The first step towards avoiding scamming and frauding is to stay vigilant. Then get familiar with and implement these preventive measures to safeguard your finances and personal information.

Payment Card Fraud

Payment card fraud involves the unauthorized use of stolen or counterfeit payment cards for direct purchases, cash withdrawals, or online transactions. What should you do to protect yourself against payment card fraud?

• Keep your payment card in a safe place at all times and report any loss or theft immediately to your bank. If you use your bank app in conjunction with your card, you can block the card in one click online using the app.
• Safeguard your Personal Identification Number (PIN) by not writing it down, keeping it separate from your card, and not sharing it with anyone. Do not put into your wallet with the card.
• If a card or PIN is not received as expected, notify your card issuer right away.
• Sign new cards upon receipt and destroy old ones securely.
• When making in-store purchases or using ATMs, cover your PIN to prevent it from being observed by others.
• When using ATMs to withdraw cash, I personally check that the ATM doesn’t have attached or installed extra parts or devices on top of the original parts (banknote dispenser, card slot, etc) trying to detatch these parts. If they are firm and don’t move easily it is a good sign that the ATM has not been tampered with.
• Try always to withdraw cash from ATMs that are located inside banks or financial institutions, rather than ATMs located on streets. This will decrease the chances of being tampered.
• Ensure your card remains in sight when paying for goods or services.

Invoice Redirection Fraud

Invoice redirection fraud targets businesses by convincing them to change the bank account details of legitimate suppliers. As a result, payments meant for genuine suppliers are redirected to accounts controlled by fraudsters. To avoid falling victim to this type of fraud:

• Educate all staff members about invoice redirection fraud and instruct them to bring any requests to change bank account details to a supervisor for verification.
• Establish a procedure that involves making direct contact with known contacts at suppliers to verify any requested changes to bank account details. Independently verify the contact information instead of relying on details provided in emails or by the sender.

CEO Fraud

This particular fraud targets people working in a company. It involves criminals impersonating the Chief Executive Officer of a company and manipulating junior employees in the finance department into processing substantial payments. Protect against CEO fraud by:

• Conducting comprehensive training for CEOs, senior executives, and staff members to raise awareness about this type of fraud.
• Empower staff to question and verify requests of this nature.
• Implement clear policies and procedures for verifying payment transfers or high-level requests from senior management.
• Encourage additional verification processes, such as making a phone call to the CEO or using visual communication, to confirm the legitimacy of a transaction.

Email Fraud (Phishing)

Email fraud, commonly known as phishing, encompasses a range of deceptive tactics used by criminals to obtain personal or financial information or install malware on devices. Follow these measures to protect yourself:

• Avoid opening unsolicited emails.
• Never respond to unsolicited emails that request personal, financial, or security information.
• Refrain from clicking on links or attachments in unsolicited emails.
• Remember that if an offer seems too good to be true, it probably is.
• Independently verify the authenticity of emails by contacting the purported sender through alternative means.

Phone Fraud (Vishing or Smishing)

Phone fraud, known as vishing or smishing, involves criminals contacting individuals by phone or text, pretending to be a trusted organization or entity, and attempting to extract personal or financial information such as credit card details. Protect yourself from phone fraud:

• Decline unsolicited calls or texts requesting private information, such as your name, address, date of birth, family details, bank account numbers, PIN, or passwords.
• Independently verify any requests for information using contact details that are independent of the caller or texter. You can also check online for their phone number. There are many online databases where you can check if it is spam or fraud.
• Do not trust callers solely because they possess some personal information about you.
• Are you expecting a phone call from an organisation or a business? If not, it is possible to be a phone fraud. Remember, if it is a legit organisation they won’t have any problem providing more information where to verify them.
• As deterrent, you can also install on your smartphone specific apps to filter unsolicited calls or user flagged phone numbers that block incoming phone calls. You can find these apps both for iPhone and Android. I personally use an app called “Should I Answer?” but there are many out there and free of charge.

Advance Fee Fraud

Advance fee fraud tricks victims into making upfront payments for nonexistent goods, services, financial gains, or prizes. To avoid falling victim to advance fee fraud follow these advice:

• Be cautious of unsolicited offers or benefits that seem too good to be true.
• Always independently verify the identity of the person or company you are dealing with, and terminate contact if verification is not possible.
• Never share personal, financial, or security information unless you have confirmed the legitimacy of the recipient.
• Exercise caution when asked to transfer money to non-identifiable locations or through money transfer companies instead of secure bank accounts.
• If you feel something strange or your instinct tells you something is wrong, refrain from dealing with the counterpart and inform the authorities.

