Ransomware and "Fake Invoices" are going around again.

Don't fall for the Fake Invoices - do not answer them, do not call the number they list. Delete the email. Call the store or bank using their NORMAL number found on the back of their Credit Card or Main Website if you need verification the invoice was fake.

The best defense against ransomware?

Computer Dudes usually recommend backups on USB drives - one USB drive for each day of the week.

Also - most of the time up to date antiviruses and anti-malware software will stop or block ransomware.  Switching to a Linux operating system and - Air Gapping your business computers are another option.

Cyber Criminals are criminals so I generally recommend you NOT pay them.

The recent movie "The Beekeeper" it is about ransomware and criminal hacker groups targeting the elderly and gaining full access to their computers and finances.  The article following this one on our website discusses the movie in greater detail.

Backups, Anti-Virus, and Air Gapping are much less expensive.

Regards
Todd
Computer Dudes

One of my more recent posts on Computers and Security included using older equipment and air gapping.

So I found it interesting tonight to see it portrayed on  "The Beekeeper," Jason Statham' newest movie.

While the movie is largely fiction - there is also an accurate portrayal of the way people hack peoples computers and steal their money.

It is also accurate that those who run viruses, and call rooms, DO TARGET the elderly, the weak, and anyone they can fool.

How to be safe.  If a security notice pops up on your computer, and someone calls you - turn off the computer, by holding down the power button and then unplugging the computer and if its a laptop remove the battery..  Then note the number and hang up.

Then call someone you trust - and discuss contacting Law Enforcement.   If Law Enforcement cannot help - then call a local to you Computer Services and Repair Company.

Also call your financial institutions and banks to have them manually change your security / passwords. When they ask about the reason tell them - possible fraud.

Other tips for safety.  Never use the same password on all accounts. Never save your account information and passwords on your computer AND most importantly - use strong passwords. 

For important accounts and financial accounts use two factor authentication - which is usually your computer and your cell phone.   Also change your passwords on a regular basis.  Your Bank and Online Financial Companies will also have advice on how to stay safe.    Many banks and financial groups flag and halt illicit activity - if this happens call the phone number on the back of your Credit / Debit Card or the Number to your bank or financial institution.   Do NOT call any numbers suggested in an email or "computer virus" alert.

Your best protection is to "Be Aware" and "Research Computer Security" yourself. Protect yourself and your relatives, including your children, the elderly, your family, your friends and your employees by discussing, passwords, fraud, conmen, and computer security.

Last thing - in the movie a person harms themselves believing nothing could be done to recover their money and photos. This is not true!  Do not harm yourself, or others - contact your financial institutions, law enforcement and private attorneys.   In most cases all the funds can be recovered, or are covered under financial institution security and insurance.

Do not restart your computer until after you have made some of the contacts listed above.  

Regards and Be Safe,

Todd W. Byars
Computer Dudes
Global Operations and Security

Day One Post - COVID 19 - Is Survivable, especially if you got the vaccinations.    

I have recovered from the latest variant of COVID 19 and my 10 days of quarantine ended today!!   The vaccines and updates work and I did not require hospitalization.   Researching COVID 19 and its new variant allowed me to recover with only a doctors guidance and over the counter meds.

If you can avoid COVID 19 and other Illnesses - but if you do get sick - know that you can recover.   Good health is the ultimate "Good News."

Day Two Post - New Solutions to Global Pollution and Warming

Computer Dudes Research on Drone guided balloons, tethered balloons, and PLANTING Trees have resulted in several a solution to Global Pollution and Warming.

We began today by selecting Eight sites on 2 properties  for tree planting - sun level testing complete, soil testing in progress. The first tree will be an apple tree planted in view of Computer Dudes workshop on my property in Tallahassee, Florida.

Day Three Post - 800 Watt per Panel, Solar Panels

Solar Panels have evolved from heavy aluminum framed panels that generate up to 100 Watts of Power per hour - to Thin Flexible Panels that require no frame, are very light, can be used in temporary or permanent placement generating - 800 Watts per panel.

The new panels are much less expensive, made of a thin plastic, and can be shredded for recycling at the end of their service life.

We have used them to power Air Conditioners, Computers and even Off Grid Data Centers 

Ten Days of Good News, Day Four - Optics, Smaller Medical Devices and Medical Watches.

