Technical Tidbits™

Some disturbing news hit the wires yesterday late in the afternoon that I really need to make you aware of.

As we’ve discussed in our recent radio show broadcast on Technical Tidbits in the Social Media Remorse episode, many of us are using smart phones to engage and keep up-to-date. Besides being a quick way to respond – and not always thinking before we do as that episode points out, there’s yet another danger that has been brought to light by a Free Mobile Security provider for Smartphones – Lookout.

The AP reported that Lookout has found that many of the apps you use on your iPhone and Android enabled smart phone, are sending back some of your personally sensitive data and forwarding it to third parties without your consent or knowledge.

The AP article, What your phone doesn’t say: It’s watching, Reporter, Jordan Robertson states:

Lookout Inc., a mobile-phone security firm, scanned nearly 300,000 free applications for Apple Inc.’s iPhone and phones built around Google Inc.’s Android software. It found that many of them secretly pull sensitive data off users’ phones and ship them off to third parties without notification.

The article points out:

The data can include full details about users’ contacts, their pictures, text messages and Internet and search histories. The third parties can include advertisers and companies that analyze data on users.

The information is used by companies to target ads and learn more about their users. The danger, though, is that the data become vulnerable to hacking and use in identity theft if the third party isn’t careful about securing the information.

This is a disturbing piece of information for all smart phone users! And it’s not just the new evil-doers of wifi data collection Google! Apple’s apps are guilty too!

Well, Microsoft, move over! You’ve got company on the “evil” sofa of software developers in the hall shame!

And shame on the app developers and the third parties collecting this data! You’re all GUILTY in this one!

A special thank you to Lookout, Inc. for discovering this! I’m glad someone is watching!  (And no! The links are not affiliate links! The software is free!)

Read the full article: What your phone doesn’t say: It’s watching

I have to admire what Google has done to try to stay on top of security issues. Kudo’s  to Google for recording my IP address and alerting me when I sign in that another IP address has accessed my account. Thank you Google.

But! I about had a heart attack this morning!

I use my gmail account for a ton of reasons – mainly, I am too involved on the web to open my Thunderbird – which I now hate since upgrading to the 3.0 version. But that’s another story for another blog post.

Anyway, I log in this morning to check out the last minute details about the radio show this morning (which was AWESOME I might add!), and they notify me that my account has been accessed by another IP address. YIKES!

Did I get compromised by corresponding with a certain individual who has had his network taken over by the hacking underground? Did I tick off someone with an article, a blog post? WTF?

What is important to note in this post is that I remembered what I did the day before which helped me track down the culprit. And this is what I want you to learn from this. Don’t panic!

Gmail advised me to change my password. I’m using 344 bit encryption in my password. It’s over 30 characters long! How could anyone have hacked that?

So I copied the IP address that they said was the one that accessed my email account. The culprit came from 209.18.68.125.  Ok, good! I have an IP address of the lousy hacker.

I do a search on WhatIsMyIp.com and find this:

(Click to see larger image)

That still tells me nothing! As far as I know, I haven’t ticked off any hackers in New Jersey!  But it’s also a corporate network which add to my suspicion that this isn’t a hack at all. Hackers wouldn’t use a corporate network! At least not REAL hackers!

Okay, so then whom might that be?

That’s when my thoughts raced back to what I did yesterday.  I did allow a new website to access my Gmail contacts so I could tell them that I was now on a new social networking site.  What the heck was the name of it? Oh yes! IMfaceplate.com! (If you want to see my profile, it’s here: DebbieMahler)

So, now I do a “Whois” lookup for IMfaceplate.com!  And in the image below you’ll see where I put a red box around the Name Servers for the website:

(Click for larger view)

Now, look between the first graphic of my WhatIs look up of the IP address and the second graphic of the WhoIs look up. See how easy that was!

So, when I allowed the site access to my Gmail account so I could grab my contacts list, it actually logged into my account and Gmail recorded the IP address! Pretty cool security feature, I must say! But also a huge panic attack on my part this morning!

