#recognizing phishing

[noob2networking]

Tech-Up Tuesday: Phishing 101 - How to Recognize and Avoid Email Scams

Welcome to Tech-Up Tuesday! 🎉 Today, we’re diving into the world of phishing and equipping you with the knowledge to recognize and avoid those sneaky email scams. But fear not, we won’t let these cyber tricksters get the best of us. Instead, we’ll tackle the topic with a humorous twist, using analogies and emojis to make it easy for even the most novice readers to understand. So, grab your…

[natbplease]

nvm

[anotherdayforchaosfay]

Cybercriminals are abusing Google’s infrastructure, creating emails that appear to come from Google in order to persuade people into handing over their Google account credentials. This attack, first flagged by Nick Johnson, the lead developer of the Ethereum Name Service (ENS), a blockchain equivalent of the popular internet naming convention known as the Domain Name System (DNS). Nick received a very official looking security alert about a subpoena allegedly issued to Google by law enforcement to information contained in Nick’s Google account. A URL in the email pointed Nick to a sites.google.com page that looked like an exact copy of the official Google support portal.

As a computer savvy person, Nick spotted that the official site should have been hosted on accounts.google.com and not sites.google.com. The difference is that anyone with a Google account can create a website on sites.google.com. And that is exactly what the cybercriminals did. Attackers increasingly use Google Sites to host phishing pages because the domain appears trustworthy to most users and can bypass many security filters. One of those filters is DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail), an email authentication protocol that allows the sending server to attach a digital signature to an email. If the target clicked either “Upload additional documents” or “View case”, they were redirected to an exact copy of the Google sign-in page designed to steal their login credentials. Your Google credentials are coveted prey, because they give access to core Google services like Gmail, Google Drive, Google Photos, Google Calendar, Google Contacts, Google Maps, Google Play, and YouTube, but also any third-party apps and services you have chosen to log in with your Google account. The signs to recognize this scam are the pages hosted at sites.google.com which should have been support.google.com and accounts.google.com and the sender address in the email header. Although it was signed by accounts.google.com, it was emailed by another address. If a person had all these accounts compromised in one go, this could easily lead to identity theft.

How to avoid scams like this

Don’t follow links in unsolicited emails or on unexpected websites.

Carefully look at the email headers when you receive an unexpected mail.

Verify the legitimacy of such emails through another, independent method.

Don’t use your Google account (or Facebook for that matter) to log in at other sites and services. Instead create an account on the service itself.

Technical details Analyzing the URL used in the attack on Nick, (https://sites.google.com[/]u/17918456/d/1W4M_jFajsC8YKeRJn6tt_b1Ja9Puh6_v/edit) where /u/17918456/ is a user or account identifier and /d/1W4M_jFajsC8YKeRJn6tt_b1Ja9Puh6_v/ identifies the exact page, the /edit part stands out like a sore thumb. DKIM-signed messages keep the signature during replays as long as the body remains unchanged. So if a malicious actor gets access to a previously legitimate DKIM-signed email, they can resend that exact message at any time, and it will still pass authentication. So, what the cybercriminals did was: Set up a Gmail account starting with me@ so the visible email would look as if it was addressed to “me.” Register an OAuth app and set the app name to match the phishing link Grant the OAuth app access to their Google account which triggers a legitimate security warning from no-reply@accounts.google.com This alert has a valid DKIM signature, with the content of the phishing email embedded in the body as the app name. Forward the message untouched which keeps the DKIM signature valid. Creating the application containing the entire text of the phishing message for its name, and preparing the landing page and fake login site may seem a lot of work. But once the criminals have completed the initial work, the procedure is easy enough to repeat once a page gets reported, which is not easy on sites.google.com. Nick submitted a bug report to Google about this. Google originally closed the report as ‘Working as Intended,’ but later Google got back to him and said it had reconsidered the matter and it will fix the OAuth bug.

[today-i-am-thinking-about]

fake phishing emails sent by company IT departments

[ms-demeanor]

This week we did our anti-phishing training at work and that's how I found out that nobody at the new company knew about cookiejacking either.

*screams forever*

Please use a password manager. Please use unique passwords. Please use MFA. Please learn to recognize phishing sites. Please check URLs.

