Hidden Menaces

As many of you who are on my email contacts list are more than aware, my email was hacked this week. I apologise profusely to you all.

The thing is, how could I have prevented this from happening?

According to the lowlifes down at Hacker9 (don't look them up, I wouldn't want to give them the publicity), it is because I am "noob or [have] very poor knowledge of internet". At least I know that nouns need articles.

One other nugget of grammatically infantile information I managed to unearth from the little toads at Hacker9 is that email hacking can be done in three different ways. The first two I almost certainly did not fall victim to. The third, however, is rather more sinister, and could affect anybody. I'm going to run over all three and how you can prevent them from happening to you.

The first is password guessing. This is something that nobody should fall victim to. If a hacker is a close friend (unlikely), or just a manipulative internet acquaintance, they can have up to a 20 per cent chance of working out your password- by simply guessing. A lot of people use memorable names, dates and places as passwords. What's more, the majority of us use the same password for pretty much everything.

So then, give up on nostalgic passwords for high-importance accounts such as emails. Use a combination of random letters and numbers, preferably more than 8 characters in length. If the website allows it, also use punctuation. The official line for multiple accounts is to use different passwords for each, but this is not always reasonable. My advice, which is in no way endorsed by anyone, is to vary your passwords on a theme. For example, if you have numbers in your passwords (you ought to), increase them by 1 for each new account you open. Or, write the same password backwards. Or half backwards and the rest forwards. The combinations are only as limited as your imagination.

Now, I'm pretty over-the-top when it comes to keeping my password private. I most certainly practice what I preach. If an email comes to me from Paypal, Yahoo or anybody else, saying for security reasons I need to reply to the email with my password, I don't suddenly decide I'm a moron and offer them my bank account details and the keys to my house as well. So I can say with 99.9 per cent certainty that it wasn't this that caught me out.

The second method used by weed-smoking maleducates and opportunist sociopaths alike is Phishing. This is a common beast, and typically wanders round shouting, "I'm really obviously trying to steal from you." Phishing works by asking you politely for your bank account details, email password or similar by promising a lovely juicy worm in return. This worm is usually in the form of a free iPod.

You can avoid the Phishermen (or women) by thinking twice before entering your details online. Do you trust the site? Remember, it is very easy to lie on the internet, because nobody can see your face.

Though I must admit to being a little too trusting sometimes, I almost certainly haven't entered my password into any kind of popup, or badly constructed website offering freebies. So that leaves just one more option, one I hadn't fully realised even existed.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to the murky world of keystroke capturing. If you want to avoid this one completely, seal yourself in a box and have your nearest and dearest feed you through a straw for the rest of your life.

It works in one of two sinister ways. The first is by using an actual hardware keylogger, which plugs into the back of the victim's computer and records every single keystroke they make. With an experienced eye, the important passwords are identified and the email accounts accessed. Though this approach seems to target just one person, and be of more interest to private investigators than spammers and scammers, how's this for a thought: what if it was stuck into a public computer? Say, in a library. Or a university.

Here it seems we may have stumbled across our culprit. There is of course, the second, even darker form of keylogging- using a software keylogger. This takes the innocent form of a video of a kitten falling off a chair sent to you by one of your closest friends. Only it's not actually from them, and it's not actually a video of a kitten falling off a chair. No, once you stop watching that kitten, he gets to work.

He makes a note of every keystroke you make, and beams that straight to the internet. On the internet, another kitten (kitten here being a metaphor for piece of software) calculates which of those keystrokes is likely to represent an email password. A third kitten then tries each of these possible combinations until bingo! She cracks it, and suddenly all your friends, family, old work colleagues and former schoolteachers are being offered Viagra.

Or worse. Another little scam running around the interweb presently is the idea that person A is being held hostage, and person B needs to send lots and lots of money to person C to free them. Of course, because the email was sent from Person A's account, Person B thinks it actually is Person A, and sends the dosh. That is, providing Person A typically writes in lowercase Courier New.

Luckily, none of my contacts got this message. They could have done though, and that makes me feel quite apologetic. I must do better. Though I am not noob, and have actually relatively snappy knowledge of internet, the second I let my guard down was the second a criminal tried his luck.