Optics is the Science of Light.  Light is used in a scientific instrument called a spectrometer.  Spectrometers measure light and changes to light once the light hits and form of matter.  Medical devices use the science of optics in many sensors.

The Medical Watch on my arm uses a small spectrometer to determine blood oxygen level, sugar level, and blood chemistry without drawing blood.
Medical watches now give all the information one receives in an Emergency Room hooked up to a number of machines as well as blood tests.

The Computer Dudes is one of millions of companies testing and developing the technology and improving the technology
The watches are already helping millions improve their health.

The future is Bright! (forgive the Optics pun) -

Ten Days of Good News, Day Five - Computers

The first computers I worked and trained on were huge, often the size of a dining room.   The first PC's were also large and required heavy CRT type monitors.

Todays computers are our Cell Phones.   More powerful than the early computers and with integrated sensors and communication systems as well as HD Cameras and other features.  As we progress into 2024 - 2025 our computers are becoming our wrist watches.     Small, portable, often waterproof, programmable and powerful - they run off their internal batteries for days or weeks.    Small powerful computers are the good news for Day Five.    Even as I write this I can envision even smaller computers including those in medical devices.

These improvements in computers benefit all mankind and are being carried into Space with us.

Ten Days of Good News, Day Six - HD Cameras

The improvement and availability of HD Cameras needs little discussion - the CONTENT and HISTORY being captured by Billions of People around the United States and World are the good news.

From my recent trip up and down the East Coast my photography shows a Nation with many different ethic groups, races, religions and sexual orientations ALL together happy - celebrating their freedoms.

Those photos are now part of American History and disprove most of the negativity posted in the media.   While there are still many fake and deep fake photos and videos the HD photos and Videos are very difficult to spoof.    The volume and number of sources of HD Photos and Videos shared and posted across the internet and in person record and show the truth.

Ten Days of Good News, Day Seven - The Economy

In spite of all the negativity from the press and the politicians the Economy in the US is "Hot Hot Hot!"  I have never seen so much new construction and so many people employed since before COVID.

Inflation seems to be under control and although people still complain about money - every Starbucks and Chick-fil-a has both drive throughs full out onto the street.

I sincerely hope you, my friends, have a good job or career and are getting the pay and benefits you deserve.  If you don't keep looking, I think hiring will pick up again after the Election. :)

Ten Days of Good News, Day Eight - USB, SSHD and Portable Hard Drives

If you had told me even ten years ago that I could store Terabytes of information on a USB Drive or SSHD that is smaller than my wallet, I would have asked you what you were smoking.
Today they are a reality and even come in metal cases that are many colors and shapes to help identify the data stored on them.

Ten Days of Good News, Day Nine - UPS - Uninterruptible Power Supply

When you live anywhere there is a power grid - especially here in Florida - expect power outages and even for the power to blink on and off for no apparent reason

If you had told me even ten years ago that I could store Terabytes of information on a USB Drive or SSHD that is smaller than my wallet, I would have asked you what you were smoking.
Today they are a reality and even come in metal cases that are many colors and shapes to help identify the data stored on them.

Originally the standard was for the UPS to give the User 10 minutes to shut down. Now UPS units act as surge protectors and give low power use computers up to an hour to work and shut down.

Ten Days of Good News, Day Ten - Electric Bikes and Offroad Vehicles.

The new electric bicycles would certainly be adored by the Wright Brothers (who built bikes into airplanes).
I like the way one can pedal and use the bike like those from my childhood but at the same time it recharges the battery.

Electric Golf Carts and Offroad Vehicles are awesome too.
All of these help get a person outside of the house, or off the couch and provide many days of fun and adventures.

Todd W. Byars, Computer Dudes, Tallahassee, Florida :)

One of my favorite things to do as a Computer Dudes Engineer is working on projects with groups from all over the world.

In the past few year a Software for Portible Phones and computers named: Android Team Awareness Kit, ATAK.

One of the groups we work with is out of Northern Europe and they have enhanced to portability, communications, extended maps which can be accessed where there is no phone or network communications.

This group has done the most work, and we contributed advice on using Shielded Wire and low DC voltages for safe secure communications.

The group is called Resilience Theater. Below are some links to their work including a how to "Wiki."

First find and follow Resilience Theater on LinkedIn -  as the group posts fresh updates - as well as adding new followers daily.

