I was searching for something online when I came across a blog post on an AOL/AIM blog which announced the abrupt closing of AOL Hometown. As far as I know, AOL Hometown is a free webspace for AOL subscribers. I don’t subscribe to AOL though I use its instant messenger (AIM) but I do know of a couple of American friends who have AOL Hometown websites. I guess it’s easy to build.

Although this happened sometime in November, 2008, I feel compelled to blog about this because, frankly, I am very dismayed that AOL did not feel that they should at least inform users of this termination of service at least a week prior to closure so that users would have sufficient time to move their webpages to another host.

Well, I think that it’s bad form to do this, let alone expect AOL to assist Hometown users to host their photos and files elsewhere, many of these are MEMORIES of users who spent long hours building the website.

Until today since the closure of Hometown, I do not see if AOL did extend a helping hand in retrieving files for these affected users. I feel sad for them.

Using public facilities and features, we must always be prepared to wake up one day to find that our files are gone. Even though we may host our own webpages, and you would expect you webhost to back up their data regularly, it really boils down to us to back up our own webpages.

Hopefully, somehow, AOL Hometown users would be able to get ahold of their web files and rebuild their homepages on more reliable services.

I read that there is a new form of phishing. It’s not enough that we have to be on 24/7 alert when checking email, Facebook private messages and Twitter direct messages. It’s not enough that we are sometimes tricked into clicking links that came from “friends” via instant messages.

Now, there is phishing by VoIP and it is termed Vishing. A press release on Meadow Free Press has a very detailed article on how phishers could possibly harvest credit card numbers and we are told what goes on when a phishing VoIP call is in progress.

I guess we can not avoid getting phishing attempts aimed at us but we can safeguard ourselves when we do get these attempts by not disclosing our log in IDs, passwords, and very importantly, our credit card numbers.

Quite a few people fell victim to the on-going phone scam that promises to give us a VIP or backup card from “Menara KL” or “KL Tower”. If you believe that you have compromised your credit card number, call your issuing back and tell them to block the card and send you a replacement.

Source: Here

Just a few days ago, Twitter sounded an alert to Twitter users that there have been attempts to phish Twitter accounts for log in IDs and passwords via Twitter’s direct message. I personally did not receive any such Twitter messages purportedly from people we know. However, a few of my friends did receive these phishing messages but they knew about this alert so were not caught.

This morning, I read that US President-elect Barack Obama’s Twitter account was also hacked, besides those of celebrities like Britney Spears.

I have wondered why hackers and phishers would want the passwords to our Twitter accounts. Apparently they know that most of us use the same password EVERY website so I guess they will attempt logging in to websites like PayPal or eBay with these user IDs and passwords that they have harvested.

So how does one know his Twitter account has been hacked, or phished? When he is not able to log into his account. To rectify this, just reset password, and a new temporary password will be sent to the email that the owner has associated with Twitter UNLESS the hacker has changed this email address with his own. If that is the case, write in to Twitter.

My friend, who runs a large website in Malaysia, told me that it’s high time he backed up his server regularly. You see, right now, his whole livelihood depends on the smooth running of his website which also has various sub-sites from the same server. He said that he could not afford any downtime as it would jeopardize his income.

This afternoon, I came across this Business Continuity Recovery server backup software offered by Syncsort which I thought is most suitable for him, and people who are like him, making money online through their websites.

What I like about it is that it reduces backup time by up to 90% and at the same time, recovery is within minutes only. This fast server backup and recovery would surely worth the investment made on the data protection software.

Exabytes have been running a promotion lately where domain name registration through them is only RM28 a year. Of course, the rates go back to normal when you renew it but RM28 is pretty cheap right now. This is what you pay registering through Namecheap WITH coupon. Oh yes, I would like to mention that if you require Whois protection, it will be a separate fee. So, it will not be as low as RM28. SIGH!!!

I am a little tempted to register a new domain name but it’s still RM28, not as cheap as their previous promotion called Crazy Domain sale or something like that, where a domain name is only RM0.99. That was awesome, I tell you, and yes, I bought one then.

Even so, if you do not already have your own domain name and would like to register for one, this is a good time to do it, at a lower than normal rate. I have forgotten when this promotion ends, so you should check the website of Exabytes soon so as not to lose out on this offer.

I received a newsletter from TM this afternoon where they are running a promotion for cheap webhosting, charging only RM199 per year, instead of the usual RM299 per year.

I think that RM199 is pretty reasonable for a 12Gig webhosting space and unlimited email accounts. My own package right now is RM180 per year already. I wonder if TM has more features than what I have right now. I never bothered to ask, or compare, though.

TM says that they could activate a webhosting account within 24 hours and for subscribers who do not have a domain name registered yet, they could do it also for RM50 per year for a .com or RM80 per year for a .com.my domain name.

Only think I am concerned about, picking a webhost, is if personal technical support is provided. I don’t know much about webhosting and the technicalities that come with it so will occasionally have to S.O.S. my webhost. That’s why I always go with those that my friends recommend.