I will no longer write or check emails from public computers. It is terrible to have been reduced to this, but the internet is swarming with armies of kittens working for a plethora of the most diabolical faces you'll never see.

Be careful out there.

The Joys of Working Life

I'm bored. The main reason I am bored is because I have not only finished doing my accounts, I have finished doing a full 12-month budget, planning in everything from the January sales to the inexplicable desire for stationery that seems to set in around mid-November.

As you can tell from the fact I was doing my accounts, I was actually quite bored before that. Another side effect of my boredom is that I have become quite addicted to tea. I can't cope without it. When I have it, I clutch it to my chest like a boiling hot child. When it cools, I drink it. Once I've drunk it, I miss it. Then I wait until nobody's looking, stick the kettle on, and the cycle starts again. The reason I'm waiting until nobody's looking is because it's polite to ask everyone else for a cup of tea. But if I ask everyone if they want a cup of tea eight times a day, they're going to notice that I, unchecked, would drink eight cups of tea a day.

When I'm not drinking tea, I'm looking at the news, but even that's gotten boring. I only noticed after I started Newstastic, but nothing's happening at all. I'm not saying don't read this week's delicious article... oh! I forgot! I haven't told you yet.

Yes! Big News! Sachtastic is no longer alone. Well, I am, but I'm branching out. I've already told you about Newstastic, my Thursdaily news blog, where I do the news as it were. Then there's the Tuesdaily artstastic blog, where I do all my reviews and things. This actually launched on Wednesday with a review of Four Lions, but Tuesday is when it's supposed to happen Finally there's the Wednesdaily Moneytastic, which sees me voice my unqualified opinions on how to save yourself money. With the latter more than anything I'm happy to see people's opinions, so for Pete's sake email me regarding your own thrifty tips or money mistakes.


Even more finally, there's Unitastic, which I won't link you to, because although there is a page, there are no posts. My idea is it's a uni life blog, which considering I'm going to be working my stripy socks off (or 10 denier tights these days), will probably be about other people's uni lives. This will be launching in time for Freshers'. See you then.

Back to Business

A little update on my life.

I have become employed, and as a result, am getting straight back into social media for a number of reasons.

Firstly, and most importantly, as a creative outlet. The job I start in September is in residential marketing and sales. This job involves a lot of hours, a lot of legwork and very little gain. I can cope with that, though. All I need to do is keep my university life, my work life and my home life in perfect balance.

At the moment, I'm working in a lettings agent's, and thoroughly enjoying the intense customer service experience. I'm one step away from answering my own 'phone with "Good Morning, Sacha speaking; how can I help you?", all the while grinning like a fool in the hope my smile somehow makes its way down the line and makes the caller want to buy stuff from me.

I expect, after a fortnight selling door-to-door I will be utterly fluent in salesperson's spiel and, without a blog, utterly incapable of addressing anybody in any other fashion. So the blog returns, to begin with, on an approximately weekly basis.

Secondly, hungry for power and status as I am, I'm looking to do a little networking. Aside from developing my interpersonal skills through the medium of sales and marketing, I'm looking to ultimately move into freelance journalism and possibly the golden grail of published authorship.

As everyone who ever told me to get my head out of the clouds and concentrate on a real career path will know, any kind of media career can be tricky to break into. It takes time, dedication and a fair measure of being in the right place at the right time. However, by successfully networking, and by getting my name out there as much as possible, I hope to be in as many different places as possible at a number of different times, and thus begin to live the dream.

This will be a long journey, however, and I will keep you posted.

Finally, it's because I need an audience. Because of my own vanity, yes, but also because writing for an audience differs so greatly to writing for oneself.

So, I call on you, my audience, to give me the greatest, and most detested gift that can be given to a writer- your criticism.

I'm still looking for an angle to take in my blogs- sideways rambling has served me well up to a point, but with employment and the associated need for direction comes the feeling that this can't last forever.

A Bit of a Break

Right, I've had a bit of a break, and I'm going to leap straight in with a film review.

