Quiet day

I got several things taken care of this morning and then spent the afternoon wondering around the internet reading about the latest breaches, hacks, phishes and frauds.

Man, there are a lot of bad people out there.

The big thing these days is phishing for IDs and passwords with the intent of using that information to install ransomware. Once they install their code on the computer, they start the process of encrypting all the data. They do it slowly so you don't notice and it may take a week for the entire hard drive to be encrypted.

Once the encryption is done, they pop up a message on the screen that basically says, "Give us money and we'll send you the decryption key. If you don't send us money, you can kiss your data goodbye."

If they are really bad people, they won't send you the decryption key even after you pay them.

They are scum and your best defense against them is to do frequent backups. That way if they get you, you will only lose the data you created since your last backup.

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The Athletics just couldn't do it and they lost to the Rays last night. That means the Rays move on to play the Astros in the ALDS.

I'm really hoping the Astros kick their ass.

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Here are a few links:

• Key phrase in this story: "Doing the splits is not part of a sobriety test..."



• I wonder what my wife would think if I got one of these.



• Only in Florida.



• Apparently cocaine floats.