PurpleCar

You may have missed the whole rape trial thing in Ohio.

Let’s sum up: Star high school footballers rape a 16-year-old, passed-out-drunk girl. They post video and print evidence of their crimes in social media (yes, they were that positive they would not be punished for their deeds. In fact, they thought it appropriate to brag). Girl reports it after she comes to and finds said evidence. Nothing happens. Various online groups bring the night and the crimes to national attention. Trial happens. Footballers are convicted. CNN and other news outlets report on the tears footballers display at the verdict. They are overly sympathetic to the criminals.

Online outrage ensues. This petition pops up overnight and goes viral.

So what happened? CNN reporters are not amateurs. But they are stuck in a basic human bias that doesn’t become a respected international news organization. They report on the drama they see; they leave out the drama they don’t see. It’s called Attentional Bias and we can take some action to prevent it from happening in the future, even if the CNN idiots are too stupid to be responsible enough to be civilized humans themselves.

If you have a blog, if you have time, money, energy or even just a minute in a water cooler conversation, bring up Jane Doe, the unseen but very real victim in this case. Bring up all the Janes that have gone forgotten and neglected by the justice system. We are living in a culture where very, very few rapes are persecuted at all. Women don’t have power in this society so we tend to not be believed or we tend to be blamed for things that happen to us.

I’m not saying fight back or start marching if you don’t want to. I’m just saying, quietly persist. In the office, at the dinner table. Quietly persist in making Jane present in the conversation. Because she is all of us. She is here. She will have to live an entirely different, more painful life (if she survives the mental and emotional anguish, as well as the ostracism of her community) than she would have if this crime didn’t happen to her.

I am opening up these comments here to give you a place to tell your story if you want. Tell other people’s stories. Write fiction that reflects truth. Whatever. Jane is present. Jane is here. Jane is me. Whether you are a man or a woman or both or neither, Jane is you. Persist.

Washing Machines Take Us To The Cleaners

Technology changes social norms. New tech usually means less effort for people (think motorized vs. horse-drawn plows), but in the end, technology oftentimes brings higher standards of production, translating into more work for the individual. A famous example of this phenomenon is the clothes-washing machine. Before washing machines, people:

• owned fewer pieces of clothing
• washed clothing infrequently and by hand
• wore clothes that weren’t “fresh”
• wore pieces until they wore out
• wore obviously repaired and damaged clothes
• wore clothing that didn’t fit well

Society didn’t fault them for any of this. After washing machines, people:

• bought more pieces of clothing
• washed clothing frequently
• only wore freshly (or relatively freshly) laundered clothes
• threw out old or damaged clothes
• wore only clothes that were in good repair
• bought clothes that fit as soon as the need arose

The old standards of dress were eliminated. Freshly-smelling and crisp clothes became the norm. Notice the work behind the points in the “After” category: More shopping, more laundering, more upkeep to maintain higher levels of appearance. Some sociologists and feminist philosophers argue that the washing machine was actually a bane on women’s existence because of the work unit change it brought about.

After people adapt to the new amounts of work, the tech becomes an integral part of everyday life. Nowadays we may hear our neighbor complain about laundry day, but if we saw her tossing of all but a dozen of her garments in the Goodwill bag we’d worry she’d joined some sort of cult.

The Internet Drives Us Wild

Today people are concerned about what kind of work Internet apps like Facebook may permanently introduce to our lives. Society’s standards of communication have seemingly changed overnight. Before ubiquitous Internet, people:

• had fewer acquaintances
• wrote letters by hand and wrote them infrequently (infrequent letters were deemed OK)
• shared news that wasn’t “fresh”
• used phones until they wore out
• made contacts by going to social events
• kept social contacts that didn’t agree with their world views

After ubiquitous Internet, people:

• have connections online to hundreds of people
• write emails and posts much more frequently than hand-written letters (infrequent communication is not deemed OK)
• have a feeling that news more than a few months old (unless very life-changing) isn’t worth sharing
• get new mobile phones every few years
• make contacts through online social networks and go to fewer real life events
• arrange themselves in silos of agreeably-minded groups online

Some people call for simpler days, but we’re not at the point yet in this tech evolution where those sentiments are deemed cultish. But know, oh ye of the no email/no Facebook/no texts: what you are saying about media technology now people have said about every new modern “convenience” after it was introduced. From the Gutenberg printing press to the automobile, you’ll find the same vein of fears and complaints.