By staying informed about the various types of fraud in Ireland and implementing these crime prevention measures, you can protect yourself and your business from falling victim to fraudsters. Remember, vigilance and skepticism are essential in safeguarding your personal and financial well-being. If something is too good to be true, means it is definitely a scam.

The post Top Six most common types of fraud in Ireland appeared first on Donald Piccione.

Using a VPN instead, is like you are connected to another computer (different IP address) and only that computer is tracked. This means your identity is shielded from your activity, therefore your privacy is 100% guaranteed.
Just for the record, a VPN is used also in a corporate environment. For example multinational companies have offices in Dublin, Palo Alto, Italy, France so all their users can connect to a single private network to access tools and programs and communicate to other departments around the world maintaining at the same time 100% security.

Why Should I Use a VPN?

Coming back to us in a more personal use, there are several reasons why you need to use a VPN.

1) Security: a VPN encrypts data and also hide yourself from being exposed to the Internet. As you are connected to a private server rather than directly to your Internet Service Provider you are protected from hacker attacks or other forms of stolen data.

2) Anonimity: As the data are encrypted and your PC is not exposed to the Internet, you are not identified and neither your personal data. It is like you are driving remotely the Curiosity rover on Mars. They just see the rover not you.

3) Freedom: Using a VPN you can connect to a server that resides to the other part of the globe and being seen as you reside there (using their local IP address). For example if you like me you live in Ireland and you want to watch an on demand TV show from Canada, like HGTV you can do so using a VPN. Otherwise you will get the classic message “Sorry, this content is only available in …”

But using a VPN the story is different.

Other examples of benefits from using a VPN

• You can browse and eventually order items that are not available in your Country. Example you can browse an American online store. Ok, they might not ship to your Country but certainly you can see the items and their prices.
• Search for flight or hotel offers that are available only to certain countries. Also depending from what Country you are browsing, the room rates are different.
• Watch American Series on Netflix, Hulu or other U.S. TV on demand services that usually don’t show here in Europe. Yes you can do it!

What VPN I am using?

I have tried different VPN and currently I am using PureVPN (external link to the website) which I rekon is very affordable and you can use up to 5 devices at the same time. This means that while you buying for you, you can also let it use to your girlfriend, wife or children. Why not, you can also give it to your friend. They have over 2,000 servers around the World covering over 180 locations, and they don’t keep track of your activity. It supports almost any operating systems and devices from Windows, Linux to Android. They have apps you can download, for example Android and IOS to launch your VPN on the go as well as plugins to install into your browser, example for Google Chrome or Firefox. How cool is that?

This is an image of my Google Chrome browser add-on

As you can see it is really simple to use. You just need to select a Country or a City to connect and click “Connect”. You will be immediately transported to the Country selected.

I personally purchased the 12 months service at a total price of 35 Euro which is less than 3 Euro / month to protect you identity, browse securely and being able to watch your favourite American TV shows online.

Please be aware that this is my personal review and I haven’t being paid to write this article. I wanted to bring you the attention on how today is important to browse safely, avoiding stolen data or tracking your Internet activities. If you have tried other VPN services and you are happy with that, please let me know and I will share in this page too.

The post What is a VPN and why should I use one? appeared first on Donald Piccione.

What is CCLEANER?

According by the company itself “CCleaner is a small, effective utility for computers running Microsoft Windows that cleans out the ‘junk’ that accumulates over time: temporary files, broken shortcuts, and other problems”. [1]

I would like to add that one great thing about Ccleaner is also the cleaning of Windows Registry Keys, startup programs (and their associated HKLM keyes), plugins and much more. For example, I used this program to resolve the famous annoying issue of SBAVMonL.dll pop up.

Legal Disclaimer: The author of this article is not responsible in any legal terms if any action you perform on your computer may modify, erase of compromise the data. If you continue reading you accept this terms and condition and therefore I am not liable for anything caused by your PC or your happiness (unless of course you are happy reading this article). I know it is just a pile of c**p writing this but it has to be done to cover my butt.