Scenes of a Sexual Nature, which, at the time of writing, is still available to watch on BBC iPlayer, and aside from failing to live up to it's title, is perfectly alright. It's not the most action-packed of films, which would probably cause a lot of people to shy away from it. It explores the nature of relationships through a variety of different characters enjoying an afternoon on Hampstead Heath in the middle of summer. Amongst these characters are people on a blind date, a prostitute and her client and two ex-lovers reunited, by chance, after over fifty years.

My favourite, however, was the portrayal of a newly-divorced couple. The scriptwriters had taken into account that things aren't always that simple. People who get divorced don't necessarily hate each other. This couple were still in love, they knew their ex was the most good-looking person they had ever known... and yet they knew that the relationship wasn't right. The novelty of this idea is summed up in this quote: 'Sometimes, relationships get to the point where you run out of things to say. Then, some people say, "I've found someone else." Others say, "It's not you, it's me." I said, "Will you marry me?" And you said, "Yes." '

The film focuses on the delicate nature of relationships, how they're not at all simple or easily quantifiable. My only issue with the film is that I don't feel I got closure on all of the stories, but I guess that's the point. I expect I've been conditioned by Hollywood romances to expect that it all gets sorted out by the end. In real life, though, things aren't always sorted out. You can be happy, but who in real life has a happy ending? For its novel approach to people's lives and loves, Scenes of a Sexual Nature gets four stars.

I had a visit from my parents and brother at the weekend. My mum and I went shopping, which was good fun (though I'm regretting not buying that red-and-black top). What is it with Debenhams at this time of year though? They've got nothing you'd ever want to wear. In any case, after that, we met L. and had dinner at Nando's, which was standard. Wandered round the docks for a bit, Tate, my brother had cake, etc. Was dead nice seeing them all but in all honesty when I run through the things we did, I have no clue where the time went. It'll be nice seeing them again at the end of term.

Dead excited about the end of term. Actually, there's a whole bunch of things I'm dead excited about. Top of the list (not actually, because that's going to the gym later today) is the Winter Ball next Monday. I am going to look amazing. So will L.; we're both going to look so sharp that people will look at us and bleed. Partly because we're that good, but mostly because they're not. Will update you, but in the meantime, bye.

I did things this weekend

On Friday night, I did something I ought to have done sooner. I was effectively bullied into it by several friends and one member of my family. I went to see Back to the Future.

I was told beforehand that, never having seen it before, I would be incapable of appreciating all the remastering blah that it had undergone before being re-released in cinemas. Whoever said this was completely right. Generally, picture quality is lost on me. Most of the time, I don't know where I am, let alone what's going on and how many hours all the little people at the end of the credits put in.

I can however, find Tesco. It's more useful than it sounds.

Anyway. Back to Back to the Future. Despite the incredulity of a certain individual, I did actually enjoy it. Marty McFly, despite being a kid in a film, wasn't excessively annoying, and though the ridiculously caricatured characters grated to begin with, it was important to portray them in this fashion so that the changes could be made clearer.

I didn't entirely approve of the film's take on time travel, and though this is apparently resolved in the second film it feels like a bit of an afterthought. The way I see it, if you go back in time, you are prevented from doing anything differently because it was never done differently. You can only do things that you always did. So Marty can't go back and prevent his parents from falling in love because they already fell in love.

Overall however, it was an entertaining film, especially at the end when everything kept going horribly wrong. I actually enjoyed that bit, except my genuinely-surprised face and my taking-the-piss face are quite similar. Four stars.

I watched something else, the next morning, what was that? Oh yeah, I remember. High Fidelity. It's one of those films that's taken me a while to get through, and I think it might be because I watched it on my own. I reckon, if I'd watched it with someone else earlier, I might have been able to follow it better.

As it was, I think I got it more this time. Things seemed funnier, to be honest, and the wicked delight I felt at his disregard of all his exes pleased me more because I could tell someone about how it was my favourite bit in the film. There's no point having a favourite bit of a film if you're on your own.