The take-away from this post is, don’t panic if you get the notice from Gmail that you’ve been hacked. Do a simple look up like I have and see if it jogs your memory about what you were doing the day of or before the alleged hack attack.

If you still can’t find the culprit, change your password. I’m not going to preach about passwords in this post because I’ve written articles about how to create a secure password until I’m blue in the face!  But if you must have a refresher course, here’s an easy read!)

That being said, I was not hacked but I did change my 30+ password anyway!

Now, I would be remiss in commenting about this IMFaceplate.com while I’m on the subject. I don’t know if it’s going to catch on.  It’s simple enough to sign up for an account but do we really need another social networking site? I mean really?

That aside, I met the owner on my twitter account. I kind of got spammed – so to speak – but that’s another post too! Suffice it to say that after getting off to a rather shaky start, he’s really a good guy trying to promote his business.  Luke Risley, (@BIGtime222) is really a nice person and a great new twitter friend.

Now, whether I need a new social network or not, I’m supporting him in his endeavor and signed up! Ya never know, it might be the next big thing! You just can’t tell these days!

Yesterday, I was downloading and reviewing my clients Google Analytics reports because I always like to see where I might be able to help them improve traffic.  I always leave my site reports for last.

When I opened the report for my personal/professional website – DebbieMahler.com – I was a bit startled to see the following search term that led someone to my web page!

(Click the image to see the full size)

I was a little taken aback when I saw that! It’s like reading your Obituary when no one told you were dead yet!

I immediately proceeded down to my roomies office in the lower level and said to him, “I’m a bit creeped out!”  Of course, he wanted to know why.

“I was just looking over my own Google Analytics report for Debbie Mahler. com and someone got to my site by searching for the terms: ‘radio show host woman death debbie’.” I replied.

My roommate started laughing and said, “Now there’s someone who knows you and knows how to use a search engine!”  I was stumped by what he meant. After all, I had myself dead!

As he went on to explain his reasoning for the results, it became clearer! And he was right! Not only did the person know enough about me, they also knew how to use the search engine to find me!

As you all know, I host a radio show – Technical Tidbits™ on Blogtalk Radio – and my name is Debbie. The key to what makes this search relevant specifically to me was the “death” search term!

What more and more people are finding out about me through listening to the radio show, connecting with me on the other social networks, or reading my metaphysical blog, is that I had a Near Death Experience (NDE) many, many years ago.

So, the person who actually did the search knew this about me and that’s where the “death” search term came into play.  And yes, this person does know how to use a search engine!

But there is also something telling in this search.  The person didn’t know my last name (Mahler) or didn’t know how to spell it?  And, they most certainly didn’t know my company because if they did, they might have entered MICE as a term.  And, they also didn’t know the name of my radio show because they didn’t use the search term ‘Technical Tidbits’ to narrow their search results.

Now, what does this rumor of my death search have to teach us? I’m not marketing my company nor my radio show properly! Otherwise, the person might have refined their search even more had they known more about me, my company, and my radio show.  So, I can guess from this search that the person is one of my social networking followers or a student from my Introduction to PC Security> course, or the Advanced PC Security course with Ed2go.

Why do I arrive at that conclusion?

1. I rarely, if ever, do self-promotion on my social networks – with the exception of the radio show.
2. I am restricted by contract from pointing my students to my personal or business website with Ed2go.

So, the take-away point of this post is that when you are reviewing your Google Analytics reports, look at more than just the basic information that it provides.

We all have a tendency to look at how many new and repeat visitors we have, what browser they’re using, where they came from, and the time they spend on the site.  What you might be missing – as I have until this search popped up in my report – is that the actual search terms may be telling a different story unrelated to SEO; as with my death!

The rumors of my death may be greatly exaggerated, but failure to get the word out about my business and my radio show could accelerate my professional demise much more quickly!

Now, go back and look over your own analytics report too!