[tobiasdrake]

I work in healthcare, which makes it critically important to protect our systems because we have. Like. All of the information you might want protected. Your financial data. Your personal data. Your medical history. Our system knows so much about you.

For this reason, the organization employs routine phishing traps against its own staff to keep everyone on their toes. We have a whole department for countering bad actors, and one of the things they do is send emails to employees pretending to be data thieves impersonating an outside contact.

If you fall for it, you get corrective action. If you fall for it too many times, termination. We can't have people who are going to leak patient information working in our critical administration.

...

Another thing the organization does is partner with outside contractor organizations to boost employee morale and offer various services.

So every now and then you'll get an email from the most random email address you've ever seen saying something like "YOU HAVE BEEN RECOGNIZED Click here to claim your $20 reward!" or "Are you on track to a healthier you? Click on this link to get started planning your road to a nutritious future."

And it's actually a legit thing the company is trying to do to boost employee morale.

...

The people running the organization genuinely cannot see the inherent contradiction of incentives here.

[willow-wispwolf]

The lore implications behind Martyn’s new rat are actually driving me insane. I've been obsessing over his rat for like an hour or five.

So, I know his rat is a part of his VTuber story cause of the scars

If you look at the designs, the scars are the same, except there are more as they go on. (I wonder if the eyepatch will stay for the rest of the lore)

The idea of him being back in the Rats world makes for a really interesting story cause I'm not sure if he'll see it as the same game or a sequel game. What makes it even better is that there are repeat characters from Rats 1. He doesn't look terribly different from his Rats 1 character, with the same hair, ears, and color scheme, so feasibly, characters like Trash Rat, Bek, El, Shelby, Will, or Tubbo could possibly recognize him. How will he interact with them?

I mean, it's clear that he's still the pun master, like his Rats 1 title. His favorite food being pie this time is cause he's a pie rat. Then, obviously, there's fishing and phishing. Phishing is clearly the punny synonym for his looting specialty from his previous Rat.

Then, the fact that he's a PI-RAT makes this even more interesting. Martyn's clothes look almost identical to his Pirates smp outfit. Maybe something happened because Doc wasn't responding, and so he got sent to the next world with some Pirates data still with him?

Oh yea and let's not forget the fact that he's the only rat who shares an occupation, and it's with REN

Y'all, I'm so ready for Rats smp 2

I wonder how many jokes about how in Pirates, we were rats in his boot, and now he's a pirate rat there's gonna be. We're gonna be flees in his boots.

[axeeglitter]

Back from the Vault: LifeX

Nathan Brown sat hunched over his desk, the glow of his laptop screen illuminating his tired eyes. His San Francisco apartment was a mess: clothes strewn across the floor, empty takeout containers stacked on the kitchen counter, and a half-empty coffee mug perched precariously on the edge of his desk. Nathan's bed was unmade, a tangled heap of blankets and pillows. The room smelled faintly of stale air and sweat, the result of a broken air conditioning unit and a lack of motivation to clean.

Nathan was staring at his laptop screen, scrolling through yet another round of job listings. His bank account was dangerously low, and the anxiety of unpaid bills was gnawing at him. He was 26 years old, recently graduated with a degree in communications, and he was struggling to find any kind of work. His YouTube channel, where he reviewed video games and shared walkthroughs, was his only source of income, but the revenue it brought in was barely enough to buy groceries, let alone pay rent or bills.

Nathan was average in build, with a light tan from his Latino heritage, and short, dark hair that he usually kept neat. His face was lightly stubbled, a sign of his growing indifference to grooming as stress took over. He sighed and rubbed his eyes, feeling the weight of exhaustion settle into his bones. He was on the brink of giving up when a notification popped up on his screen, breaking his focus.

"Subject: Exciting Opportunity for Collaboration!"

Nathan hesitated, then clicked on the email. It was from a company called LifeX. He didn’t recognize the name, but curiosity got the better of him.

