Phishing, pronounced just like fishing, is a term you must be aware if you use the Internet for any kind of sensitive transactions.  You could be at risk of a phishing attack if you use online accounts such as Paypal or your bank account, credit card account, etc.

Quoting Wikipedia,

Phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. Communications purporting to be from PayPal, eBay or online banks are commonly used to lure the unsuspecting. Phishing is typically carried out by e-mail or instant messaging and it often directs users to enter details at a website.

I had written on How to spot a fake PayPal email in the past and it was well received. Today, I received an improved version of another PayPal phishing attack by email. I think this is another good chance to raise awareness on such attacks and what you should be watching for.

In the past post, we looked at a few clues that gave away the PayPal phishing attempt. The clues in the last email were:

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Hello newcomer, did I say welcome to ShanKri-la yet? Before you move on, just wanted to thank you for visiting and we hope you come back and see us again!

I am on Twitter and seeing so many people looking to download Firefox 3 only to face disappointment with the sites being down. I did update my last post with the download links but you probably woulnd’t know of the update if you didn’t visit the site.

So, I am posting it here again for those subscribed by RSS or email.

Update: If you are wondering why Firefox 3 isn’t available for download yet, it will be there for download at 1:00PM EST.

Update 2: Looks like all the Firefox download sites are down for me still at 1:45 PM EST. Here are the ftp download links, if you promise to help with the Guinness Record by downloading again.

Mozilla Firefox 3.0 Final For Windows

Mozilla Firefox 3.0 Final For Linux

Mozilla Firefox 3.0 Final For MACOS

(thanks Umana)

Update 3: 2:45PM EST : DISCLAIMER: Looking at the release notes in the links above points to Firefox 3 RC3! These may not be the actual download links. Sorry! My linux download from the above link has Firefox 3 final release notes. So they may be ok.

Update 4: 3:06 PM EST Here is another direct ftp listing of Firefox 3 downloads for various platforms

ftp://mozilla.isc.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/3.0/

Update 5: 3:52 PM EST Firefox 3 is finally available from GetFirefox.com

If a link doesn’t work, just try again. I was able to download all three versions.

If you interested in running your current Firefox 2 & Firefox 3 simultaneously, you could follow this tip.

I am not sure if downloading it from these links will impact their attempt at the Guinness Record but as long as we can doanload it again before tomorrow from the official sites, it might be alright. It’s just not fair to NOT be able to get to the downloads after all this anticipation.

What do you think this will do to Firefox 3’s credibility?

Gmail 2.0 saw some nice design updates but the overall look of Gmail has been the same. But, thanks to a Firefox extension called Stylish, it is possible for a Firefox user to completely overhaul the look of Gmail.

Stylish is a Firefox extension that can load user created scripts that can change the look and feel of any website. Just like Greasemonkey changing the user-interface options via user-created Javascript, Stylish lets you change the look and feel via CSS. There is a huge number of popular Stylish scripts out there. (look at the Related posts section in the bottom for my collection of Greasemonkey scripts for Gmail 2.0, Google Reader, etc.)

Here is how you can pimp your Gmail in 2 easy steps:

Step 1 - Install Stylish Extension:

Grab the Stylish Firefox extension from the newly updated Firefox add-ons website and install it. Restart your browser.

Step 2 - Install Re-designed Gmail Stylish Script

Scroll down in this page until you see a title named ‘Install Options’. Install the script and login to Gmail. Voila!

That’s it. Enjoy the new look.

Why would I want this?

• If you are looking at your monitor all day long, darker themes are supposedly easy on your eyes
• The new look just rocks. Look at the screenshots.
• You can always turn this off with a click and go back to your old ways or even switch back and forth

The script is being constantly updated so check back every few days to load the new version as the bugs are getting squashed. The comments in that page indicate the ‘Remember the Milk’ extension as incompatible but I am using it with no problems. There are many Stylish/Greasemonkey scripts for Gmail but this has to be the best one so far.

Boy, it looks gorgeous. Now, here are some screenshots of my inbox

I have just recently adopted the Inbox Zero methodology coupled with GTDInbox Firefox extension. It really is a lot less stressful to look my Inbox now.

Sorry my posting has been light lately. Just busy with some projects and stuff around the house.

Have a great weekend!

It’s no secret GTalk client is for Windows only. Linux and Mac users have so far sought out other IM alternatives thanks to GTalk using Jabber protocol for their IM client. I use openSuSE 10.3 as my primary desktop and have had trouble getting some of the excellent IM clients like Pidgin to work behind a proxy.

