The credit union’s servers are down. Been down for a good half hour. I ask you: can anything be more unnerving?
Who or what has hacked their servers? Or if the things just collapsed of their own weight, how much data have they lost?
Oh well. I wrote two checks that I neglected to enter in the check register. Can’t get into the online account to take a peek at them, so…guess I’ll just have to enter mystery payees in Quickbooks.
Speaking of hacking, at the Scottsdale Business Association our IT guru reminds us that the CryptoLocker hack — where the crooks tie up your entire computer system by inserting an encryption code and then demand that you pay to get your data back — is spreading and is pretty serious stuff. The crooks now demand that you pony up money within three days. If you don’t do so, then at that point even they can’t unencrypt it. He said most recently a large law firm had all of its data scrambled and lost. He says typically the ransom demand is around $300 and advises it’s best to pay up — and quickly.
He also reports that anything that’s mapped as a drive, such as an external disk drive or DropBox, is encrypted by the CryptoLocker hacks. About the best defense, apparently, is to back up data manually and then unplug the back-up drive. Meanwhile, never click on an unfamiliar e-mail message — that’s where most of the attacks are coming from: the instant you open the e-mail the software invades your computer — and of course keep your browser and antivirus software updated.
Or buy Apple hardware: Cryptolocker targets Windows machines.
This has nothing to do with this article.
I was looking for a specific publisher to find a book and found this and
thought of you and your novel.
Hope it is helpful and if not – oh well, you know someone in the great out there was thinking of you.
Thanks! Is there a link to “this”?
The cover art, map, and timeline are almost done, so whenever all that is thrashed out, the package should be about ready to put up on Amazon. Unless a miracle happens and some famous publisher comes along and buys it. 😉
Duh – I do not care what my kids say – I’m blaming it on becoming a Grandmother for the first time, NOT old age!
http://www.maineauthorspublishing.com/
It says Maine Authors, and since I’m originally a maineiac it caught my eye, then I thought of you. It does not say, at least where I saw,
that you have to be from Maine. Good luck.
LOL! Definitely not old age!!!
Recently I read a study that indicates most full grown-ups (which is what I call those of us in our fully developed age range) start to feel forgetful not because their brains are developing holes but for exactly the opposite reason: the brain can only process so much information, and by the far end of middle age, most people’s brains are pretty much FULL. So the human brain copes by prioritizing new things that need to be remembered and sloughing off the rest of it.
Makes sense, doesn’t it. 🙂
Thanks for the lead.
I hope the lead turns into good things for you!
I totally agree with that study and agree with you that it makes sense.
Again, good luck.
It is ridiculous that the law firm’s entire backup directory was also locked. That’s mostly poor planning on their part as I believe an enterprise level backup system would have prevented it.
The scams just keep multiplying, though. Best take home, don’t click on anything you don’t know is legit.