“Dear Nathan,

We’ve come across your YouTube channel and believe we could work well together. LifeX is launching a groundbreaking new game, and we are looking for individuals to help us with beta testing and promotion. Your content aligns perfectly with our vision, and we think this could be a great collaboration. If you accept, you’ll also be able to help us optimize the AI of our games by creating your own NPC character, it’ll be later implemented in the game when it’ll be released. Of course, we offer financial compensation for your work.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Best regards, The LifeX Team”

Nathan’s first instinct was skepticism. It sounded too good to be true, and he’d heard horror stories of scams and phishing attempts. But the desperation for money overrode his better judgment. He quickly searched for LifeX online, finding only a sparse website filled with vague marketing speak about “immersive experiences” and “cutting-edge technology.” There were no reviews, no user testimonials, nothing solid. This should have been a red flag, but Nathan was too desperate to care. He needed this. He needed a break.

Nathan decided to respond. He typed out a quick reply expressing his interest. Almost immediately, another email arrived, containing a download link, setup instructions, and a NDA requesting his personal information: name, age, location, and other details. Nathan filled out the form, barely thinking about the potential consequences. He selected the longest trial period possible: one month, hoping it would give him enough content for his channel and enough time to determine if the collaboration was worthwhile.

As soon as he submitted the form, a melodic chime sounded from his laptop, followed by a smooth, professional voice:

“Thank you for signing up, Nathan. To begin your experience, you will first create the NPC character, and then you’ll be ready to start your experience in the environment you’ll choose. For the trial to run successfully, please ensure that your computer remains on for the entire duration of the test period: one month. Any interruption may result in data loss or corruption. Welcome to LifeX.”

Nathan frowned at the last part but shrugged it off. He figured it was just standard legalese, probably meant for immersion. The screen changed to a character creation window, displaying a basic human figure in a T-pose. Nathan leaned forward, curiosity piqued, and started customizing the avatar.

He named the avatar “Cody,” envisioning him as the polar opposite of himself. Cody would be everything Nathan wasn’t: confident, athletic, and effortlessly cool. He adjusted the height to 6'4", pushed the muscle sliders to the maximum, giving Cody bulging biceps, a broad chest, and thick, powerful legs holding a perfectly muscled ass. From the corner of his eyes, Nathan spotted a slider on the groin area. He laughed as he understood he could also determine how big he could adjust Cody’s penis and balls. Smiling, he selected the largest option possible for his dick and added a huge heavy pair of balls to go with it, watching it grow in proportion to the rest of his body. He added bright hazel eyes, bushy eyebrows, and messy dark brown hairs that would contrast perfectly to the pale sun kissed skin.

After the body customization, Nathan saw a new window open: Clothes and accessories. After thinking about it, he chose a pair of denim shorts that ended mid-thigh, showing off Cody’s muscular legs. Nathan opted for no T-shirt, exposing Cody’s ripped torso and added a ripped sleeve shirt opened on his muscled hair pecs. He then moved on to accessories and decided to put a loop earring on his right ear and a silver chain around his neck.

After the customization was done, it was asked for Nathan to enter some information about the NPC he just created to create a base behavior for him. After a while, Nathan decided to go for the stereotypical fratbro behavior to go with the appearance he just did. He started typing, adding details about Cody’s lifestyle. He entered notes in the behavior interface: “Cody is dumb as a brick. He loves gym, training and being barefoot, feeling the ground under his calloused feet.” He laughed as he added another line: “Cody never takes showers, loves the smell of his own musk, enjoys sniffing his hairy armpits after a workout and scratching his big dick every couple of minutes after what he smells them and always smile enjoying his own musk.” Nathan chuckled, amused at the thought of creating such a ridiculous character. It was so far removed from his real life that it seemed like a fun NPC to talk and interact with. Just a dumb easy-going character that is always down for a fuck and a drink after a gym session barefoot in the woods.

Satisfied with his creation, he confirmed the settings. The game prompted him to select a location, and he chose the Secluded Forest Realm, envisioning Cody as a carefree physical trainer just out of college living in a cabin in the wilderness.

The screen went black for a moment, and the professional voice returned: “Now that your character is complete, it’s time to play! Please keep your computer running at all times to maintain synchronization. Any interruption may lead to data corruption. Enjoy your month-long experience, Nathan, and welcome to LifeX.” Nathan was really getting excited now. He conder what kind of character he would create for himself when he saw a flash of light on the screen. It looked like some kind of swirling mesh, almost like a blackhole. For a moment Nathan thought it was kind of a cool effect, but everything changed when he went to grab his half drink cup of coffee sitting next to him only to realize his right hand was tingling and tiny particles were escaping his nails, flying straight to his screen.