Cars Crush Facebook

During the heyday of the first automobiles, people were experiencing similar reservations, protests and conversions to the machines. Here’s a short paragraph by late-adopter Mrs. Henry Wallace of Des Moines, Iowa. In her Hearts and Homes column on page 18 of Wallace’s Farmer periodical published on October 23, 1908, Mrs. Wallace writes about her initial resistance then change of heart toward automobiles:

“At one time I was foolish enough to say I would never ride in an automobile. It is an illustration of the fact that we sometimes say things do things and later find we were mistaken. The time came when an automobile came into the family and I was invited to share a seat. It was not long until my ideas of automobiles and automobile riding were entirely reconstructed. … It is another illustration of the fact that we live and learn.”

What’s funny here is that if we replace “automobile” with “Facebook” (and change some corresponding words), we can easily imagine any social networking holdout saying pretty much the same thing:

“At one time I was foolish enough to say I would never JOIN FACEBOOK. It is an illustration of the fact that we sometimes say things do things and later find we were mistaken. The time came when a FACEBOOK USER came into the family and I was invited to FRIEND THEM. It was not long until my ideas of FACEBOOK AND FACEBOOK USE were entirely reconstructed. … It is another illustration of the fact that we live and learn.”

Even some automotive industry types would mention the challenges the machines brought to society. T.E.A. Barthel, VP and Gen Mgr King Motor Car Company, wrote a small mostly-laudatory piece called “Automobile News” on page 2 of Chicago Livestock World in January, 1910. In it, he wrote:

 “No one now regards the motor car as a mere fad. The world knows it has fulfilled its mission. That it is a real necessity for comfort, health and business progress… The motor car… has given to municipalities the biggest problem they ever tackled – the solution of street traffic regulations. There is not a city in the country where this problem is not serious and the subject of great thought.” 

We give “great thought” to battles today over who controls the Internet. Just as AAA and the government’s DMV were formed to help society cope with automotive technology, The Electronic Frontier Foundation and other such entities grow out of the need to regulate controls on Internet traffic, namely, to disallow corporate control of the Internet’s virtual street corners:

 “From the beginning, EFF has championed the public interest in every critical battle affecting digital rights.”

JUMP AHEAD

More than 100 years after their invention, cars of all sorts are used worldwide. Most people ride in a car before they can walk. Imagine what the Internet will be 100 years from now. Will people be complaining that the Internet like the automobile ruined family dinners, or will Internet use and social networks be an accepted part of everyday life? “Car Addiction” is hardly listed in the Diagnostic Manual; I’m guessing all discussion of “Internet Addiction” will fall from the general consciousness as well.

How do you see the Internet and the Web progressing in the next 100 years?

 

Photo credits: Washing Machine: DominusVobiscum Model T: MJH Bower

Received this phish/virus today in my email. It contained a ZIP file. Scroll down to see the giveaways of this attempt.

Here’s the text:

Dear Agent

Ref. 13 March 2013

Please find enclosed your settlement report for the date indicated above. Please pay the amount due today.

If you have any query, please contact your local Settlement Executive.

Thank you for your co-operation.

Regards

Please do not reply to this unnatended e-mail address

—————

Cher Agent

Veuillez trouver ci-joint votre rapport de règlement pour la date indiquée ci-dessus. Veuillez nous remettre le montant du aujourdhui.

Si vous avez besoin de renseignements supplémentaires, appelez votre Administrateur local.

Merci de votre co-opération.

Bien à vous

——————————————–

Apreciable Agente,

Ref. 13 March 2013

Sírvase encontrar adjunto su reporte de cierre de la fecha arriba indicada.

Favor de contactar a su representante de cuentas para cualquier pregunta adicional.

Saludos

2001-2013 Western Union Holdings, Inc. 

A few points:

• Lack of Detail (not addressed to me personally, no phone number or postal address, no reference or contact person. What’s a “settlement executive” anyway? That’s not a thing).
• Crappy “from” address: Trey Mccoy <ourselves57@gmail.com> or Sonya Greene <thinnerq07@gmail.com> (I’ve received 2 of these attempts so far).
• Misspellings! (the bane of the criminal amateur-mind) “unnatended”
• Bad grammar. No signature, lack of commas.
• Three languages=They obviously don’t know me because anyone who is due a legitimate, law-enforced payment knows their payor and the language that person speaks.
• Court proceedings, especially ones involving payments, are not conducted by email.
• Obviously timely as it is playing off the Facebook Settlement email (which was real).
• Contained an attachment! Legitimate businesses and government offices are well aware of phishing attempts, and go to great lengths to keep their emails looking safe. Part of this effort is to avoid sending any attachments whatsoever.
• This came to my purplecar.net account, which is not used for anything but this site. I never use it to sign up/sign in to anything. It’s very easy to determine spam/phish attempts when you know the email address is only found on your website.

Assume any email with misspelled words, attachments and lack of details is a phish attempt or virus. Branding, “legit looking” return addresses or links, etc., don’t matter. Legit businesses have your phone number and your mailing address. If they want to get in contact with you, they will.

