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World-famous Boracay Island is this year’s host venue of the 9th Miss Earth 2009 beauty pageant. Miss Earth is an annual beauty pageant promoting environmental awareness.

Miss Earth 2009

Boracay is popular for its pristine white sand beaches and crystal-clear seawaters and dubbed as one of the world’s best beach.

The Grand Coronation will be on November 22, 2009 at the Boracay Ecovillage Convention. The convention center can accommodate as much as 3,000 people.
The Miss Earth Foundation has found Boracay Island as the most appropriate location for the pageant night.

Miss Earth is organized by Carousel Productions Inc and will be aired via ABS-CBN and in many countries worldwide through The Filipino Channel (TFC) and other partner TV networks.

There are more than 80 delegates from different countries gather together to vie for the title and help promote environmental projects.

Miss Earth logo courtesy of Miss Earth Official Website

Today, I received an email from a sender using the email  Facebook [update+vhohyyts@facebookmail.com] in my Microsoft Outlook account.  At first glance,  it looks like a real email message sent by Facebook as it uses the look and feel of the popular social networking site. But if you try to point your cursor on the hyperlink, it is pointing to www.facebook.com.sazzawk.me.uk which is of course not an official Facebook website. The email is fake and so is the website it is pointing to. This may seems to be a “traditional” phishing attack that tries to steal your Facebook password.

A screenshot of Facebook phishing email

In the area of computer security,  the term “phishing” refers to the fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames,  passwords, credit card details and more by acting as a legitimate organization in an electronic communication like e-mail.

The e-mail has the following message:
—————————————————————————
Dear Facebook user,
In an effort to make your online experience safer and more enjoyable, Facebook will be implementing a new login system that will affect all Facebook users. These changes will offer new features and increased account security.
Before you are able to use the new login system, you will be required to update your account.
Click here to update your account online now.
If you have any questions, reference our New User Guide.
Thanks,
The Facebook Team
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Phishing e-mail messages like the one I received take a number of forms. They might appear to come from your bank or financial institution and asking for your credit card information. Other phishing emails might include links to spoofed Web sites where you are asked to enter personal information like your phone numbers and password.

What to do with Phishing emails?

If you have received phishing emails, simply ignore the message and do not click on any hyperlink on the fraudulent email.  Report the incident to concerned authorities like the US-CERT(United States Computer Emergency readiness Team).

The US-CERT is collecting phishing email messages and web site addresses. You can report phishing incident by sending them an email (phishing-report@us-cert.gov).

There are many web tools that are developed to help web developers in the web development. These web tools are commonly called add-ons or extensions. Firebug is definitely one of the most popular in-browser tools usually used by many web developers especially for Firefox users. Firebug is a Firefox extension that allows you to inspect and diagnose HTML, CSS, Ajax and JavaScript codes.
With Firebug, you can view the results of HTTP connections and visualize your Cascading Style Sheet or CSS to formulate the website layout.

Firebug interface

Firebug is an open source application and comes with a JavaScript console, logging API, and a useful Network Monitor necessary for HTTP connections.

Firebug is also a very helpful tool for AJAX application developers because it is capable of instant edits on the Document Object Model (DOM) to see what happens when you manipulate Web page elements after a user action.

Other common in-browser tools are Web Develper, YSlow and Fiddler Web Debugger

Instant Messaging allows users to send and receive messages in real time via their computers or mobile phones using the Internet technology. This service is usually provided for free. Some companies that offers Instant messaging application are Google, Yahoo!, AOL and MSN. The use of Instant Messaging had become popular since the late 90s. The use of Instant Messaging as a way of communication is undoubtedly growing along with increased Internet penetration.

Chikka homepage

Chikka is one of the pionners when it comes to deployment of Mobile Instant Messaging and developed the first mobile instant messenger to run on short message service. It is a Philippine-based mobile messaging solutions provider and made South East Asia’s most popular real-time messaging services. Chikka already started its commercial operations in India and expanding presence in the US with the recent partnership with telecom giant AT&T. Chikka is also developing more products and integrate new features for mobile entertainment applications like ring tones and games for its users.

