//beconfused

A recent case of Microsoft updating Windows Vista and Windows XP has got quite a heated discussion on the internet. Apparently, Microsoft gives an option for users to choose not to update Windows automatically. However, there are several updates that seem to have some sort of a stealth ability and sneak through those options to update. And that really is a bad idea.

The Windows Update Program Manager has explained that the updates are pertaining to updating the Windows Update software only:

any user who chooses to use Windows Update either expected updates to be installed or to at least be notified that updates were available. Had we failed to update the service automatically, users would not have been able to successfully check for updates and, in turn, users would not have had updates installed automatically or received expected notifications. That result would not only fail to meet customer expectations but even worse, that result would lead users to believe that they were secure even though there was no installation and/or notification of upgrades. To avoid creating such a false impression, the Windows Update client is configured to automatically check for updates anytime a system uses the WU service, independent of the selected settings for handling updates (for example, “check for updates but let me choose whether to download or install them”). This has been the case since we introduced the automatic update feature in Windows XP. In fact, WU has auto-updated itself many times in the past.

Some users’ computers are set to download for do not install them automatically. However Windows Update went ahead to install it anyway. The files updated are as follows:

• wuapi.dll
• wuapp.exe
• wuauclt.exe
• wuaueng.dll
• wucltux.dll
• wudriver.dll
• wups.dll
• wups2.dll
• wuwebv.dll

This time Microsoft is in trouble with many techies beings rather upset. If you really do not want Windows Update to update itself, make sure you disable the download completely.

The option to download but not install is a good idea. It should have been a lot more clear. And allowing Windows Update to install itself without consent it just double standards and I’m sure no administrator is going to like that at all.

Online phishing is getting more and more common and it is important to safeguard your identity and passwords. There are numerous tell-tale signs that you can look out for. Check out this quiz by McAfee to see how vigilant you are towards internet scams. I scored a 10 out of 10.

McAfee SiteAdvisor Phishing Quiz

YOU ANSWERED 10 OF 10 QUESTIONS CORRECTLY

Rating: Safety Guru

Nice work! Your practically clairvoyant knowledge of the Web allows you to spot even the most realistic looking spoofed sites. We’re impressed!

But remember that even one misstep on a deceptive Web site can put your personal information at risk which could lead to identity theft or financial losses.

Don’t let scammers fool you! SiteAdvisor can help protect your identity by warning you before you visit a risky site.

And McAfee didn’t forget to do product plugging to and quickly pointed out that ‘Even the savviest expert can use a little help sometimes’ and recommends me the McAfee SiteAdvisor plugin. It’s free by the way.

It’s a new record! Wireless encryption method WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) isn’t secure at all, it can be cracked in as little as one or two minutes with a 1.7GHz Pentium-M. If you frequent bank websites to transact money and stuff, consider upgrading your encryption method to WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) or WPA2! Or, just save get a network cable and plug it in!

Your home or office WiFi network may be even less secure than you think. Researchers have now shown that they can break 104-bit WEP, a common 802.11b/g/n security mechanism, in as little as one or two minutes.

read more | digg story

If you have a wireless network at home, consider securing it. Things you can do to secure your wireless network includes:

1. Give a better SSID then ‘default’, ‘linksys’ or ‘netgear’. My SSID is ‘Aphrodite’ and you can call yours ‘Venus’ perhaps.
2. Remember to change your default password! My old password is ‘p0seid0n’, it beats having ‘admin’ as my password.
3. Refrain from broadcasting your SSID to let the whole neighborhood aware of your router’s presense.
4. If WPA2 option is available, use that. WPA is also okay but no one should really be using WEP and it’s too easy to crack.
5. Note also that it is illegal to connect to your neighbor’s wireless router in Singapore! Also, it is unsafe to do that as your neighbor might be a 14 year old computer geek that loves to obtain your passwords. If you do have the habit of piggybacking on your neighbor’s wireless network, use refrain from logging in to web sites. And note that it is still illegal.

An unsecured wireless network is an open invitation to hackers to walk right in to your computer and steal your personal information, upload malware onto your computer, and otherwise terrorize you. Thankfully, securing your wireless connection is extraordinarily simple to do.

read more | digg story

Yay! //beconfused celebrates 700 posts of crap. My posting rates are getting lower these days. And that’s because of some restrictions. I don’t want to visit my web site using the army computers as they are:

# Generally slow computers that screams “trash me” when each application hangs.
# Curious eyes often pry on what I surf - that means no blog, email and reading nerdy stuff. [Nerdy stuff bad; nerdy ain't fitting well with the army guys.]
# The army has a list of web sites all the computers visit. It’s a rumour but I think I am confident to confirm it since it’s so easy to get a log file with those information anyway.

So that’s no blogging. No comment moderation. Sorry if your comments got stuck. I got an off on coming Monday and am quite happy about it now. I tried so hard to apply for an off day, they just keep refusing to let me have it! Now I got my off day with strings attached - I promised to return immediately if something crops up.

I notice that the almighty WordPress 2.51 has been release and can’t wait to upgrade it. I’ll do so once I resolve some FTP (File Transfer Protocol) problems with my internet service provider.

By the way, Akismet - the spam filter I deploy - is totally amazing. My spam level is down 99% I tell you! It’s caught lots of spam comments since installation.

My most popular post is just a photo of Jay Chou (with 75 comments at present). Most loyal commentor is probably Nafcom - who blogs about ICQ and Opera from Germany! Thanks to all readers.

By the way, thanks to all the visitors who clicked on my Google advertisements. I can’t identify anyone but I get about 1 or 2 clicks a day (I don’t click it). It helps me pay for my blog’s web hosting. So do click if you see advertisements that interests you.