Another hint: NEVER OPEN EMAIL WHEN YOU ARE TIRED. Our defenses and decision-making processes are diminished when we are tired or hungry. Email is a business activity, even if the messages are social in nature. Emailing takes thoughtful and careful responses; Make sure to have your “street sense” up and running before opening up that Inbox.

I received some new spam/phishing attempt in my email today.

Here’s a screen shot:

Here’s the text (with links portrayed in red bold and actual html pointers removed):

 

Thank you for choosing Delta. We encourage you to review this information before your trip.

If you need to contact Delta or check on your flight information, go to delta.com/itineraries

Now, managing your travel plans just got easier. You can exchange, reissue and refund electronic tickets at delta.com/itineraries. 

Take control and make changes to your itineraries at delta.com/itineraries. 

Speed through the airport. Check-in online for your flight. 

 

Check-in

Flight Information

DELTA CONFIRMATION #: DCEA5743

TICKET #: 00415873598959

Bkng Meals/ Seat/

Day Date Flight Status Class City Time Other Cabin

— —– ————— —— —– —————- —— —— ——-

Mon 11MAR DELTA 372 OK H LV NYC-KENNEDY 820P F 19C

AR SAN FRANCISCO 8211P COACH

 

Fri 15MAR DELTA 1721 OK H LV LOS ANGELES 1145P V 29A

AR NYC-KENNEDY 812A# COACH

 

Check your flight information online at delta.com/itineraries

 

I’ve written before about similar spam emails, but this one is particularly funny because each one of those links contained a different site. Not a different page on a larger site, totally different sites with various domains. Note the filename at the end of each link is the same except for #4.

Don’t click on any of these (I haven’t). Here are the sender’s address and the links contained in this email:

• Sender: DELTA CONFIRMATION <CVgTTMHTk@govdataservices.com>
• 1st link: http://bjhonglu-hotel.com/wps.php?v20120226
• 2nd link: http://fidele.com.ua/wps.php?v20120226
• 3rd link: http://cgtlmh.com/wps.php?v20120226
• 4th link: http://www.guitarska.com/wp-content/plugins/akismet/a.php?v20120226
• 5th link: http://www.sust.edu/department/ipe/templates/beez/wps.php?v20120226

Here are some ways you can determine this is spam:

1. Are you expecting any communication from this company? If no, then immediately become suspicious of spam.
2. Is the letter professionally written? In this case, No. When would you see official correspondence with so many links? Also, many companies now do not send any links at all in their emails, due to the high number of these types of phishing attempts. When in doubt, always open up a new browser window and go directly to the site. E.g. paypal.com – and don’t click on the type ahead entry your browser may have saved.
3. Hover over the links. Do they look strange? Yes? Don’t click.
4. Is the sender’s address from the business? This spam has a spammy sender address. Dead giveaway.
5. Did you receive this email at your regular account or an account you don’t use much for transactions? I have an account solely for business, and another for this site, and yet more for family things. I can easily identify spam when it is sent to another account that I do not use for transactions. Obviously a “crawler” gleaned my email address from somewhere and sent the spam. If you do not have multiple email accounts to help you keep business transactions separate, perhaps you can signup at a free service like Yahoo or Google.
6. Go to a search engine like Google and type in “[company name] spam” (leaving out the brackets and quotes). See if any similar spam emails come up.
7. When in doubt, write to the company directly by typing their name into a search engine, then finding their contact page. I’d also say check social media channels for the company and see if there was an announcement about the spam, but I find that Delta and others are loath to address this problem publicly. Maybe as the years go by companies will face this issue more pro-actively.

I searched Delta Airlines’ site and did a pretty good search of the Web but I couldn’t find any official statement addressing this phishing attempt. I wrote them an email asking for one. I’ll update this post if/when I do get it.

Here’s what to do if you have clicked one of the links:

• Clear out your browsers cache and erase all cookies.
• Run anti-virus software on your machine very diligently for the next week to four weeks, updating every day.
• Keep an eye on your credit card statements and credit report if you suspect you’ve lost financial information. Probably it’s pretty harmless if you did download and run a .exe or other file containing virus, and most anti-viral software will get rid of it.
• If you find your computer has slowed down dramatically, take it to a shop to get cleaned up immediately. It may be a “zombie” and being used to send out spam to others.

Be careful out there, folks. And just remember: almost all large companies have hired security and communications experts. They will not be sending emails that give you even the slightest pause. If a communication seems hinky, it probably is. Typing the company name into a new browser window and logging in there is a small price to pay for your safety.

 

****UPDATE March 6, 2013

I received this email from the Delta support desk yesterday:

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