Rick's World

Link: http://us.mcafee.com/virusInfo/default.asp?id=description&virus_k=137760

Ok, so I've been commenting lately about how the referer spammers are attempting to use blogs around the world to spread virii in order to possibly take over your computer remotely. Turns out, I was right and have confirmation of it. My virus scanner found this today in my temporary files. I never ran the file and my machine has been updated to not be suseptible to this virus, so I am safe, but there are many who arent. See the link for this blog for info on the virus.

cyber-search.biz is spreading this virus intentially all over the Internet! Either that or they've been compromised themself by someone else to spread this virus unknowingly.

Introducing Jewel!

These spammers are becoming downright criminal in their actions. Here's a few new ones I've noticed in my logs:

1. Our friend cyber-search.biz, who's been feeding this 33.WMF file for the last few weeks is now feeding a different WMF file, named 'cyber.WMF'. Whether or not this is the same file with a different name, I don't know. I am still suspicious that this WMF file is an exploit of the Windows WMF processing bug. I see this cyber-search.biz site feeding these WMF files all over the place.
2. It looks like some spammers are taking advantage of some badly written web sites to disguise the URL of their sites. I'm seeing entries in the log file where it's what looks like a legitimate site that is using HTML frames. Their frame page is written to take a parameter that passes in the URL of the web site to display in the frame. The spammers are then using this parameter to essentially wrap their URL inside a frameset from the legitimate site. This leads your browser to display the URL of the legit site, but show the content of the spammer site. Plus, if you attempt to block the site, you end up blocking the legit site and not the spammer site.
3. The spammers are heavily targeting teens as a way of compromising the teen's computers. I see many links from site with the word 'teen' in the domain name. The names have harmless sounding domains like 'teensspace.com' (which sounds suspiciously similar to the very popular teen site 'myspace.com'), 'teen-search.info', etc. Many of these sites link to that infamous 33.WMF file that cyber-search.biz has been feeding. A teen clicks on these sites, loads that 33.WMF file, and ends up unknowningly compromising their computer for the spammer/criminal's use.
4. The spammers are now using false 'search engine' sites to redirect people toward this 33.WMF file. I see MANY 'refering searches' in my logs as coming from these bogus sites. This is just a different way of the bloggers trying to force their way into your site so you can display their links for the unsuspecting to click on.

Link: http://www.browardeducator.com/index.html

Well, it's been a long time since I wrote to update on my progress on learning the guitar. Why? For the simple reason that I really haven't made any progress. I dabble on this thing, but I don't really know what I'm doing, and so I'm not making any progress. It's been frustrating. This will hopefully change on March 23rd though.

On March 23rd is my first class in Beginner Guitar. I signed up for an 8 week evening course on learning the guitar. It's located at the W.C. Young Community School in Pembroke Pines on Thursday nights from 6-8 PM. For the next 2 months I'll be spending 2 hours a week learning the guitar and hopefully making a lot of progress at this thing.

I really want to learn this! I haven't given up!

Link: http://www.fastaccess.com

My BellSouth DSL is now running at 6Mb/sec! woohoo!

I just called BellSouth (1-888-757-6500) and found out that they are offering the 6Mb/sec DSL now! I just upgraded my account. It's due to start March 2nd. It doesn't look like you can order through their web site yet, but if you call them, it may be available!

To all the bloggers out there, beware!

There are a lot of referer spammers posting sites that as soon as you load the page, it tries to load a file named '33.wmf'. I strongly suspect this is a WMF exploit file designed to take over your computer! Beware!

Link: http://www.consumerreports.org

I've written several blogs in the past discussing organic food and why I think it's better than conventional food. Up until now, it's just been me, some anonymous Joe Blow on the Internet spouting off with his opinions on this subject. Now a very reputable magazine has chimed in with its opinion and they agree with me! In the February 2006 issue of Consumer Reports (page 12) is an article discussing the benefits of organic food. If you don't believe me, believe this reputable source. For those of you out there who don't subscribe to this magazine, like I do, I thought I'd summarize the article for your benefit.

Buy these items organic as often as possible

What: Apples, bell peppers, celery, cherries, imported grapes, nectarines, peaches, pears, potatoes, red raspberries, spinach and strawberries.

Why: USDA lab testing shows that even after washing some fruits and vegetables consistently carry much higher levels of pesticide residue than others. Among fruits, nectarines had the highest percentage testing positive for pesticide residue. Peaches and red raspberries had the most pesticides on a single sample. Amoung vegetables, celery and spinach most often carried pesticides, with spinach having the highest number on a single sample. For more info go to FoodNews.

What: Meat, poultry, eggs and dairy

Why: You greatly reduce the risk of exposure to the agent believed to cause mad cow disease and other toxins by eating organic meat, as opposed to conventional meat. You also avoid the daily supplemental hormones and antibiotics, which have been linked to increased antibacterial resistence in humans.

What: Baby food

Why: Children's bodies are especially vulnerable to toxins and they may be at risk of higher exposure. Due to the fact that baby food is often made up of condensed fruits or vegetables, they can take in larger doses of toxins.

Buy these items organic if price is no object

What: Asparagus, avocados, bananas, broccoli, cauliflower, sweet corn, kiwi, mangos, onions, papaya, pineapples, and sweet peas.

Why: These vegetables rarely show evidence of multiple pesticide residues.

What: Breads, oils, potato chips, pasta, cereals, and other packaged foods, such as canned or dried fruit and vegetables.

Why: These are processed products, that while they may have less toxins, are lower in nutrients due to their processed nature. (The more processed it is, the less nutrients it has.) Rule of thumb: Buy it, and cook it in its natural state!