A sudden wave of fatigue hit Nathan, and the lights in his apartment flickered briefly. A sense of unease washed over him, making the hairs on his arms stand up. Before he could react, the tingling sensation spread from his fingertips up through his arms. He stared in disbelief as his fingers began to dissolve into streams of glowing white code, spreading quickly across his body. He tried to scream, but his voice caught in his throat. His vision blurred as the Life X logo was pulsing in bright light in the center of the screen with a loading bar under it going up further and further. The last thing he saw was the 100% before everything went black.

Nathan found himself suspended in a void. He was floating, naked, surrounded by darkness. Panic set in, his heart racing as he tried to move, but his body was frozen in a T-pose. The sensation was bizarre, as if he were trapped in a dream. He wanted to call out, but his voice was muffled, like shouting underwater. The smooth, professional voice returned, echoing through the void:

“Welcome to your new life, Nathan. Don’t panic; this process is normal and painless. In a few moments, you will begin your ideal life in the Secluded Forest Realm. Relax and feel calm. Avatar synchronization will begin in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…”

“What the fuck, where am I? What is going on? Why can’t I move?! HELP!!” thought Nathan as he tried to scream even though his face remained frozen.

Nathan’s body suddenly stiffened. A pressure built inside him, starting at his core and spreading outward. His bones stretched and cracked, lengthening to match Cody’s new height. His arms and legs grew longer, muscles bulging and expanding to fill out his new form. Nathan could feel his muscles tearing and healing at an accelerated rate, becoming stronger and more defined with each passing second.

His skin began to tighten, smoothing out imperfections and leaving with a perfectly smooth skin all around his muscled body. Nathan would be screaming if his voice mas not muted. Everything was burning and it was like feeling his DNA being rewritten while still being conscious. As he felt tears rising up his eyes, a new sensation invaded his newly modified skin. In his pits, legs and between his pecs, he felt like thousands of needles were piercing holes. The sensation was only multiplied as he started to feel hair sprouting from the holes. They were dark brown and thick but worst, the sensation of piercing needles started to appear around his groin too. Still wondering what was happening to him, Nathan tried to connect the elements he could find and that when he realized. The secluded forest, the muscles, the hair; that was Cody’s information, which means… Just enough time to understand what was happening to him when the hair started to sprout in abondance around his dick and nuts and climbing up his sculpted abs in a thin happy trail. After the hair, the modifications started to appear on his face. His jawline becoming sharper and more angular, his cheekbones more pronounced. His lips filled out, becoming more defined, while his eyebrows grew thicker, framing his eyes. His vision sharpened, colors becoming brighter and more vivid. His brown eyes shifted to a bright hazel as he lost vision for a moment. Everything was happening all at once and still, Nathan felt like it was an eternity of pain.

Nathan’s hair thickened, turning into soft, dark strands that fell casually over his forehead. His ears reshaped slightly to match his new head structure. A sensation of warmth spread through his throat as his vocal cords tightened, his voice box reshaping. When he tried to speak, his voice was deeper, richer, and carried a slight accent, a relaxed, Western drawl.

Nathan felt a growing warmth in his groin and realized what was about to happen now. All of a sudden, he regrated giving Cody such a big dick and heavy nuts. His cock thickened and lengthened, becoming larger than Nathan had ever been. He could feel the veins snaking down his growing dick as his cock head started to grow thicker and bigger. He could feel the cold air surrounding him as the head sneaked out of his foreskin. Wait, his foreskin? He didn’t remember going this far in details. His nuts fall down and grew thicker and full of potent cum as he could feel them going overload working on creating new manly sperm nonstop. Nathan could feel the horniness starting to rise as his body was assaulted by huge amount of testosterone. A drop of precum appeared at the tip of his cock as he could feel the weight of it between his legs, an odd sensation that both embarrassed and intrigued him. His buttocks tightened, becoming firm and lifted, while his thighs and calves thickened with muscle.

