My Views on Abuse Reporting
In the previous post, I said that commercial pressures and the fact that most of the social networking and other companies are outside the jurisdiction of the UK and the EU, will make it very difficult to enforce any proper reporting of abuse.
But we can do something.
Take Sunday morning. I was driving out of Cambridge, when a guy in a very large 4×4 pulled out on me. He just didn’t look and if there had been anything coming the other way, I would had the choice of hitting his vehicle side-on or the other vehicle head-on. Luckily, there wasn’t any traffic and I passed easily.
I did shake my head at him and he took offence. So as I drove out of the city in a queue of traffic at the legal limit, he was about a couple of metres from my back bumper. This behaviour continued on the A14, until I was able to let him go.
We’ve all had things like this happen and they are just too trivial to report. For me life is too short and I have many more important things to do, than waiting in a Police Station to fill in endless forms, that will result in no action at all.
Now, this guy’s behaviour could have been caused by many things. He may have just got out of bed the wrong side, had a row with his girl-friend or more seriously he may have been severely hung over from the night before. One off’s are excusable, but supposing he’s a bad driver all the time and is always driving like this. If it’s the latter he needs to be informed that his behaviour is not acceptable.
I should say that I have a vested interest at this point. A few years before my wife died, she had breast cancer. The cancer appeared at exactly the same spot, as where she had got a bruise from a car air-bag in an accident. (Search various forums and you’ll find other women, who have got breast cancer by say being hit by a ball, whilst playing tennis or squash.) The cause of the accident had been a foreign truck driver. A few months later we believe that the same driver killed an innocent motorist because he was driving outside his hours.
How many near misses had the truck driver had in the UK between the accident with my wife and the killing of the other driver?
What is needed is a site, where driving misbehaviour can be reported? Not a site run by say the transport industry, which only reports compliments, but one run by the Police.
Obviously, the Police would not be able to follow-up every report, but software exists to analyse these reports to identify the worst offenders. (I’ve wrote systems like this so I know!) So if say a vehicle is always cutting up other drivers, then it can be identified. Probably in most cases a simple letter to the keeper of the vehicle would suffice.
But, one thing that has to be born in mind is the fact that often bad drivers, find it impossible to get any insurance and so how many of those reported would be drivers who shouldn’t be on the road for one reason or another. You may think that this a bad link, but the Police have shown that if they stop a driver without valid documents, there is a fifty percent chance a non-motoring offence is being committed.
The system would have to have safeguards, but just as it would identify bad and irresponsible drivers, it would also identify the vindictive, who perhaps constantly report someone for parking outside their house, when they have a perfect right to do so. I’ve heard policemen say that these are sometimes the worst disputes between neighbours.
Properly used such a database would be an asset to everyone, but if it was setup badly, it could be used as a means of abuse.
Over the last few days, we’ve had reports of cyberbullying and problems with social networking sights.
Let’s take the cyberbullying first and I’ll add to that all of the fraudulent scam e-mails that you get trying to extract money from your bank account. The problems may be different, but the solutions are the same.
The government should have a short text message number and a simple e-mail address, where any unwanted message can be sent. These could then be analysed and real abusers located. With say mobile phones, the abuser would just be told to desist and after a second strike their number would be cancelled. The same could be done with e-mail messages too, although here it would be more difficult to cancel addresses as many are outside the jurisdiction. But many of these e-mail scams use UK phone numbers, which can of course be cancelled immediately.
Some would argue that this might be a bit draconian, but I suspect, it would most abusers would quickly take the hind and desist. You won’t stop the foreign crooks and their scams, but hopefully the publicity would mean that there work was less productive.
There is always the point about who pays.
In fact, if done properly, these sort of systems would be self-financing, as there would be reductions in motoring offences, cyberbullying and e-mail fraud.
Unfortunately, Pete’s budget would have to be raided to pay for Paul’s. Governments never do that well!
Reporting Internet Abuse
There has been a lot of reporting lately about cyberbullying and abuse on social networking sites. In fact the BBC breakfast phone-in was about this subject.
I have no experience of reporting problems on social networking sites, but for years I have been fighting a campaign against on-line fraudsters using the Internet and mobile phones. I have reported endless people for abuse to e-mail organisations and so have many others I know who work in this field.
No service provider have ever informed me that they have taken serious action. As these scams are still occurring, it would appear that nothing has been done. I have found that the same e-mail addresses keep coming up in different scams.
Why?
These companies want the traffic to continue and as they run tight ships, they can’t afford the methods that everyone knows would stop all of these practices.
It is exactly the same with social networking sites. Put a button to report abuse on a site and the abusers will go elsewhere, so a site that does it, will lose traffic and advertising revenue, which is of course geared to traffic.
I also have a granddaughter and she was showing me an innocent site aimed at her age, with educational games, quizzes and puzzles. There was nothing wrong with the site, but some of the advertising on it, was promoting all the foods and snack products that you shouldn’t give to children of her age.
All of these problems are driven by commercial interests, most of which are headquartered outside of the jurisdiction of the UK and the EU. So in truth we are just whistling in the dark and the sites will never change.