How to install Free version of Ccleaner

Simply go to FileHippo repository, and on your right hand side of the top corner you can see a button with “Download the latest version”. Click on it. On the next page you will see a message that states your program is being downloaded. Once you have downloaded, install it on your PC. A message will prompt asking you if you wish to proceed. You should be able to see the author name as Pirisoft Software Ltd to ensure it is a legit file. Just follow the next steps and you are done.

How to use CCLEANER the first time. Basic Settings

Once you have installed for the first time, I will give you some priceless tips on what you have to do to get the most of this program and clean better your PC.

1) CLEANER section > Windows Tab – Ensure you ticked all the following boxes

2) CLEANER section > Applications – Ensure you ticked all the following boxes

Please be aware that some applications listed in the below picture may not appear in your ccleaner tab because you haven’t installed, while others you have installed are not shown here. The important here is to ensure to tick the same boxes, such as session and Compact Databases.

3) REGISTRY section – Ensure to tick all the boxes

Now it is time to Run the Cleaner

After you applied the settings above, you can run your first cleaning session. Go to Cleaner Tab and on the bottom of the app you will see the button “Analyse”. The program will start analyse all your files on the computer and at the end gives you a summary of what you can save in space. To clean it, you need just to click on Run Cleaner button on the right side. When you run the cleaner you need to close all the browsers, otherwise you get a message to do so.

Registry Cleaner too

Once you have done cleaning the files from your computer, it is time to clean the registry file. Basically every time you install or upgrade a program there are some registry file that are not used anymore. It is best practice to clean all of them so the PC can run smoothly.

On the Registry section, you can press the “Scan for Issues” button where at the end you will end up with a list of issues such as “Missing Shared DLL”, “Unused File Extension”, “Invalid Default Icon”, “Active X/COM Issue”, etc.

As you see from the picture above all the issues are ticked as per default. You need to press the button on the right side “Fix Selected Issue”. You will be prompted to optionally back up these registry. It is up to you to do it. Either you backup or not, the next step would be to click on “Fix all the selected Issues”. You will see at the end of the cleaning the list becomes empty as all the issue are fixed.

If you want to keep your PC healthy and decluttered from your unused files, you can scan it every 2 weeks using this tool. Once in a while you will get a message that a new version is available to be downloaded. Just click on yes and follow also my instruction I wrote above regarding the CCleaner installation.

If you wish, you can leave your comment above. I will be happy to read you.

The post How to Use CCleaner like a Pro appeared first on Donald Piccione.

The message states: “There was a problem starting SBAVMonL.dll The specified module could not be found” although I have an Italian language OS, just in case you are Italian and you are looking for the same solution, the message in Italian says: “Errore durante l’avvio di SBAVMonL.dll – Impossibile trovare il modulo specificato“.

What is the issue with SBAVMonL or SBAVMon? Can be fixed?

While Windows is booting, it looks for a DLL file (SBAVMonL.dll) into their system Directory. This DLL relates to Creative Labs SB Monitor Launcher utility for Sound Blaster products. Windows cannot find it so it tells you that there is an error. This can be fixed easily. I just want to give you an overall of what I found online before fixing on my way.

What solutions I found online that didn’t work or I wouldn’t advice?

What I did first, as I suppose you did it as well, is searching on …Google if you can find a solution.

1)First page I found was from Microsoft Community Forum, which unfortunately didn’t provide a real solution. This because it was advised to go to the old directory in your PC where the previous O.S. was installed. In my case I didn’t have any windows.old file so it didn’t work.

Another solution I found online is actually to go to search for this DLL from a third party website, download and install into Windows and you fix it. This is a very bad solution because DLL’s are used also by hackers and scammers to infect your computer. You will never know if a website is 100% genuinely safe or it might be but, they might not know that they have an infected DLL. Rule of thumb, never, ever, download a file like this from a website. Never ever install it in your machine. NEVER!

My easy fix against SBAVMonL.DLL error

There is one program you must have anyway and use on regular basis called CCLEANER. This program cleans unused files, temporary files etc, improving the speed of your PC. I use this program since I used to work on behalf of Microsoft as Technical Support Advisor back in 2007 for Windows XP. Did I tell you I used to work as Technical Support Advisor? No? Now you know. Once you are in the Ccleaner page (I shared the link before) you see the Free version column. Scroll down till you see a link to Filehippo repository. Click on that link and in the new page, you see a green button on the right side corner that allows you to download the free version of Ccleaner. Again this is nothing related to affiliation, commissions or stuff like that. The program is free and you must have installed anyway. In another post, I will tell you more about this program so you can improve your PC performance. Once you downloaded, you install it and run it.

