Those who want the easy way out of their weight problem easily get spammed. Many users have been victims and have lost money due to bogus offers that they received from emails. Before saying “yes” to any of these offers, it is best to establish the legitimacy of the sender, lest you fall into a trap. Many offers appear to be legitimate as con artists have improved their craft. The problem may be insignificant at the start, but could later blow up if left unchecked.

Weight loss claims which are sent through spam mail generally fall into two types. The first group consists of products such as creams, patches, pills or other items that promise weight loss, minus the need for a special diet or exercise. The second are products that boast about their ability of absorbing fat, calories or carbohydrates.

A New York-based study on weight loss spam mails revealed some interesting statistics. Twenty percent of young, overweight people say they have been victims of weight loss spam. Some other related results of the research placed overweight individuals more at risk to spam. Compared with other groups of respondents, more overweight individuals say that they receive spam that sells weight loss products. A good 42% of them say that they opened the emails, and 18% say that they bought the products sold. All of these figures are higher compared with other groups.

The increase in the number of malicious tools that brings disaster to the security of internet users is continuing. There are lots of issues about identity theft, security threats, viruses and other things that proliferate in the online community. One of the latest malicious tools is Firesheep, which can steal data, including passwords for email and social networking accounts.

Because of this disturbing condition, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Access is now campaigning for the international deployment of HTTPS through HTTPS Now. They are calling on users to join them in their crusade to improve security measures and make web surfing safer. One of their activities is spreading the word about HTTPS Now and how to take advantage of HTTPS security features by using it correctly.

HTTPS or Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure offers optimal protection by using encryption technology. A user’s request is encrypted before the browser sends it to the server. The resulting pages received from the server are also encrypted, making the data contained therein “unreadable” by anyone while it is being sent to the user’s computer. This makes web surfing more secure as compared to HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) alone. However, many websites are still using the HTTP, which is unencrypted and vulnerable to several kinds of threats.

You are about to know the truths about a new app that might put an end to internet privacy. Created by Yianni Kakavas, Creepy is a “geolocation information aggregator”. The potential impact of this application to privacy has raised concern among many privacy advocates. Read further to find out why this should be a cause for worry.

Creepy is an application package for Linux or Windows. The third package that is still in the process is intended for Mac OS X. As a geolocator, this app makes use of data from social networking services in order to pinpoint a user’s location. It gathers the information provided by the user to the network and puts these pieces of information together. Although relatively new in the internet, the software consistently shows its efficiency in doing the job.

Kakavas embedded a search utility in the app to find any individual of interest. A user can just input the Twitter or Flickr username of that person then hit the “Geolocate Target” button. What Creepy does is download all photos or tweets that the individual has provided online. From each of the downloaded materials, Creepy will look for the user’s location at the time the material was uploaded.

A cookie is a piece of text file composed of letters and numbers that are stored on a user’s computer when he or she accesses a website. It is also known as a browser cookie, web cookie, or HTTP cookie. This file is used by the browser to navigate the website more easily. The browser can use the cookie for authentication preferences, language settings, shopping cart contents, themes and more features that use text data.

A cookie may or may not have an expiration date. One that does not have an expiration date is automatically deleted as the browser is terminated. One that has an expiration date may be stored by the browser and deleted as the expiration date passes. Although a cookie itself does not hold information, it can help a website to function more fully.

Most cookies are stored in the browser’s cookie file. These contain the name of the server, its duration and the cookie value. The cookie value is a randomly generated number that makes the cookie unique. This cookie value is used by the server that created the cookie to remember the user when he or she comes back to the site, or to navigate through pages.

Google was plagued with federal charges after launching its networking service called the Buzz in February 2010. The charges were filed by individuals who did not like the way Google used their uploaded information. The complainants alleged that Google violated its own privacy policy and deceived users. The latest development regarding this issue is that Google agreed to improve its privacy program.

Buzz has the capability of automatically creating a public circle of friends, even without the user’s consent. The program was made a part of Google’s Gmail email service. The circle of friends is generated based on the user’s most frequently used Gmail contacts. Contrary to what Google expects, many users did not like the idea. Users pointed out that they did not want some of their contacts to be included. This circle is public in nature so anyone could see and have access to it. It is clear that users did not want their individual privacy intruded upon.

Google has agreed to the requirements set by the Federal Trade Commission. It has promised to study its existing services to look for provisions that pose privacy risks. All the company’s existing programs would be reviewed for any of these risks. In addition, Google would strictly scrutinize all new services before these are launched. Then, all necessary revisions would be done on the program and new policies would be developed as the need arises.

There is a strong need to engage lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) populations in health studies. This was reported by a committee at the Institute of Medicine. LGBT population data should be collected proactively. This means that this data should be readily available even before the need for health services arises. This will help the medical professionals and allied personnel to provide better services. What is important is that their personal information is already on file so that it would be easier to understand the specific health conditions that affect them.

As of now, there is very little comprehensive data on LGBT population health status and needs. Although they are given medical attention, the problem lies in the way they are being acknowledged. Still, these groups are being treated as a “single homogeneous group”. Due to the scarcity of complete data, the report suggested that health researchers should focus on how this gap could be bridged. Specifically, these should emphasize the different stages of life among the LGBT groups. Also, a clear outline and strategy for research and data collection should be put in place. The main objective is to gain a fuller understanding of these groups of population.

There should be a change of direction from being too general to more specific. It used to be that health researches concentrated on, say, race and ethnic minorities. This should be the right time to input research efforts not only on routine collection of information. There should be more emphasis on the understanding of different health conditions that are prevalent among various groups, or those that affect them in a different way.

To enhance the safety of school children, school bus drivers have to give up some of their personal privacy. They have to reveal any mental and physical health issues to their company. They also have to consent to random drug testing and list the medications that they are on before getting hired. Judge Bruce Fraser recommended the foregoing in the fatality inquiry report on the death of Kathelynn Occena in 2007.

Occena, a nine-year-old girl, was killed in a school bus accident on October 18, 2007. The vehicle driven by Louise Rogers veered off into a parked gravel truck then smashed into a power pole. This resulted in the death of Kathelynn and injury to three other children including her sister Julia. The four victims are studying at Mountain View Academy but shared a bus with Third Academy that day.

There was no indication that Ms. Rogers did it on purpose, as Judge Fraser wrote in his report. Authorities found no reason why the bus driver drifted onto the shoulder. Investigations revealed that the driver was recently hospitalized for mental health issues. She has been taking sleeping pills and antidepressants.

A 23 year-old man pleaded guilty to charges including computer intrusion, false impersonation and possession of child pornography. George Bronk was accused of violating the online privacy of women. He is about to serve six years in prison as promulgated by the state attorney general’s office. A probation officer wants him to serve four years instead.

Bronk was able to intrude into the Facebook accounts of some women. He would then search for nude or seminude photos and videos of these people that were sent either to their husbands or boyfriends. After finding these materials, he would forward these to the women’s contact lists.

The prosecutors ruled out that Bronk was stalking the women. Once he intruded their accounts he changed their email passwords. He was then able to control their accounts and at some time had some online exchanges with them. There were instances when he coerced at least one woman to send him some more of similar photos. He also threatened these women to distribute the pictures that he already had if they would not give in.