It is becoming easy for me to identify phishing emails these days. Kudos to some of these guys, they give their best to get these mails delivered to inbox despite the mail clients constantly updating their spam filtering methods. Now these guys have to be really smart and surpass these filters and also convince the reader to take an action out of the mail. Even though I was able to identify one of the mails that got into my inbox today, as a phishing email, I was quite impressed by the quality of the mail content. It was a typical mail that my paypal account has been restricted and that I have to complete a checklist by clicking a link to activate it again. The highlight of this mail beyond its actual intent is the right side section of the mail that gives tips on protecting my account - probably something copy pasted but a job well done. The only thing that gave away the authenticity of the mail is the from mail id which wasn’t from paypal.com. Below is the image snapshot (Click to view original).

I didn’t leave at that and I wanted to see how well the imitation continues in the rest of the steps. So I clicked on the link in the mail and it took me to an almost similar Paypal site. Look at the below snapshot and compare it with Paypal US website. In the phishing site the only way you can identify it is fraudulent is by looking at two things - one the URL and the second you click on any link like the “About”, “Privacy” etc., it always lands you back to the login page. But just by comparing these two screens you will be surprised at the amount of imitation in terms of fonts, styles, images etc.

Here is the fun part. The phishers can’t really validate if someone is genuinely using their paypal login and password. But their best bet is if someone really gets convinced that it is from paypal they would input their credentials. But what matters to these people are not the credentials, but the details in the subsequent page. So enter any invalid email address and password, you would be taken to the next page. In the next page comes the details that these guys want - the whole credit card section.  Look at the screenshot (click to view original).

Again here the highlight is, to convince the user, they have links like “Help finding your Card Verification Number” and “why is ATM Pin required?”. Clicking on “Why is ATM Pin required?” link shows a popup with the below message.

“By adding VeriSign Payment Services industry-leading tools such as Payflow Link and Payflow Pro to PayPal’s suite of payment solutions, we’re now able to offer online merchants even more choices for their businesses.
Requiring PIN Signatures is the latest security measure against: identity theft, credit card fraud and unauthorized account access. PayPal will verify it with your bank records for your own protection.
If you provide a wrong PIN your account will be suspended for unauthorized account access.“

LOL for the last line there .

But Firefox was quick to mark this as a forgery website, when I tried second time clicking on the link to take screenshot for posting here. What surprises me most is, this is not a mere copy paste job, it involves lot of work to imitate the original site, including some testing. For example the login page does a valid email test. So there should be a team with good knowledge on web application programming (this one was done using php, just looking at the URL gave away that), HTML, CSS etc. If only these guys could use their skills to get into a decent job, not only will they be in for a bad cause but the software industry would have got few more good developers. Do these guys realize that by writing software for someone to steal money from those that succumb to this deceit is as good as being thieves themselves?

Sometimes it is good to be a copy cat. This post is one of those. The Validation movie is the one that I had watched few times recently through several blogs I read. And everytime someone blogs, I watch the video again. This is one inspiring movie that you will love. I thought why not I too post this, as there could be few of you who might not have seen this video. It’s a must watch. You are great!

Wish you a happy and prosperous new year! May the coming year bring you success, health and prosperity.

If you are a person who is keen in maintaining your balance sheets up to the penny and keep track of it everyday then probably Xpen$er is a handy tool that will let you keep track of your expenses in a simple and very effective manner. The application as a concept could be something that is very old and applications existed right from the days computers became common. But what makes it special is the approach and most simple ways to add the expenses quickly and leave the rest to the system. Not just one way but many ways to add the expenses quickly. Because the most difficult part of maintaining expenses is to remember them and record them. It is easy to record the expense immediately after it happens rather than trying to recollect end of the day/week/month. So if you have to record an expense immediately you may not have the time and patience to open a software and record it. Moreover you may not be near your computer or online when you actually spend. Xpen$er allows expenses to be recorded by sending SMS apart from recording through email, all popular IM’s and Twitter. Check out Xpen$er, even if you are not a person who has been keeping track of the expense, you might actually start doing it looking at the ease of using Xpen$er.

“Necessity is the mother of invention”. But are we pushing the limits of our necessity? I was thinking about it when I happened to see this new gadget - “Flying Alarm Clock“. Have we become so lazy that we can’t force ourselves to get up when the alarm goes off? The flying alarm clock goes little above the line of what an alarm clock is supposed to do. It will definitely be useful for those that disregard the alarm when it goes on and keep hitting the snooze button and go back to sleep. The clock is fitted with a little propeller that starts flying and falls somewhere in your room when the alarm goes on. It also makes a loud shrieking noise once it is on. The propeller is a key and until it is fit back to the clock the alarm doesn’t go off. Since it is lying in some corner of your room, you don’t have a chance to stop it without getting up, picking up the the propeller and stick it back to the clock to stop the alarm. By that time you would be wide awake that you cannot go back to sleep easily. But after few days, the frustration could make a person force to get up if a normal alarm clock goes on.

Have a fantastic weekend!

This is a forwarded joke that I couldn’t resist laughing after reading. It is a copy pasted joke about copy paste.

A popular motivational speaker was entertaining his audience. Said he:  “The best years of my life were spent in the arms of a woman who wasn’t my wife!”