Here is their Wiki which gives instruction on the systems, sensors, and advanced options for any TAK system.

Start Here with the project overview and systems created to enhance ATAK systems    https://resilience-theatre.com/wiki/

Some of the most interesting and useful functions are: "Edgemap," which is a map database on a chip or single-board computer like a Raspberry Pi 4 or 5. Those computers use 5 Volts DC and cannot be detected, especially if you use Shielded CAT 5 or 6 Cables.

Resilience Theater also created an encrypted Push To Talk, PTT, system.

Here is their link to Edgemap. https://resilience-theatre.com/edgemap/

In North Florida these systems are used by Forest Ranger, Forest Fire Fighters, People with Off Road vehicles and even people on vacation to they do not get lost.

We would like to say "Well Done" and "Keep up the good work!" to all those working at Resilience Theater, as well as the many who contribute knowledge and share net techniques. Thank you for doing such nice work.

Your friend,

Todd W. Byars
Computer Dudes
Global Operations and Security

#computerdudes #resiliancetheater #atak #sensors #security #edgemap #ptt #sensornets

Report from Bermuda

Toured Dockyards and Old British Navy Fort and Prison. Tour of local area near sea port and history.
Noted:

For Global Cooling Project: Houses here are built from quarried Limestone including the roof of the building. All roofs are painted White every 2 years. Water is in short supply especially in the last century. All houses have a cistern under or beside house and water is collected from the rain and special gutters which drain in to cistern. A cistern is a round often open topped tank build of brick or stone.

White roofs and cisterns a technology from more than 2 centuries ago are still viable options to help with global warming and water shortages.

Golf with friends and business contacts from UK and Europe at Turtle Hill Fairmount Golf Course. Technology and Security discussed along with #solaroneballoon and #solaronedroneballoon. Solar Power and #solaronedatacenter which requires no building and can withstand a hurricane and power outages.

Discussed Drone Defense course for civilians including beam guns and plasma antennas. Uplink technology and communications upgrades also discussed.

Also discussed new 800 Watt per solar panel technology that is now for sale around the world as well as hybrid Solar / Electric air conditioning units.

I am aboard the NCL Gem and we are in Bermuda for 2 more days then on to Maine and finally back to Boston.

A vacation that is both business and pleasure is a good thing - especially if one does not plan too much.

I am having a great time and the food, entertainment, pools, and people on the ship are all very nice.

More soon...

Regards

Todd W. Byars
Computer Dudes
Global Operations and Services
www.thecomputerdudesinc.com

#computerdudes #research #technology #powersystems #solar and #waterpurification

The Computer Dudes, Inc,  Tallahassee, Florida: 6-3-2024

Following the Broadcomm take over of VMware several of our clients asked for options on replacement and security.

We divided up our research among Computer Dudes in Atlanta, Las Vegas, Maine and Texas. We then sent equipment and instructions to several prospective groups seeking to be Computer Dudes in UK, Germany and Australia.

Here are our current solutions:

Beowulf Clustering

Beowulf Clustering - which is faster and more secure than the cloud, especially if you do the clustering by Server Rack using a backplane or software that thinks it is a backplane

QEMU

QEMU is an Open Source VM Emmulator - it is a big project supported by many around the globe and gets good reviews from users at different levels. Here are the Specs:

Developer: Fabrice Bellard License: GPL-2.0-only Operating system: Linux, Microsoft Windows, macOS and some other UNIX platforms
Repository: gitlab.com/qemu-project/qemu Stable release: 9.0.0 / 23 April 2024 Programming Language: C

CITRIX

Citrix Hypervisor is now ZenServer-8. They have a VMware ESXi migration tool to convert and activated any ESXi Virtual Machines, Servers or Appliances. One free download without registering. Free to try - about 20 bucks per user, per year, per user license.
You will also need the Load Balancer and some of the tools for advanced configuration and speed.

Why do Computer Dudes share our research?   We consider anyone with the skill to work with VMware, Citrix, QEMU, and GetHub to be "Computer Dudes."   
"Dudes" is not a gender pronoun - it is a DESIGNATION of skill, ethics, and communication with clients.

Good Luck with your summer research - implementation begins in the Fall - Additional Updates will be posted in the comments below this article

Regards

Todd W. Byars
Computer Dudes
Global Operations and Aerospace
Virtualization and Security