When you open Ccleaner program (or APP if you are a Millennial) You see a menu on your left side like this

From the left side to the right side, select Tools > Startup then see the Windows tab there is a list of Programs. Go to locate the program called “Creative SB Monitoring Utility Launcher“. You see that has a YES on enabled (means that it runs every time you switch on your PC). Clicking on that and you can see on the right side the button “Disable“. I advice using the disable button instead of Delete. This way you can have a test to see if disabling may cause further issue. If not you can eventually go back to these steps and use the Delete button.

You can now close this program and restart your PC. You should be able, like me, to have fixed this annoying pop-up message.

As usual, you are more than welcome to share your thoughts in the comment area below.

The post How to fix SBAVMonL DLL Error in Windows 10 Once for All appeared first on Donald Piccione.

As Digital Marketer but also an emphatic user-friendly supporter, I wanted to find a WordPress plugin able to block any Country with the following characteristics:

• Easy to install
• Easy to set up
• Easy to update

Did I ask too much from this? In the end, this should be bread and butter for everyday WordPress plugin but, still nowadays is not.

What I found is called IP2Location Country Blocker. In my opinion the name is something maybe to revise, but at the end, the important is to install it and make it run. This plugin basically allows you to set up what Countries you want to include or exclude from visiting your website. The logic is the following:

a) Traffic is enabled to all countries, with the exception of XXX

b) Traffic is disabled to all countries with the exception of XXX

In my case, I have few clients who provide local service in Dublin, so they don’t really give a damn to be visited from America or China. Also because nowadays websites are visited by spam bots and other dodgy shit. So I don’t need them to visit my website.

Another reason, if you have limited resources in your server, let’s say you have a cheap hosting with limited bandwidth, you can avoid being overcharged for traffic you didn’t need, also your database will work only on genuine requests from real users, making it quicker.

How to install IP2Location Country Blocker

You can go to your dashboard and then click on Plugins > Add New. Then type the name above. Once you see the plugin like this

You just need to click on Install, the once installed press Activate. In my case above you see it shows as active.

What settings you have to do with IP2Location Country Blocker?

FIRST STEP

One important thing first is to have installed an updated database of IP addresses. If the plugin tells you that is not updated, just go to this website https://lite.ip2location.com/ and see a section called “Free databases for download”. I usually select the most completed one (it is free anyway) but not the best completed one. My choice is the DB5 LITE. Once you have downloaded the zip file, you have to unzip and extract the file called IP2LOCATION-LITE-DB5.bin and upload into your remote website folder where the plugin is installed. Usually is:

/wp-content/plugins/ip2location-country-blocker

You may have another folder path before the wp-content but once you go to your root location, you can see the same path. Once you uploaded, you basically got the latest version. If in 6 or 12 months you get a notification in your WordPress dashboard that the file needs to be updated, please follow the same instructions above.

SECOND STEP

When you are in this plugin area, click on the setting tabs. Ensure that you have selected
IP2Location Lookup Mode to be Binary Database. If you select the web service, you have to register and pay. If you stay on Binary database, you just need to update it manually every now and then but it is free. I don’t use the IP2Proxy Lookup mode.

Going down the settings, you see that there is another option to download the database using a Token. You get the token if you register to their website, but, sometimes it doesn’t work, meaning that you may get an error telling that you are unable to download the database. So if you do manually it much practical.

Now you set up the Country Blocker in your WordPress website, you need to tell this plugin what rules you want to apply either for Front End (the pages user see in your website) or Back End (when you go to your dashboard in WordPress). You can set up one or both. Be sure to set up the country correctly, otherwise, you will be kicked out from your own website and then you have to spend the time to get it back fiddling into your database Apache.

My set up is the following

As you can see I blocked all countries with the exception of Ireland, etc, etc. Also be sure you select DO NOT BLOCK the bots such as Bing, Google, etc. If you have a website where a user can login, you might also want to repeat the same set up in the Backend tab. Once again, double check that the Country you are blocking is not your country otherwise you are kicked out from your own website.

This is all you need to know about this plugin and how to install it. After some time, you can go to the tab Statistic and you can see the volume that has been blocked.

I hope you found this post helpful and you also found this plugin easy and useful. I am not endorsed by the authors or owners of this plugin. I just thought it is interesting to bring it to your attention.

