Technology How To’s

Article that I’ve written over the years to resolve specific technology issues that I’ve run across in my day to day life.

Thunderbird RSS Feed Fix

Posted by Rick on in Technology How To's 1 Comment

Thunderbird RSS Feed Fix

I love Thunderbird for reading emails, and keeping track of my RSS feeds.

But for some reason RSS tends to become corrupted. I don’t believe it’s necessarily Thunderbird’s fault, although it seems a bit pickier about feeds that are correctly crafted then other RSS readers.

A clue that there is a problem is RSS feeds simply stop receiving any new messages. When looking at the feed it appears that it is no longer subscribed. Deleting the feed and resubscribing fails with a message stating that the feed is already subscribed.

In cases like this the only fix seems to be to manually delete the feed.

In Windows do this by going to: C:Documents and SettingsUserNameApplication DataThunderbirdProfileswsfdfsgb.defaultMailFeeds

The part after profiles, in this case wsgjbxgb.default, will be different on each machine. In some cases there might even be two files that both have .default in them. If so, the newest one is usually correct.

On Macintosh, these files are located in /Users/username/Library/Thunderbird/profiles/wsfdfsgb.default/Mail/News & Blogs/

Once in the correct folder, simply delete all files with the name of the site that you’re pulling feeds from. Note that this will also delete any saved articles you might have kept, so be sure to back those up within Thunderbird.

After deleting the files, restart Thunderbird and re-add the feeds. Everything should be working now!

 

Digital Protection Malware virus

Posted by Rick on in Microsoft, Technology How To's, virus 0 Comment

Digital Protection Malware virus

There is a new major malware virus going around right now. This one is “Digital Protection” and infects computers after the user gets one of those pop-ups that says “You have a virus!”

The odd thing about this one is that it’s also taking over the Windows Updater program, so it can’t be used to download new security patches and fixes from Microsoft.

It’s also loading itself multiple times into the Windows registry. Below are step by step instructions on how to remove it. http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/Removal-instructions-Digital-Protection-t274218.html

This is a nasty removal process so if you’re not familiar with editing the Windows registry, I highly suggest you take this somewhere professional.

How to report Internet Fraud

Posted by Rick on in Scams, Security, Technology How To's 3 Comments

How to report Internet Fraud

Internet Fraud is on a rise. As more and more people get online around the world, more viruses are created to steal information, and more people see the anonymity of the Internet as a good way to steal, fraud rates will continue to rise.

Common fraudulent acts range from using stolen Paypal accounts to pay for eBay or Craigslist products. Sending people fake checks for significant amounts of money over the selling price and asking for the extra back, or the common “Nigerian 419  Scam,” where you’re contacted (usually via email) for help moving large amounts of money from another country. But they quickly ask you to send a couple of thousand dollars as a “transfer fee” and none of the money is ever seen again.

The first step in reporting fraud is to gather your evidence. Good portions of such reports go unanswered and forgotten because of the lack of evidence. Providing ample and accurate proof will greatly increase the chances of action being taken by Law Enforcement. When reporting fraud and scams, use this template to provide your evidence. Keep in mind that some online forms may not have room for all this info, but it’s good to compile it before submitting.

Name: Address:

Phone Number:

Email:

Other Contact info: (IM ID, Forum Name)

Scammer’s Name:

Address:

Phone Number:

Email:

Other Contact info: AIM or Yahoo IM ID, Forum Names, AKA names. Also include any other email addresses, phone numbers or physical addresses known. Essentially any way used to contact you should be cataloged here.

Nature of Fraud/Scam:  Give a brief description, i.e. “Was contacted by person to…”

Estimated Value Lost: Use a range for actual goods, or the sell price of the goods. Otherwise use the actual cash value.

Timeline Description: This is the important section. Provide a day-by-day, hour-by-hour account of the transaction and what went wrong. Cut and Paste Chat Logs, Screenshots (if possible,) and all emails. Be sure to present everything in chronological order as it happened.

Links to evidence: Provide links to forum posts, screenshots of emails and IM logs, etc.

There are several places you can report fraud to depending on where in the world you are.

Online Fraud Complaint Forms:

In the United States:

The Internet Crime Complaint Center: <a href=”http://www.ic3.gov”>http://www.ic3.gov</a>

National Fraud Information Center <a href=”http://www.fraud.org/info/contactnfic.htm”>http://www.fraud.org/info/contactnfic.htm</a>

In Canada:

Royal Canadian Mounted Police:

<a href=”https://www.recol.ca/intro.aspx?lang=en”>https://www.recol.ca/intro.aspx?lang=en</a>

Other Countries: Please look in comments below, or post if you know your countries web page.

Once you’ve filled out the online forms, it’s a good idea to directly contact any of the below Law Enforcement Agencies. All of these agencies (except maybe City and County Police Departments) have an electronic crime agency who will take your information. In some cases you may be referred to another person, or group. Expect to get a bit of run around but do not take it personally. Remember to be polite and patient when explaining the nature of the fraud.

Local FBI Office: http://www.fbi.gov/contact/fo/fo.htm

Local Attorney General: http://www.naag.org/

Local U.S. Secret Service Electronics Crime Division: https://www.treasury.gov/services/report-fwa/Pages/ReportFWA.aspx

Local State Police: http://www.statetroopersdirectory.com/

Local County Police Department: Varies, search Google for your County Name, Police Department and Electronic Crimes Division

Local City Police Department: Use the same search term above

If someone scammed you out side of your country, the Federal Trade Commission has a special site for these complaints. https://www.econsumer.gov/pls/econsumer/wimsnery2$com.main?p_lang_seq=1

A lot of scams involve Paypal due to the ease of setting up accounts or stealing the information from others. Their claims page is located at: https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_comres_flow&trans_id=

Phone: 1-888-221-1161×8232 ; or 402-935-2050

If a company or business scammed you there are a couple of good places to report them to.

