E-TUTORING

There’s a new way to earn as you learn. If you are a student of math or science and have decent communication skills, you can make up to Rs. 17,000 a month e-tutoring kids in America and Europe. Educational Process Outsourcing (EPO) is enabling over 100 Delhi students make handsome dividends from a few hours spent answering queries and clearing doubts. Manya Education Private Limited, an e-tutoring firm, recently began campus recruitment in IIT-Delhi, Delhi University and Jamia Millia Islamia.

Academically strong students from the Sciences stream were selected and trained for a month. The e-tutoring model requires these student-teachers to log on to a chat-based software and answer queries from students in the US and Europe.

For an average four-hour session, they earn between Rs. 12,000 and Rs. 17,000, depending on competency. Varun Thakur, a Chemistry (Honours) student, is back from office in time for classes in Venkateswara College, after four hours spent interacting with American students in grades IX to XII. “E-Tutoring is exciting. I work from 3.30 am to 7.30 am and am back home before classes. The courses in the US are the same as ours. The only difference is the teaching methodology,” says Thakur. Beginning with Math, Physics and Chemistry, Manya Education plans to include social sciences lessons. The teaching fraternity has welcomed the initiative. “E-tutoring is a great option for bright students with a good grasp over their subjects,” said Rihan Khan Suri, placement officer, Jamia Millia Islamia.

News Source: The Daily Telegrams, Port Blair