The post Best Free WordPress Plugin to Block Countries appeared first on Donald Piccione.

Note before starting: Ensure that you have a recent (updated) theme and your WordPress website is last version, as if it is not the case, once you activate the SSL you will see your website like in the old HTML version. This because some old themes may refer to HTTP from a relative URL path. Usually, you can fix it activating the https rewrites (see below), while other time you will need to check where is the issue. It is always a best practice anyway to have the latest version of WordPress installed.

Note 2: Please ensure to do these steps during low peak traffic if you can, for example in the night or early morning. You know when your users are not browsing your website. So, in the event of something goes wrong, you have time to revert to previous settings and have a check, or have time to fix it.

Note 3: Another best practice in WordPress World is making a backup of your database, just in case something (it never occurred to me in ages) goes sour. Still a good habit to pursuit.

Steps on how to Setup the free Cloudflare SSL Certificate

Step 1: Install Really Simple SSL Plugin

This plugin is Free and it is listed in my Essential WordPress Plugin guide.

On your Dashboard, go to Plugins > Add New. Then type the name in the search bar and install. You can activate the plugin. Once the plugin is activated it will tell you if it can see the SSL certificate or not. It is not always simple to get the https ready and straight from the activation. Sometimes it takes more time and you have to figure out on how to fix it and where the issue is located.

Step 2: In Cloudflare, you have to activate the SSL and do some settings

Go to Cloudflare dashboard and click on Crypto tab.

Ensure that these options are enabled:

• SSL – Flexible (double check that the status of your certificate is Active = you have an SSL certificate);
• Always use HTTPS: On;
• Authenticated Origin Pulls: On;
• Require Modern TLS: On;
• Opportunistic Encryption: On;
• TLS 1.3 : Enabled + 0RTT;
• Automatic HTTPS rewrites (very important) must be ON;

In the last option, this ensures that eventual calls from the HTTP in your website will be transformed to https:

From Cloudflare:

If your site contains links or references to HTTP URLs that are also available securely via HTTPS, Automatic HTTPS Rewrites can help. If you connect to your site over HTTPS and the lock icon is not present, or has a yellow warning triangle on it, your site may contain references to HTTP assets (“mixed content”)

Wait 5 minutes and go back to WordPress Dashboard. Reload this page. If the certificate is active you might be logged out. Once you go back to your dashboard you will see the https working.  SSL Settings section can be found in Settings > SSL where you can see eventual errors or enable debug mode.

On the overall, I have tried these steps above on several websites so far, and I had just one that was harder to activate the SSL. In some cases, it is just a matter of cache to flush to see your website in HTTPS. Don’t panic, focus on where the issue might be. If you had some issues with this certificate and you fixed, you can share your thoughts in the comment below (Zero tolerance policy to spammers).

Donald

Disclaimer: Trademark/Copyright/Logo goes to their respective owners. I am not endorsed by Cloudflare. I don’t participate in any affiliation. I just want to share my knowledge and the use of this free product. I am not responsible if following the above steps may cause any issue to your website. These are the steps I have used to activate SSL on my websites. If you feel not confident to follow the steps above you should hire a professional.

The post How to setup Cloudflare Free SSL for WordPress websites appeared first on Donald Piccione.

Most often it is not guaranteed that the SSL issuer checks the quality of other websites as far as it is ok with the domain name (example: don’t infringe copyright or trademark policies) but this is another story.

So, long story short, how you get your free SSL certificate? Cloudflare is your answer.

There are other companies who are offering a similar service and certificate but so far I have found Cloudflare being reliable and also giving other free services such as CDN (Content Delivery Network), Data Analytics, Firewall, etc.

This SSL Certificate resides in their own Cloudflare platform through their DNS, so, in order to use it, you need to move your nameservers (stored in your domain) to their nameservers (usually Elsa and Hank).

These are the steps to follow:

1. Register with Cloudflare;
2. Confirm some settings (A, CNAME, etc);
3. move nameservers to Cloudflare dns/cdn;
4. Activate Free SSL Certificate and do some settings on your WordPress website;
5. Enjoy the Free Certificate

Donald

Please note: Trademarks/Copyrights/Logo goes to their respective owners. I am not endorsed by Cloudflare. I don’t participate in any affiliation. I just want to share my knowledge and the use of this free product.

The post How to Get a free SSL Certificate for https appeared first on Donald Piccione.