All these indignant phone-ins are just free publicity for these social networking sites. They would have had to pay millions to get the same effect. I’d love to see how many new members have joined them in the last few days.
The BBC does Lotteries
These scams keep coming and you do wonder why anybody is stupid enough to fall for them.
BBC.CO.UK NATIONAL LOTTERY
PROGRAMED CLAIM HOME UK
HEADQUARTER, UNITED KINGDOM
===========================
The National lottery winners Results
These Are The Email’s Lucky’s Winning Numbers
*(04)*(06)*(12)*(31)*(38)*(48)*BONUS*(29)
ON Wednesday November 11th
Check On Your Winning Number
Draw Times – Find details
on this site below
website. http://www.bbc.co.uk/lotteryYour Email Winning Number=(38)
Dear Lucky Winner,
We are pleased to announce your email address as one of the 300 lucky stars winners in the Bbc.co.uk national lottery promo draw held on the 11th NOVEMBER 2009.
All 300 winning addresses were randomly selected from a batch of 200,000,000{TWO HUNDRED MILLION} international emails addresses.Your email have been approved to claim the sum of £1,000,000.00GBP(ONE MILLION POUNDS),We are proud to say that over £25 Million GBP Pounds are won annually in more than 130 countries world-wide.The Bbc.co.uk national lottery promotion draw is held once in every three years interval.And is also organized to encourage the use of internet and computers.
For security reasons,you are advised to keep your winning information confidential until you claim your prize money.However you will have to fill and submit this form to the events manager for verification & direction on how you can claim your winning fund.you are required to provide us with the information below for verification.
you must be 16 over to claim the prize
Fill the Details Below
1.FULL NAMES:
2.DATE OF BIRTH:
3.GENDER:
4.OCCUPATION:
5.POSITION
6.WORK ADDRESS
7.RESIDENTIAL ADDRESS:
8.COUNTRY:
9.MOBILE NUMBER AND NETWORK NAME:
10.ALTERNATE MOBILE/PHONE NUMBER:
11.AMOUNT WON:
12.EMAIL ADDRESS(S):
13.Your Winning Number:CHOOSE METHOD OF CLAIM WINNINGS ( COURIER DELIVERY OR DIRECT BANK TRANSFER)…..
Sincerely,
Mr.Brian Adams
Promotion Manager.Reply this email with the information for claim
E-mail:bbccouk_nationallotteryclaim@yahoo.com.hk
website. _http://www.bbc.co.uk/lottery
Name:Ethan Sawyer (Mr.)
Phone:+44 7024 079 993
National Coordinator
Congratulations once again.Copyright (c) 2009 Bbc.co.uk national lottery Online Promotion Inc.
Some points to note, which apply to nearly all of these scams.
- I got four of these e-mails all to undisclosed-recipients. Did I win four times? No! I didn’t even win once!
- There are numerous spelling and grammatical mistakes. Look at the heading for a start, which contains Headquarter and programed.
- Capitalisation is bad too.
- The e-mail address is in Hong Kong.
- The phone number may well be one that costs quite a lot for each minute.
- The copyright notice has Inc. in it. The UK does not use this American form.
Remember no-one has ever won a lottery they didn’t enter.
One thing that should be done is that the UK should tighten up how 07 numbers are allocated. Many seem to be used for frauds. It might be difficult to check everybody before they get a number, but after any hint of fraud, the numbers should be cancelled immediately.
Power to the Computer Programmer
I’m impressed by the article in The Times about the new scanner at the London Chest Hospital. The cost of each scan is around £500 which might seem a lot, but if it can detect a problem that saves a life, it’s peanuts! Incidentally, in its previous incarnation, this hospital was Bart’s, who did a wonderful job on my mother-in-law. And did it twice!
I’m also pleased that the next scanner goes in at my local hospital, Addenbrooke’s.
We will be seeing a lot more devices like this. Some will be big and massively expensive and will be limited to regional centres like Addenbrooke’s. I’d always prefer to travel to get the best treatment.
But think next time you are in the GP’s surgery. He, or in my case she, has massive levels of computing power on their desk. Could we not see equipment plugged into the USB ports on their computer to scan for such things as skin cancer?
I’m too old at 62 to develop ideas like that, but I know there are programmers out there who can create applications like that. The rewards would be massive for worthwhile applications.
Go and create!
I’ve Been Very Lucky
I’ve just won not one but three prizes in this lottery, that I didn’t even enter. That must be some sort of record.
EURO-PW LOTTERY v7.0,
http://www.europw.com
POSTBUS 636-5930 AM
TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND.RE:OFFICIAL PRIZE AWARD NOTICE.
DEAR WINNER,
THIS IS TO INFORM YOU THAT YOU HAVE WON A PRIZE MONEY OF ONE MILLION EURO (1,000,000)FOR THIS MONTH (NOVEMBER 2009)EURO-PW LOTTERY ONLINE PROMOTION.
ALL PARTICIPANTS FOR THIS ONLINE VERSION WERE SELECTED RANDOMLY FROM THE WORLD WIDE WEB, THROUGH AN ELECTRONIC BALLOTING SYSTEM (E.B.S.)AND EXTRACTED FROM OVER 100M SECURED WEBSITES WORLDWIDE.