Chikka offers free texting services in the following countries:
1. Guam
2. Hong Kong (Smart 1528 only)
3. India
4. Indonesia (XLcom only)
5. Philippines
6. Saipan
7. Spain
8. United States
9. United Kingdom

Chikka has greatly contributed in spreading the benefits of Instant Messaging in the Philippines.
Chikka transforms its free download Web site and incorporates new web 2.0 platform for Internet-based services. The company partnered with fastmobile, a leader in mobile instant communications solutions to develop a downloadable, mobile-to-mobile version of the popular real-time messaging application Chikka Messenger.

Chikka.com Instant Messenger features an integrated free text messaging capabilities where receiver can easily send replies and log-on via their mobile phones. It is also seen to adapt to new Internet culture that is converging around social networking and user generated content sites like Facebook and YouTube.

Chikka Text Messenger is one of the first commercially successful integration of Internet and mobile technologies.

Last August 17, 2009, a hacking incident was reported and affected popular social-networking websites. High traffic websites have been a favorite target among computer hackers nowadays.

Twitter.com, a popular micro-blogging was out of service due to web attack just this month. The Twitter service has been restored and the site is back online. The attack has made Twitter’s millions of users to unable to use the website. Analysts did not disclose the specific source of the attack but considered the attack as denial-of-service. Denial of Service (DDoS) attack is where intruders send bulk of junk requests to the site. This can create a huge increase in website traffic and can bring down the server. This technique has been used by many computer hackers to slowed down the operations of websites.

Facebook, on the other hand, was “degraded” by a distributed-denial-of-service this month. Other popular sites such as Youtube and Livejournal.com were also affected.

Twitter is now working to defend the website security against any malicious attempt to disrupt its service and had teamed with Google to investigate the said incident.

Stress affects people‘s lives in many different ways. Family problems, present lifestyle, working environment, financial matters especially in today’s time of crisis are just some of the reasons why people feel stress. It has been now considered a silent killer. Stress makes a person lose its concentration and focus. It is common to people working in a fast- paced environment like working in call centers, construction, customer service and many others. Headaches and physical exhaustion are just some of the results of stress. So, if you feel stressed out and want to combat stress, hereunder are 5 helpful tips to consider:

1. Laughter
Silly it may seems but according to the medical research, laughing decreases the blood   pressure. It helps increase oxygen in the blood and produces an enzyme that protects the stomach against stress. It also strengthens the immune system which protects the body from harmful illness. In a research conducted by Lee S. Berk of Loma Linda University in California, USA, it was found out that an average American adult laughs out loud only about 15 times a day as compared to 400 times made by an American child. One good tip is to call a friend that will make you laugh or watching a comedy movie would also be helpful. Laughing helps you feel more relaxed an obtain focus to go on with the day.

2. Change your daily routine.
Sometimes repeating tasks will cause you stress. This is most evident especially for people working in performance–based jobs like sales and marketing who are not achieving the desired result. If you are inside the office all day, then you have to go outside for a while. Take an exercise or coffee break. Practice singing a new song. Start a new venture or a project perhaps. Those things will enable your mind to go in a completely different day from what you usually do in a day.

3. Take a nap.
If you are working in an office bring with you an alarm clock. Take a 20-minute nap if necessary. Research showed that 20 minutes is the optimal time to nap. It gives a person a much-needed rest without being overtired.

4. Observe a healthy lifestyle.
A good health helps fight stress. Observed proper diet and take vitamins supplements if necessary. Eat healthy foods like vegetables and fruits. These can rejuvenate skin tissues. Stress makes you old and groggy.

5. Maintain a positive attitude.
Your attitude is very important to fight stress. If you have present problems on hand, keep looking forward got the positive thing ahead. This can help you become more upbeat and maintain a positive attitude in life.

People that usually feel stress out are those who are thinking the things that will cause you stress. Hope these tips on how to fight stress will help you come back to work renewed and refreshed and of course with a significantly lower level of stress.