Better Business Bureau

FTC Complaint Center

Also be sure to report them to your and their Attorney General’s Office.

The United Postal Service is especially tough on scammers and fraud via Mail. If you sent a Money Order via mail, or goods and didn’t get anything in return they want to hear from you. Their online form is located at: http://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/forms/MailFraudComplaint.aspx

The Postal Service is very tough on fraud and scamming. To help them out it’s always a good idea to use Delivery Confirmation when sending large amounts of money, checks, or even expensive goods.

UPS has an online claim section too, https://www.ups.com/myups/login?returnto=https%3a//wwwapps.ups.com/webClaims/create%3floc%3den_US%26report_type%3d1&reasonCode=-1&appid=CLAIMS

Reporting fraud and scams is time consuming, but every bit helps. If you’re short on time at least submit reports to the first two links. Remember, the scammers aren’t going to stop if they get away with it. All it’s going to take is one or two to get caught as warnings to the rest.

Poking a hole in that pesky firewall.

Posted by Rick on in Hacking, Linux, Technology How To's, Unix 0 Comment

Poking a hole in that pesky firewall.

There are more than a few ways to access a firewall.  I will be giving a brief tutorial for one of the more common methods. Called “poking a hole”, or professionally called an SSH back door.  Please, please be careful with this, any script kiddy with 30 lines of code can exploit an SSH server.

This is a great post by IBM detailing it pretty well. If you have any question feel free to leave a comment and I will assist you.

  1. SSH from ginger to blackbox.example.com with the -R flag. I’ll assume that you’re the root user on ginger and that tech will need the root user ID to help you with the system. With the -R flag, you’ll forward instructions of port 2222 on blackbox to port 22 on ginger. This is how you set up an SSH tunnel. Note that only SSH traffic can come into ginger: You’re not putting ginger out on the Internet naked.You can do this with the following syntax: ~# ssh -R 2222:localhost:22 thedude@blackbox.example.com

    Once you are into blackbox, you just need to stay logged in. I usually enter a command like:

    thedude@blackbox:~$ while [ 1 ]; do date; sleep 300; done

    to keep the machine busy. And minimize the window.

  2. Now instruct your friends at tech to SSH as thedude into blackbox without using any special SSH flags. You’ll have to give them your password: root@tech:~# ssh thedude@blackbox.example.com .
  3. Once tech is on the blackbox, they can SSH to ginger using the following command: thedude@blackbox:~$: ssh -p 2222 root@localhost
  4. Tech will then be prompted for a password. They should enter the root password of ginger.

Thanks IBM.

How To: Check Apple Warranty Status via ARD

Posted by Rick on in Apple, Technology How To's 6 Comments

How To: Check Apple Warranty Status via ARD

Here is an awesome little script by Scott Russell of the University of Notre Dame. Using the “send Unix command” in Apple Remote Desktop, it can pull the system’s serial number, send the information to Apple’s Warranty Website and then tell you if the machine is under warranty.

#!/bin/bash

# warranty.sh
# Description: looks up Apple warranty info for this computer, or one
specified by serial number on the command-line

# Written by: Scott Russell, IT Support Engineer, University of Notre
Dame
# Created on: Sat Jan 5 16:20:54 EST 2008
# Last Modified: Thu Sep 25 09:29:11 EDT 2008

###############
## GLOBALS ##
###############

WarrantyTempFile="/tmp/warranty.txt"
PlistFile="/Library/Preferences/edu.ND.DSSBranding"

if [[ $# == 0 ]] ; then
SerialNumber=`system_profiler SPHardwareDataType | grep "Serial Number"
| awk -F': ' {'print $2'} 2>/dev/null`
else
SerialNumber="${1}"
fi

[[ -n "${SerialNumber}" ]] && WarrantyInfo=`curl -k -s
"https://selfsolve.apple.com/Warranty.do?serialNumber=${SerialNumber}&countr
y=USA&fullCountryName=United%20States" | awk '{gsub(/","/,"n");print}' |
awk '{gsub(/":"/,":");print}' > ${WarrantyTempFile}`

#################
## FUNCTIONS ##
#################

GetWarrantyValue()
{
grep -w "${1}" ${WarrantyTempFile} | awk -F ':' {'print $2'}
}

###################
## APPLICATION ##
###################

echo "$(date) ... Checking warranty status"
InvalidSerial=`grep "serial number provided is invalid"
"${WarrantyTempFile}"`
#echo "InvalidSerial == ${InvalidSerial}"

if [[ -e "${WarrantyTempFile}" && -z "${InvalidSerial}" ]] ; then
echo " Serial Number == ${SerialNumber}"

PurchaseDate=`GetWarrantyValue PURCHASE_DATE`
echo " PurchaseDate == ${PurchaseDate}"

WarrantyExpires=`GetWarrantyValue COVERAGE_DATE`
echo " WarrantyExpires == ${WarrantyExpires}"

ProductDescription=`GetWarrantyValue PROD_DESCR`
echo " ProductDescription == ${ProductDescription}"
else
[[ -z "${SerialNumber}" ]] && echo " No serial number was found."
[[ -n "${InvalidSerial}" ]] && echo " Warranty information was
not found for ${SerialNumber}."
fi

exit 0