ONLY FIVE WINNERS EMERGE EVERY MONTH THROUGH ELECTRONIC BALLOTING SYSTEM (E.B.S.),AND YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS WAS SELECTED AND ATTACHED TO THE WINNING NUMBER BELOW WE CONGRATULATE YOU FOR BEING ONE OF THE EURO-PW v7.0 WINNER.
PLEASE CONTACT OUR APPROVED AGENT FOR YOUR REGION WITH YOUR WINNING NUMBER AND YOUR FILLED CLAIMS VERIFICATION FORM BELOW.
WINNING NUMBER: EPWL/11/17/18/25/08
EURO-PW LOTTERY v7.0.
CLAIMS VERIFICATION FORM.
FULL NAMES .
ADDRESS .
NATIONALITY .
COUNTRY .
TEL/FAX .
AGE/SEX .
MARITAL STATUS .
OCCUPATION .PAYMENT OPTION
1. COURIER DELIVERY OF CERTIFIED WINNING CHEQUE (…..) 2. TRANSFER OF PRIZE MONEY VIA ONLINE BANK TRANSFER (…..)TICK AN OPTION WHICH SUITS YOU BEST FOR THE REMITTANCE OF YOUR PRIZE MONEY TO YOU.
CONGRATULATIONS FROM ALL MEMBERS OF STAFF OF EURO-PW LOTTERY.
NINA T. FRIJTERS (Mrs.)
DIRECTOR; CLAIMS DEPARTMENT.
TEL/FAX: +31 (0) 84 740 8620
E-MAIL: europwdesk2@hotmail.comFROM: Venancio Massingue (Mrs.)
NOTE: ALL CORRESPONDENCES SHOULD BE FORWARDED TO europwdesk2@hotmail.com
In fact my luck is so astounding as I have won three out of the five prizes on offer. How many millions to one is that?
Sadly, it’s fraud. If you reply the obnly winner with be that crook, Venancio Massingue.
Hamleys Forget to Renew Domain Name
It can happen to anybody, but it happened to Hamleys.
Perhaps they should use a domain name company, like Low Cost Names, who are very persistent, when you don’t register a name. I’ve dropped a few in my time and know how they behave. It may be annoying, but you do what you need to.
Infuriating Excel
I plot all of my Zopa investments in Excel. This gives me a good hold on how they are performing.
But about a week or so ago, the date axis on the chart disappeared. Strange because on my other computer the chart still works in the same way.
No matter what I do, I can’t seem to get them back. I get no message to say what is wrong either.
I hope I don’t write software like that!
I’ve done a bit of investigation and I’ve found that on the machine where the chart works, the version is Excel 2007 SP1 (12.0.6331.5000) and on the other machine that doesn’t it is Excel 2007 SP2 (12.0.6504.5001). I’ve since found that Windows updated my Office and probably Excel on the 27th of October.
The Daily Express Web Site
I first heard that the Higher Eco-Tax story was in the Daily Express.
It is not my favourite rag, so I don’t look at it very often, if at all. But I did go to the web site to find out about the story. You’ll note that I actually link to the Press Association. The reason is that you can’t enter the Daily Express web site without getting an extra copy of your browser with an advert.
So I won’t be visiting it in future.
Other web sites that I hardly use because of this practice include IMDB and Friends Reunited.
There are alternatives which I use instead.
Update for Microsoft Outlook / Outlook Express (KB910721)
This is a scam.
What gives it away is that Outlook and Outlook Express are separate programs, so the update would not be for both of them. The version of the program is also not given. Click here, to see what Sophos, a respected computer security company says.
Basically, it installs a phishing program on your computer to get your banking details and other private information.
Don’t click the link or install it!
How to Show Football on Television – 2
It seems that the farce of showing the Ukraine-England match on television has had an effect.
The FA, who don’t really have a reputation for being media savvy have decided to show the England-Macedonia Under-21 International on Friday on the web.
Here’s their press release.
The FA has announced exciting details of the first England game to ever be screened live and for free exclusively on TheFA.com.
On Friday 9 October, The England v Macedonia 2011 UEFA European Under-21 Championship Qualifier at Coventry City’s Ricoh Arena will be streamed live on TheFA.com (kick-off 7.45pm BST).
The FA took the landmark decision to air the game for free on TheFA.com after UK broadcasters confirmed they were unable to schedule the match during peak-time.
Commenting on the move, Ian Watmore, Chief Executive Officer of The FA said: “This is the best way to ensure as many fans as possible around the country get the chance to see England’s young stars in action for free.”
Fans logging on to watch the game can look forward to seeing some great young players in action. Stuart Pearce has assembled an impressive squad including Theo Walcott – returning to the England Under-21s set-up fresh from scoring in Arsenal’s 6-2 defeat of Manchester City at the weekend.
Watching the game is simple. Just visit TheFA.com at 7.45pm on Friday night, click on the link to the game and enjoy all of the action free of charge.
Note the words “free of charge”.
The FA have certainly got this one right. To be fair they had nothing to do with the other farce.
The Anonymous Widower 