The transformation was almost complete when Nathan felt a sharp pain on his left pec. He wanted to scream, but his body was still frozen. The pain was like a branding iron pressing into his skin. “What is this?!” screamed Nathan in his new deep voice. A voice appeared from all around him “Dear user: NATHAN BROWN, as talked with you earlier on, you agreed to review and help us create the new generation of AI used for our NPCs. For that, your character, CODY, will have to be monitored. This assignation, XXIV, is the link to your identity and allow us to track your character. Please relax as your actions will be tracked and then saved. The program will make sure to copy all your movements, thoughts and everything that your character, CODY, might do to make sure to copy human mechanism that will be implemented in our NPCs later on. Thank you for your service.” When it subsided, a Roman numeral tattoo “XXIV” was there, bold and black, as if it had always been part of him. Nathan could feel the tattoo pulsing with energy, as if it was more than just ink on skin.

As his body finished transforming, clothes materialized around him. He now wore a sleeveless, open checkered flannel shirt and a short pair of denim shorts. Then he felt his ear being stabbed as the earing appeared in it and the coldness of the silver metal appeared around his neck. His feet then started to tingle as Nathan could feel the skin of his sole getting thicker and denser to better serve his barefoot lifestyle in the forest.

Nathan was terrified about what he just heard; his humanity was going to be used to program AI that will be implemented in NPCs. How is that even possible? Does that mean he was Cody now? And for a whole month? He didn’t agree to this. He had a life outside, friends, job to find, maybe some interviews if he was lucky. And about the bills? What was he going to do?

As all the questions were swirling in his head, Nathan fell the restriction holding his body in place as it was being modified lift. He could move on his own again, and the first thing he tried to do was take of his shirt or necklace. But every tug on the clothes or metal fell like he was trying to rip a part of him away. The clothes were part of him now. Nathan started to feel tears rise once again in his ears as all he could see around him were the infinite void of this artificial world. “Modification process terminated, Assimilation to the realm starting in 3,2,1…” Out of nowhere, the ground started to shake under Nathan’s barefoot. Then he saw light pierce through the ceiling. As a reflex, he put his hands to cover his bright hazel eyes but the light was way too bright. Nathan could see entire walls of darkness vanish and being obliterated by this bright light coming from above and fear started to raise in him. Nathan closed his eyes as all he could see was the infinite light engulfing the void and him with it. When he opened his eyes, Nathan was alone in a cabin in the woods, standing in front of a mirror. For the first time, he could see from the first person point of view what the body he created really looked like. Everything was looking so life like, even scent of pine and dirt were coming from the opened window next to him. He could smell the woods, feel the sun on his skin, the wood under his foots. Everything was lifelike. As Nathan sight started to look what his transformed body looked like, his head started to spin. Nathan grabbed it with his two manly hands but the pain was growing stronger. And in the blink of an eye, Nathan was no more. Cody stared at his reflection before smiling and flexing his biceps while smiling. His right hand lowered to get inside his shorts and scratch his hairy dick before putting his fingers under his nose to smell his musk. Cody laughed as he walked away, grabbing a snack on his way out to go exercise a bit in the nature.

“New NPC starting test phase. Remaining time 30 days, 23 hours 59 minutes 23 seconds. Behavior analysis… Acting following user NATHAN BROWN encoding. Tester assimilation… Assimilation stable, user will turn back when tests are over.”

______________________________________________________________ Hey guys! Here's another story back from the Vault, and it's my first ever published story: LifeX Hope you guys enjoy this new version of my story. Let me know what you think of it. As always, my asks are open and i'm always looking for new ideas and prompts from you. I try to answer them all and I love to read your ideas so please, don't be afraid to send anything you'd like me to write and I'll do my best to do it :) Take care of yourself! P.S. A follow up to this story should arrive soon ;)

[sophisticatedpjparty]

PSA for my fellow artists

Please be aware of a paypal scam going around right now!

Tonight I received messages from a "commissioner" asking me to draw a picture of her and her son. She offered me a large amount of money for my work, which leads me to my first point:

Always ask for payment upfront from new customers!

Doing so protected me from losing time (and potentially a lot of money) working on a piece for a scammer.

She claimed she was willing to pay extra for the work to be "finished as soon as possible". In hindsight, this is one of many common ways scammers create a false sense of urgency so you don't have time to think critically about what they're asking.