Don't bother buying these items organic

What: Seafood

Why: There are no government standards for what is considered 'organic' seafood. This means that companies are free to call their seafood organic, even if it's not.

What: Cosmetics

Why: Most cosmetics don't contain much organic material. Also, government regulations seem pretty lax in what they allow as 'organic' in cosmetics. Cosmetics manufaturers also routinely use synthetic ingredients, even in their 'organic' products.

Chemical Health Risks of Conventionally Produced Foods

Pesticides: In 1996 a law was passed requiring pesticides to meet safety standards for children, whose developing bodies are especially vulnerable to damage from toxins. This law causes more and more pesticides to be banned each year, but consumers can still easly consume small amounts of more than 30 pesticides daily when eating a healthful variety of foods. Evidence also shows that pesticides can be passed in a woman's bloodstream to a fetus in the womb. Studies have shown that eating an organic diet for as little as 5 days, can reduce signs of pesticides in your body to undetectable levels. There is also evidence that "exposure of the fetus to organophosphorus pesticides produces babies with small head circumference, which is a risk factor for reduced intelligence and behavioral disturbances".

Hormones: Studies suggest that synthetic growth hormones are carcinogenic. These hormones have also been linked to the precocious onset of puberty in girls. These hormones are banned, by law, in all poultry, but not in other types of beef.

Antibiotics: Leads to increased antibiotic resistence in humans. This means that when antibiotics are used to fight a normal infection in humans, they will be less effective. This can cause the antibiotics to not work in fighting the infection/disease.

Ok, my continuing adventures with the referer spam has lead to an interesting discovery - I think criminals are now using referer spam to spread viruses. I think they are doing this in order to 'own' more computers for their botnets.

Today, I was browsing through the latest referer spam links on my blog. My blog no longer displays referer links on the site. (Thank you b2evolution!) This has slowed down the flow of referer spam a lot, but I do still get occaisional spams. Whenever I get one of these spams, if I'm not sure what it is, I go to the site. I got a few of these referer spam links today that I wasn't sure were referer spam, so I visited the site. As soon as I loaded the page, I got a box from Firefox asking for permission to download a WMF (Windows MetaFile). This is a very unusual thing to see on a web site. 99.9% of all images on web sites are either GIF or JPG format files. A WMF is a Windows-only image format. It is also the source of a recent exploit on Windows. This exploit can be used to secretly run programs on the person's machine without the person knowing it. This means that if someone were to load this WMF, it would install a program that would allow the criminal to secretly take control of your computer. You would NEVER even know that this is happening! If this exploit works, you've just 'donated' your computer and your Internet connection to this criminals own uses. He can basically use your computer to do anything he wants - send emails, perform DDOS on other sites. Anything. It's a scary thought.

Fortunately, Firefox does not display these images by default and I did not fall victim to this. I also have my computer properly patched to prevent this exploit. I am sure that there are millions of computers out there that have not been patched to fix this exploit, however. this means that there are millions of pontential 'free' computers for all these criminals to exploit. The sites that were hosting this WMF were clearly not legitimate sites. They all contained a seemingly random collection of words (no doubt in an attempt to attract higher placement on search engines). The domain names were also named to attract teens. The names had names very similar to MySpace.com (a very popular site with teens). These names could easily be confused for the real MySpace.com site causing the unsuspecting teen to fall victim to this exploit and add his computer to the criminal's botnet. This is downright scary.

Am I positive that this was an intentional attempt to spread this WMF exploit? No. However, based on the evidence, I don't see what else it could be.

Disclaimer: Am I doctor? No. These are merely my opinions based on some research I've done recently. Now that we've got that out of the way, let me just say that 'safe' drugs are not safe, whether they be prescription or non-prescription drugs. All drugs have side effects. Some worse than others. What many people don't realize, is that prescription and non-prescription drugs are one of the leading causes of health problems in America. Here are a few examples: Non-Prescription Drugs Acetaminophen: The main drug in such brands as Tylenol, Excedrin, and Theraflu can cause acute liver failure, requiring the victim to receive a liver transplant! NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs): The main drug in such brands as Advil and others can cause stomach ulcers. Prescription Drugs Note that this information is derived from an article in the January 2006 issue of Consumer Reports. Celecoxib (aka Celebrex): This drug is used as a pain reliever. It may cause increased risk of heart attach and stroke. Estrogen: This drug is used for menopausal symptoms. It may cause increased risk of breast cancer, heart disease, stroke and blood clots. Isotretinoin (Accutane): This drug is used for acne. It may cause birth defects, depression, psychosis, and suicidal tendencies. Malathion (Ovide): This drug is used for treating head lice. It may cause flammability of hari and neurotoxicity. Medroxyprogesterone (Depo-Provera): This drug is used for contraception. It may cause irreversable bone loss. Mefloquine (Lariam): This drug is used to prevent Malaria. It may cause disorientation, severe anxiety, paranoia, hallucinations, and depression. Rosuvastatin (Crestor): This drug is used for high cholesterol. It may cause muscle breakdowns and kidney damage. Salmeterol (Serevent): This drug is used for asthma. It may cause increased asthma-related deaths. Sibutramine (Meridia): This drug is used for weight loss. It may cause increased blood pressure and heart rate, heart-rhythm abnormalities, heart attack, cardiac arrest, and memory problems. SSRIs (Zoloft, Effexor): This type of drug is used to treat anxiety and depression. It may cause increased suicidal tendencies, especially in children and teens. Tegaserod (Zelnorm): This drug is used for irritable bowel syndrome with constipation. It may cause potentially dangerous diarrhea and other intestinal problems. Topical immunosuppressants (Elidel, Protopic): This type of drug is used to treat Eczema. It may cause increased cancer risk.