High Fidelity's quite real. It disregards a lot of the Disney magic surrounding film romances and just focuses on the things that real people do. Real people are awkward, they hang around with people they don't really like, they get into relationships with completely unsuitable people just, well, because. Also, people panic about things they have no right to panic about. It won't help or change anything.

And do you know why it's so real? The book it was based on was written by Nick Hornby. He's good. He always has a main character with a real emotional detachment from the world. So do I when I write*, except my characters are usually a lot more flawed and a lot less real. I give High Fidelity four stars.

That was on the way to London for a friend's 18th. Had an interesting time. It was interesting to see who had changed for the better, who had changed for the worse and who had not changed at all. It reinforced in my mind who my real friends were, and if you're reading this, it's most likely you. Or you're stalking me; hi.

I thoroughly enjoyed karaoke. Everyone who was there with me knows how much I enjoyed karaoke. So what if I can't sing? I can shout louder than everyone, with or without a microphone. I even had to "sing" Michael Buble, because it was just damn disappointing without me.

I reckon that I misunderstand the concept of karaoke. It was my first time doing the thing properly, and nobody outlined the protocol beforehand. I reckon though, that the people holding the microphones are supposed to sing, and take it in turns to do so. I prefer the football-crowd style roar that we had going on though. It was invigorating.

Food was nice too. I could have probably eaten more, if the spicy food hadn't run out. As it was, it did, and quickly. Delicious! If I knew what any of the dishes were called, I'd certainly have them again.

The club, though not my style, was fun. I had a brief conversation with an Irishman who guessed that I wasn't local. When I said that I guessed he wasn't either, he told me never to lose my accent. Ohoho. If only you knew. I have been having the Michael taken out of me by hmm... everyone. To some, I'm too northern. To others, I'm not northern enough. Despite "reassurances" that my accent is going to get stronger, I think it's about as bad as it's going to get. The vocabulary will be the next thing to go though.

I can speak without the accent, but it's only when I've thought of what I'm going to say before I say it. Yes, if you ever needed convincing of how infrequently that happens, the evidence is before your very ears.

Journey home was exciting as well. On the train from Liverpool I sat near a pair of fairly inebriated gentlemen. The first wanted to know if I had a boyfriend. I said no. He asked why. Any response I made from then on was met with the question "Why aren't you courting?" I was midway between explaining that we don't call it that anymore and sitting him down and explaining fully that I've only just arrived in Liverpool and give me time.

The other was very taken by my interest in nuclear power, and told me that what power stations were producing was actually steam and that the electricity was a by-product. I explained that the electricity was the whole point of the exercise. He said that in Sweden they use the steam to heat houses. I haven't researched this, but short of building houses on top of Didcot's coal-fired power station, I'm not sure what we can do. Thermal energy is incredibly difficult to do anything useful with. That's why it's often called "degraded".

It turns out that you can't explain this, nor that your primary interest is in nuclear power, more specifically nuclear fusion "like what happens in the Sun". They couldn't even grasp that concept. I said that we were going to move on from fission, to which one's response was "but it should all be 'fficient". Sigh. He then suggested burning wood "injected with oil". I suggested just burning the oil. He then replied that we needed a way to get rid of the wood. Touché. What we are all suffering from is an absolute glut of wood.

Thankfully, the train journey was only ten minutes, and I was able to disembark with my sanity intact.

*Hardly anybody has read any of my fiction. There is one story currently being edited for length, style and to separate it from Twilight (the original predates Twilight, and sickly teenage girl romance aside, there are parallels. Apparently. Though my "Edward" is brilliant.) and I'd say more, but for the spoilers. I'm very excited. As long as uni and life don't get in the way, it should be done within a year. It's hit a bit of a hitch in that I've met someone with the same name as one of the characters, and because I absolutely refuse to change his name again, I'm going to have to be careful to separate real L and fictional L in my mind. As long as real L doesn't behave like fictional L, this should be fine.

First Week

We had a project, on my lovely Physics course, to send a manned mission to Mars. Don't worry if you weren't involved, it's a lot less fun than it sounds.