Blogging has been made a student favorite. I know of many students who blogged. I even know of teachers who blog actually. Some classes have group blogs. And some people started hate-blogs. There are just too many examples and I’m just lazy to slot in the links.

A lot of students (once, me inclusive) think of a blog as a personal space that you can write anything you want. It’s your opinion and it’s your freedom to write what you want. Of course, I know there would be bound to have some restrictions but today, it would only seem that blogging is much more restricted than what Singaporeans would think.

It’s funny. Numerous people who publishes posts on their blogs don’t want anyone to be viewing their blog. It kinda go against the very reason to own an online blog actually. An online blog isn’t what they want, they want instead a journal from Microsoft Outlook or something. Unless you manage to lock up your diary with some password or something, your blog can still be found! So stop perceiving privacy.

Sometimes, they would give the links of their blog to their close friends. The close friend links up the blog to his or hers and - tadah - there goes your privacy. You may be bitching about the girl who wore g-strings to school and may be writing all things offensive about her character. Then one day, she just check out a friend’s blog and link and link and link to your blog!

Schools act against students for ‘flaming’ teachers on blogs

The message has been sent out loud and clear, with five junior college students being punished for posting offensive remarks about two teachers and a vice-principal online.

The students, all girls, were made to remove the remarks from their Internet diaries, or blogs, and suspended for three days last month.

One such remark referred to a secondary school teacher as a “prude”: for disciplining a student for wearing a too-short skirt. “Frustrated old spinster. Can’t stand to see attractive girls,” the blog read.

Source: The Straits Times, published on Tuesday, September 27, 2005

Yes! You can get sued even. Recently 2 guys just got sued as they are writing racist comments I think. I didn’t really follow up on that news. Blogging is not as safe as you think. The girls are just trying to express their displeasure. Unfortunately, publishing something in the world wide web is the wrong method. I can assure you there are lots of people who has blogged about their teachers saying they are gay or pairing them up with another teacher. I’ve seen insults of their friends and many more.

I now sit in front of my computer feeling a little afraid. My blog can be a victim too. I don’t want to be sued. If I blogged about something that is against the law, do tell me about it, I’ll do something about it.

I hope you guys be more careful too. I am trying not to blog about my friends nowadays for the same reason, I am gradually stopping just gossipping since a year ago. But I can’t help but to write some stuff about my friends as this is a personal blog.

We understand and respect that you are concerned about your privacy. That’s why we want you to know that if you choose to enable the Google Toolbar’s advanced features (e.g., viewing the PageRank of web pages), information about the web pages you visit will automatically be forwarded to Google. The purpose of our Toolbar Privacy Policy is to inform you of this process, explain the type of information Google Toolbar is collecting, and explain how you can enable or disable the advanced functionality. [Source]

…But I want the advance features in Google Toolbar 3.0 (Beta). I guess I’ll just have to let Google have access to the web addresses that I use. This is like a more honest spy-ware. It stays on your browser to aid you in search.

Why do you download the Google Toolbar in the first place?

# I want an easier place to do my searches.
# I like the highlighting feature.
# PageRank is a cool to look at.

Now I am starting to ask myself if it really is necessary. I can live with the Find tool in Edit. I don’t mind going to Google.com myself like I always do in the company anyway. I’ll just sacrifice the PageRank which isn’t very important anyway.

But why does Google want the addresses that I use? How can it help the company? It probably can help by determining which is the web site that has more visitors and the amount of time they spend on each page. If Google can get hold of that information, they can better determine if this is a good or a bad link. [Of course, Google may just be innocently wanting to help the users by providing more information without making use of these web addresses they have obtained.]

Anyway, I enabled it. And then I wondered, “what is this advance features that they are talking about?” I would assume that it is the Auto-Link feature that requires. It provides more information (by viewing the map) of any American street address that you see in your page. That is a totally redundant feature for me, I disabled it instantly.

_(Google Toolbar 3.0 has spell checking feature. Now that is what I think is useful for me.)_

What I actually like about Google Toolbar 3.0 is that it allows spell checking. Now, that is cool. I like the feature. I am crazy about spelling every single thing right and now I can be more obsessed into this already. [I just want to spell things right, it doesn't mean my grammar has to be correct because you and I know that it pretty much sucked big time. And, no, Google Toolbar doesn't check grammar.]

All the erroneous words are colored in red and bold and underlined so that I can see it clearly. It says I spell ‘blockquote’ wrongly, that’s okay though since it’s not found in the dictionary. But it also pointed out that ‘Toolbar’ cannot be followed by an apostrophe. Well, I guess the dictionary is not foolproof, you can always add it to your dictionary.

I think this upcoming release of Google Toolbar 3.0 is promising and I like the updated look of the icons and the spelling checker of course. If you are using Blogger, the Google Toolbar also allows you to blog through it. Other enhancements include voting for and against a particular website, word translator and browsing the internet by typing names in the address bar (reminds me of what Microsoft used to do).

I’ll rate it 4.5 out of 5 with all the ninfy features. Privacy-wise, I can’t comment much. I enabled the advance features and now I’ll have to send Google information on the page I view. But now I want to try disabling the advance features so that I don’t have to send Google these information. And how do I do that? I have absolutely no idea. I don’t think I can do that in fact, unless I uninstall and install it back again. Perhaps Google can do something about that before they release their toolbar.

[You can download Google Toolbar 3.0 BETA to try it for yourself, but remember that Google Toolbar 3.0 is in beta which is not the final release version and may still have unsolved bugs.]