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Sheraton Deira Hotel
Ideally located in the heart of the city, the Sheraton Deira Hotel, Dubai welcomes international travelers with an easy and relaxed ambience. Whether visiting for business or leisure, guests will love the thoughtful and friendly service. Situated just a few minutes from the Dubai International Airport, shopping malls, and the Dubai Exhibition Centr.....
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Marriott Riyadh
The Marriott Riyadh is located in the heart of the city's corporate, financial, and government sectors, close to downtown, and is approximately 23 miles from King Khaled International Airport. Local attractions include Murabba Palace, and Al Thumairi Gate.Hotel amenities include free valet parking, newspapers, ATM, currency exchange, laundry facili.....
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Taj Palace Hotel
The architecture of the building is asymmetrical, with - a stepped feature on t he upper floors of the Hotel entrance end of the building. - featuring palm tree gardens on top of the room beneath. - an atrium ascending from the lobby to the 8th floor of the hotel. - an open-air area passing through the entire building, ascending 3 floors of the ban.....
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The Internet can be described as the Wild West of
today and as with all new frontiers there are baddies & fraudsters, looking to
make a quick buck from the innocent and hard working people who venture into
this brave new land.
So before you head of into the wild west make sure you are
adequately prepared for your journey so that you can reduce the chances of falling foul to
the Internet fraudsters.
1) MAKE SURE your computer has the latest virus protection
and you are running a firewall. If you are using windows XP then this comes with
its own firewall otherwise download
Zone Alarm free version for maximum
protection. What does a firewall do? In simple terms it stops programs from
accessing the internet and other people from gaining access to your computer
from the internet. Without a firewall your computer is like a house with all its
windows and doors open. If you don't lock them, then sooner or later some one is
going to break in and steel all your belongings. The firewall locks all your open
doors & windows and monitors the flow of traffic in and out of any openings.
BUY
the latest virus software such as
Norton Anti Virus, you wouldn't put a cheap
lock on your front door, so don't do the same for your computer. Your computer
can hold sensitive and personal information such as accounts, bank details,
private pictures in fact your computer can hold a complete profile of your life
and by using second rate virus protection you are making it easier for the
fraudsters to take this information and use it for their own good.
2) Read my article on
safe Internet shopping.
3) Fake / Junk / Scam emails - As soon as you get an email
account you will start to receive junk email. Most email companies such as Yahoo
& Hotmail have very good filters to weed out this junk mail but as quick as they
can block it, the people behind the junk emails find a way to beat the filters.
If you shop online, have an EBay account, PayPal account or bank account then I
will guarantee that you will get fake emails and so I have compiled a list of
the common categories that these emails fall into to :-
-
You have won a lottery email Internet fraud
-
This scam is
very cleaver in that it dupes you into believing that you have just won a
large sum of money from a European / American / any country and that in
order to claim your prize all you have to do is contact the organizers.
DON'T DO IT because you will end up out of pocket and red faced. How? At
some point throughout the process of claiming your prize you will be asked
for an administration fee (the sting) and once you pay, you have just become
another victim and the only winners are the fraudsters who are laughing all
the way to the bank.
Examples
-
"My late husband / Father / Mother / Client has
died and left me x millions of dollars in a secret account and I need your
help in getting this money" email Internet fraud.
This email comes in many disguises
but all have the single intention of taking you for a long and costly ride
at your expense! Every body loves a deal and most of us would jump at the
chance to make some serious money, especially when it looks so easy to get.
But this couldn't be further from the truth. As soon as you respond to this
email you will be hooked as these fraudsters have fine tuned their sales
pitch and will convince you that they really do have the money and that you
will soon be a very rich person. I can assure you that the only one getting
rich out of this scam is the scammer and at your expense. How it works? You
will be asked to provide funds for legal fees, bank fees, travel, medicals,
you name it as long as you keep paying they will keep on inventing the
charges until eventually the penny drops and you realize that you are never
going to see the money. No matter how convincing these emails look, do not
respond to them.
Examples
-
Bank Account / Internet Bank account / EBay
account / PayPal account email Internet fraud.
This Internet scam is designed to
capture people new to online banking / shopping and its sole aim is to get
your password and user details so that the the fraudsters can drain your
bank account or abuse your EBay / shopping account. How it works? You will
receive a very convincing email stating that your account has been broken
into, attempted to be broken into, suspended, details changed, they have
lost some of your details, a payment has been made / sent from your account
and so on. The one thing that will be common in all these emails is a link
to your account, only this link will not go to your account but instead to a
fake page set up to look exactly the same as your real account login. You
log in as usual only this time you will be told that the site is down or
being maintained and can you please come back later. By the time you come
back they have entered your account and plundered it. If you are not sure
about any email of this type then go to your account through your browser as
you normally would and log in. Most online banking / shopping services run
their own messaging service once you log in and any important messages about
your account will be shown here.
Examples
-
Free porn, Free Viagra / Offer to good to be true
email.
This email will offer you something for free or a product at
unbelievable prices. Be assured that it really will be to good to be true!
and the emails offering free porn will send you to a page that will contain
a virus. Remember there is no such thing as a free lunch!
4) Clear your Internet History and remove cookies on a
regular basis. Ever sat there wondering how fraudsters get your details? Every
time you visit a page, you store this information on your computer, cookies can
hold your email details, name or even passwords. Cleaver programmers can design
websites that look innocent but in the background they are reading this
information and storing it so that the next time you check your email you get a
message addressed to you with details of products that you have looked at
previously. Remember information is every thing on the net and so the less info
you give the harder it is for fraudsters to act.
How to clear your history.
5) Never pay by Western Union or similar money transfer
system for goods or services. This method of paying can not be traced if your
transaction goes wrong and is the most commonly used method for defrauding
people, so don't do it. If they don't use a service such as PayPal then keep
away.
6) Keep your virus software up to date and run a scan at
least once a week. I know it is tedious so schedule it to scan during your
favourite TV program or while you are eating. Allow for about 40 to 60 minutes
for a full scan depending on how many files you have on your computer.
7) Use a secure password - Do not be tempted to use a
common name or well known phrase when selecting a password. The safest type is a
combination of capital / small letters and numbers and should not be shorter
then 7 characters i.e. T78jH71
There are thousands of variations on the scams that I have
listed but almost all follow a pattern of :-
- Extracting money from you at
some point.
- Obtaining your Username & password details.
My golden rule is if you are not sure then leave it alone,
If you won a prize then why are you being asked to pay? and most important of
all - Use your common sense
Useful links to help prevent and learn about fraud on the
Internet :-
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