By the third day, everyone had practically given up, accepted the futility of the task, and just concentrated on getting to know each other. This essentially involved winding up the other groups, producing long lists of non-essential items to be incorporated into the mission.

These included four cows, dessicated (to save weight). These would be fed pineapple on the journey, and then reconstituted on the surface of Mars for use as transport. They were also necessary to provide fresh milk throughout the three-year journey.

The Mars habitation required, for the purposes of boredom alleviation, a swimming pool, sauna, hot tub, basketball hoop and balcony. We determined that the most efficient and cost-effective way of heating the habitation was with a wood-burning stove, which, despite the habitation being only 2.5 metres tall, required a 30 metre chimney. We had to provide details of all of this to the heatproofing department, who wrote down the dimensions down without argument.

They did have issue, however, with our balcony. Not the fact that we had a balcony on a single-storey building, which, now I think about it, is an obvious flaw. No, they took issue because the dimensions specified that the balcony had 15 metre walls. When called upon to explain this, I eventually cracked, and admitted that the balcony did not actually need to be that tall.

The next question was, of course, why we needed a balcony in the first place. The explanation given was so that we could have a good view while we were smoking. I think a penny dropped for the heatproofing department here. They pointed out that we would need to carry a lot of cigarettes for the entire journey. I explained that we were only taking half the cigarettes we needed, and that we would grow the rest of the tobacco in the hydroponics facility once we were on the surface of Mars.

Another requirement we had was for a cat flap. In response to the question, "Why?", I like to imagine that someone would answer, "For the cat." In fact, there was no cat. There was, however, an autistic cheetah called Barry who had spades for hands, but who signed in on our list with his back paws. He was also, I think, writing a musical, and may have been female at one point.

So, I've met more interesting people, and I'd imagine that I may keep a few of them. I'd imagine that I said that last time, but there really are a multitude of fantastic people here.

I'm also coming to the realisation that this city is an absolutely brilliant place to live. Even without the superlambananas, it's rich in culture and history. It's also a great place to be a student, and I think that the next three years of my life are ones which I will treasure for the rest of it.

Just to give you some idea of the delights I've been sampling:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A21897192

Blanks

I haven't posted for quite a while now. I'll try and update you, but there will be a few blanks.

I quit college, and am now at the University of Liverpool reading Physics. It's Freshers' Week, so I am currently dying from a sore throat. It's really been fantastic though.

Let me fill you in on some other stuff first though. First of all, I spent the 18th (Saturday) driving fast cars, which was fantastic. I was driven around at high speed in a Porsche 911 turbo RS before getting behind the wheel of an Aston Martin DB9. Yeah, I did drive around in third, but that thing is amazing. The gizmos are neat, the decor  just makes you feel like a child, because its so futuristic that it doesn't look sci-fi. It looks real and just as if it is the best that car design will ever achieve.

I drove in the rain, but I still drove fairly fast, lapping five times in ten minutes, as opposed to the average four. I scored 92/100 on whatever rating system they use.

The next day, I was down in London for Chelsea-Blackpool with a formerly football-ignorant friend. My navigation aside, the afternoon was absolutely amazing. Chelsea won 4-0, with all the goals coming in the first half. On television, this would have made for a dull second half, but seated (infrequently) in the Matthew Harding stand, we were treated to, and participated in, some of the greatest terrace anthems you will ever hear.

And of course, the classic, "Where's my eight-nil you c**ts?"

I think my friend even sang along to one or two of the chants. If you fancy a go, or fancy a listen, check these out:  Carefree; Chelsea, Chelsea; In Your Northern Slums; Didier Drogba; Celery; Hello, Hello; F**k 'Em All; Blue Flag; Chelsea, Champions (sung as a call and response by adjacent stands); Chelsea; Come On Chelsea; Dennis Wise; Follow Malouda...

There were more, but we won't go there. There were also a couple of anti-West Ham songs. I don't think we much cared who the opposition were by the end.

The next day, I went to university. Everyone had already moved in, so I'd missed all of the introductions, but my room is opposite the kitchen and sees a lot of traffic. I've met more amazing people in the last five days than I can name. And if they end up reading this blog, hey. :)