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Lighten Up 23 August 2002 Edition
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It's time again for your weekly dose of more mischief and madness from the hidden depths of cyberspace.

Are your executives overweight, listless, lacking energy? Here's the answer -- ditch that conference table and get a Conference Bike!

Here's a site that documents the gradual decomposition of a plate of various meats. There's a webpage for every day -- and it's very hard not to click on the "next" button -- even though you know you're not going to like what you see.

When the man from Pizza Haven or Pizza Hut drops those soggy cardboard boxes on your doorstep, do you ever stop to realise that there are some very real do's and dont's when it comes to eating pizza? Just in case you need help, here are some official tips on the serving and eating of pizza.

Kiwi Spammers A Growing Problem?
Most of the spam we get in our mailboxes comes from overseas sources which generally means that there's not a lot that our local ISPs can do about it.

Many of these emails are bounced off poorly configured mailservers in countries such as China, Korea or other Eastern European countries and quite a few have had their true origins neatly obfuscated.

While there are a few dedicated individuals who religiously pursue the senders of such spam, most people simply groan and delete it.

But what about spam sent by Kiwis and delivered through local ISP accounts?

Fortunately this type of spamming is rare -- but it seems that it's becoming more commonplace and those doing it are unrepentant.

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One Aardvark reader claims he's been spammed and tricked by the website findschoolmates.co.nz after he received an email claiming:

"You have been invited to join the www.findschoolmates.co.nz website by a friend.
 
Someone that knows you has sent this to you to inform you of this site."

Turns out that after the reader went through the registration process, there was no sign of anyone he'd been to school with. In fact there was no one at all from *any* of the schools he'd attended.

If you get such an email -- think twice about wasting your time perhaps?

Another reader advises that he's been spammed by nzbusiness.biz.

Yes folks, it's "yet another online business directory" that expects gullible people to pay as much as $450 per month to have their product, service or website promoted on its pages.

The reader says he rang the company's CEO, Pearce Kinchella, who told him that they'd purchased his email address from "reputable US-based sources" and appeared unrepentant about his spamming.

Since there are what appear to be paid ads on the site -- I think it's safe to say that gullibility isn't the sole domain of silly individuals, and perhaps next time you're dealing with one of those advertisers you might want to ask them why they're pro-spam.

I tried to contact the company by phone for comment but it seems that they don't personally answer their calls -- relying instead on an answerphone -- how's that for the "personal touch?"

Their unsolicited commercial email appears to have been sent through XTRA who, according to the person who reported this incident to me, simply aren't interested in pursuing the sender for breaching their terms of service.

Have your say.

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Latest
Security Alerts
Microsoft plugs critical Office holes
(ITWorld - 22/08/2002)

Security flaw hits Windows, Mac, Linux (NewsFactor - 7/08/2002)

PGP Outlook plugin has major hole (TheReg - 12/07/2002)

IE scripting flaw uncovered (TheReg - 12/07/2002)

Microsoft Reveals Still More Security Flaws (NewsFactor - 28/06/2002)

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Worm spreads through KaZaA network, again (TheReg - 22/08/2002)

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