The audience was in silence and shock.
The speaker added:  “And that woman was my mother!”
Laughter and applause.

A week later, a top manager trained by the motivational speaker tried to crack this very effective joke at home. He was a bit foggy after a drink.

He said loudly, “The greatest years of my life were spent in the arms of a woman who was not my wife!”
The wife went wan with shock and rage.
Standing there for 20 seconds trying to recall the second half of the joke, the manager finally blurted out “… and I can’t remember who she was!”

Moral of the story:
Don’t copy if you can’t paste!

The top manager must be a guy who would have never seen a computer in his life . Happy Thursday.

I was impressed reading a recent news article in the local newspaper on 18 ministers in Kerala being provided with a website for their respective departments, that keeps track of their profile, reports, achievements and many more. I was initially thinking that the quality of the sites maybe substandard as I have seen many other Indian Government sites, but surprisingly the quality is not at all bad and it already contains many information on each of the state department’s activities. This is a good step and every other state in the country should follow it, provided the content is regularly updated and also provides ways for people to reach out and provide suggestions/complaints etc.

Sometime back I had written a post “Lessons learnt from Jenga“. The latest revelation came to me again through Jenga. Somehow I get fascinated to this simple game! Every time I visit my nephew I play Jenga with him. It was only this time that I found a variation of Jenga in a toy shop, called Uno Stacko. If you have not played Uno, then you have missed some fun, particularly when you are in a group during events or functions. Anyway this game is a combination of rules applied from Uno and Jenga. This makes it even more interesting and challenging.

After playing several rounds, in a particular game, we came to a “can’t remove anymore” point where the tower started to sway and even a blow would bring it down. Neither I nor my nephew wanted to pull out pieces anymore, it was quite obvious the entire tower was shaky and clearly the foundation was very weak and supported by only individual pieces.

An idea stuck to me at that moment, what would it take to do a reverse Jenga? At this point how easy or difficult would it be to construct back the tower to its initial state? I relaxed the rule and used both my hands in doing this, so that I can hold the tower with one hand and it doesn’t collapse. Slowly I started taking the pieces from the top and started inserting them into the gaps. Very soon I realized that it was much more difficult to insert the blocks than to remove them. Because of a poor foundation, the weight of the tower had fallen on its individual pieces that were at the bottom and it was very rigid to insert any piece near them.

I had to force and lift the pieces carefully, so that a piece can fit in. But beyond a point I could not hold the tower any more, inserting a piece at the foundation was harder than removing it. Ultimately the tower collapsed. My friends, here is where I realized again, how important the foundations are, if you miss learning them in the first place, it is very difficult to put in those pieces later because, by then you would become rigid, your practices are rigid. Less flexibility provides less scope for putting in those important pieces which are the basis to support for the future.

But there is nothing as impossible. What is more important to realize is that there is always scope for unlearning and re-learning. Creating a stronger foundation is always possible if you are ready to let go of whatever you have learnt (wrong) and build the foundation again by relearning it the right way, which adds more value. Traditions and old practices may not apply for every generation. You can sustain and keep growing only if you are able to let go of old practices that are not applicable and learn and apply what is necessary for the current needs. So my friend, be open to unlearn and relearn as and when necessary.

This post is part of the foundation stone series of posts.

“Quality in computer software is a controversial field. For some, software quality is a largely aesthetic and practical issue, dealing with the question of how efficiently and elegantly a computer program performs a task and source code looks (see Programming style). For others, quality is defined as strict conformance to requirements and absence of bugs. In both cases, there are sets of practices that are either required, or highly useful in this pursuit.”

That’s an introduction to software quality on Wikipedia. While I was agreed upon that description, I had some realization and thought around that word recently. This happened after my visit to a friend’s place in the United States last week. My friend wanted to meet a relative of hers and asked me to join her. We went to her relative’s home and after some introductions they offered us to show around their house. The first impression I got was this house must be new. Apparently my friend had the same question (this was her first visit too) and it came out of her mouth as a question. I was wrong and they were living in that house for some time now. I realized the saying “Cleanliness is next to Godliness” looking at that house and how it was maintained. Sparkling clean with each and every object placed properly and positioned properly. The credit goes to the mistress of the house and from further discussions we understood it is her passion to keep things in order every day. Her in-law quoted that she is so particular about things in proper place and positioned properly and was explaining with a tooth brush holder which had to be positioned parallel to the walls and not tilted sideways. The closet looked like a cloth shop.

The visit had an effect on me and made a lasting impression. I started feeling that the essence of quality can only be realized with some attitude. It is an attitude of perseverance, an attitude of trying to be a perfectionist, an attitude of being passionate about the work being done, an attitude of being adamant about doing right things the right way. When these characteristics show up in work, that is the evidence of quality. A common proverb in India says, you just need to crush a rice to see if the entire pot of rice has boiled or not. A quality work shows up on its own. Quality is also not about having a check once in a while but it is something that needs to be practiced on a day to day basis. When each member in the team has these quality attitudes, then the team is a quality team. When each team in the organization has these quality attitudes then it is a quality organization. Think about it, do you have these characteristics in you?

My other Foundation Stones