Thanks to GChat in Gmail, I have been able to use IM even if it has to be within Gmail. I even used a Greasemonkey script for Gmail 2.0 to alert me with the tab flashing when there is a new IM. However, I did find this a little annoying to keep going back to Gmail to check on IM messages. Because, everytime I go into Gmail to see IM messages, I would also end up checking my Inbox and before I know 20-30 minutes would have vanished. This kind of goes against my goal of trying to increase productivity with all these web apps and hacks.

So, I started to run Google Talk gadget in my browser sidebar with a browser bookmarklet. This freed me up from using GChat in Gmail to GTalk in my browser sidebar.

You’d think I’d be content at this point. Not.

Run Google Talk (GTalk) gadget with Mozilla Prism

Mozilla Prism released their 0.9 version last week and I am smitten by the usefulness of it. If you haven’t heard of it, check out my Mozilla Prism review. In that post, I also show how you can run it from behind a proxy at work or school. Since it’s a beta version and a work in progress, they don’t have a straightforward setting for proxy in it’s options yet.

If you don’t want to click over, Prism is a prototype from Mozilla Labs which lets you split your web applications from the web and run it in your desktop as a standalone application. They even allow separate profiles for each Prism app which means you can have multiple Gmail accounts open in different Prism web apps in your desktop.

I have taken this idea and created a Prism web app for the Google Talk gadget and now I have a GTalk client like app running standalone in my desktop!

Here’s how you do it:

1. Install Mozilla Prism - Windows, Mac & Linux installers (v0.9 at the time of writing)
2. Create a new web app with url https://talkgadget.google.com/talkgadget/client
3. Give it a name and choose to save it on desktop
4. You are done!

If you are a Mac or a Linux user, you can now run GTalk standalone in your computer with Mozilla Prism. If you are already using Firefox 3, with this Prism Firefox extension you can just open this url (or any other web app) in Firefox 3 and then directly create a desktop application for GTalk right from your browser.

I see that Prism has an option to install extensions. It doesn’t look like it’ll accept Firefox extensions as it complains that they are not compatible. I even tried turning off compatibility checking but didn’t have much success. I would love to hear if someone has succeeded installing extensions with Prism as that would open up a whole new world of options to these Prism web apps. I am sure it will be obvious in the coming releases. But, I want to make it work today!

GTalk makes it the fourth web app I run in my Linux desktop with Prism after Gmail, Google Reader and Remember the Milk.

What other web application do you see yourself running on your desktop with Mozilla Prism?

I have become a big fan of opening some of my most used web services/applications in my browser sidebar after starting to use a widescreen monitor. It gives me good use of the extra space I have in the browser with most sites I frequent being fixed width and don’t really have to be as wide as the monitor.

Here are a few things I open in a sidebar right now:

• Open Google Calendar in browser sidebar
• Open Google Docs in browser sidebar
• Open Remember the Milk in browser sidebar

Open Google Talk Gadget in Sidebar

I have been using the Gchat within Gmail for a while now. I have the Faviconize tab Firefox Extension and the Gmail Favicon Alerts Greasemonkey script to get the Firefox tab flashing when there is activity in Gchat. But, I would have to either keep my eye on the tabs (I tend to have a dozen open) or miss someone’s IM for a while until I go back into Gmail.

I recently came across a cool bookmarklet for Google Talk gadget and figured I could use that to open the gadget in my browser sidebar. I love this as the Google Talk gadget offers a few more options than the Gchat in Gmail. You get a ‘Call’, ‘Group Chat’ & offline message (Gchat goes to compose window when a contact is offline) with Google Talk gadget. Plus, chat sessions with different contacts appear in neat tabs. When you get a new message, it creates an easy to notice yellow message blurb even if you are on a different tab.

Also, you get to see your contact’s profile picture in the gadget if they have one.

Here is how you do it:

1. Drag this link to your browser bookmark bar GoogleTalk! OR right click and copy the location and save it as a bookmark
2. Right click on the saved bookmark and open Properties
3. Choose ‘open in sidebar’ option (Firefox & smiliar browsers.. not sure if it’ll work in IE)

That’s it! In Firefox, you can use F4 to toggle the GTalk gadget sidebar window. (Update: This is true only if you are using All-In One Sidebar Firefox extension as that gives you a hotkey to toggle sidebar)

I realize this post isn’t for everyone but with wide-screen monitors replacing the regular ones, I figured you might find it useful.

I love to find new things and would love to hear how you go about using Gchat/GTalk. I am sure this is not the only way and I am always open to new ideas.