Secondly, she asked for the email used for my paypal. She claimed it was for sending payment, but this was actually a method for sending a scam email later, claiming that there was an issue with her payment requiring me to "refund" her $200. This is when I was able to confirm that it was a scam, stopped, and reported the email and the tumblr account. Had I not blocked her she likely would have continued to insist that she'd made a payment or possibly even threatened to take action against me if I didn't refund her money I never received, again, another common way scammers create a false sense of urgency and panic.

But other artists may not be so lucky, or know how to recognize these kinds of phishing schemes, so I thought making this post could be helpful!

Warning signs:

1. She asked for my pricing information and email through DMs, rather than reading my pinned post or using my carrd when directed to, things a legitimate customer would know to do.

2. The email was from "service paypal" (instead of just "paypal") and was in my spam folder.

3. The email used an impersonal greeting. All official paypal emails will begin by addressing you by name. It also contained a handful of grammatical errors that might be missed at first glance, especially if the scammer has successfully created a sense of panic.

4. The email claimed that due to the large size of the payment, the transaction could not be completed until an additional $200 payment was made from the customer that should be "refunded" to them once "made". This is blatantly untrue and an extremely unprofessional/sketchy practice a legitimate business like paypal would never use.

In my case, it claimed that it was part of the process of creating a business account- business accounts are free to create, however, and I already have a store page.

5. Most importantly: I never received any payments or notifications through paypal's official app or website.

Scammers will send you fake screenshots of their payments to attempt to convince you that they've spent or lost money and that it's your responsibility to help them get it back. Don't believe it. They're just trying to get you to "compensate" them for an issue that never occurred, by any means necessary. If there was any genuine issue with their payment, they could work with paypal or contact their bank to cancel the transaction or refund them. If you never recieved any payment, you don't owe them anything. It's not your job to "refund" them.

If you encounter a scam like this, block, report, and change your paypal password for good measure.

I got lucky, I didn't lose any money or get scammed, I only wasted a few minutes talking to her before I recognized it for what it was and stopped interacting. Sometimes, however, even if you recognize that something is a scam, just opening the email and viewing any attachments may potentially compromise your information. Never click any links in an email like this.

Below are screenshots of the email I recieved, which I'll be sharing for awareness purposes.

I'd also like to include this page from Paypal's website about the common signs of a phishing scheme:

Take care out there and look out for eachother! Please continue to spread awareness about these kinds of scams when you see them so your favorite artists can stay safe and informed.

I'll be updating some of my commission guidelines later to account for situations like this in the future.

Thank you for reading!

[whumpdoyoumean]

Whumptober #28

A/N: This is set post-season 4 and so has vague references/spoilers for that.

xxx cctv

Lamb stares out at the team from behind his desk, a blank but somehow still deadly expression on his face. They've all been standing here, crowded in Lamb's office, for a silent and uncomfortable minute while they wait for him to explain why they've been summoned.

"Where the fuck is Cartwright?" he finally says.

Louisa has to fight the urge to roll her eyes. "He's probably just running late."

Lamb's lip curls. "Hmm. It's as though he doesn't value his employment here."

"I can try calling him," Louisa says, already pulling out her mobile. Lamb tsks.

"Don't bother. It's not that important, and if it were, it may be for the best that he's not here, anyway."

"So..." Roddy ventures after another length of silence, "if it's not that important then why've you called us all in here?"

Lamb snorts. "I don't fucking know anymore." He gestures lazily toward the door. "You can go. I'm sick of looking at all your faces."

"Fuck's sake," Shirley mutters under her breath as they all shuffle out into the hall, and it's hard to blame her.

Ever since, well, everything – with Frank, Coe and Patrice, Bad Sam, Cartwright Senior, Marcus...The mood in Slough is grimmer than ever. She'd never say it, but Louisa thinks she probably wouldn't be surprised if River just decided to stop coming to work.

They've just gotten out of Lamb's office, Shirley slamming the door behind her, when Louisa's mobile buzzes in her hand, at the same time that Shirley's chimes. Roddy's goes off too – a high, breathy moan emanating from his back pocket. Louisa and Shirley both make faces.

"Grow up," Louisa says at the same time that Shirley says, "You're foul!"

Roddy shrugs. "You're both just jealous that I've got a girlfriend."

Louisa sighs, shaking her head, and pulls up the email that just came in. The subject line reads, in all caps, YOU'RE NOT GOING TO WANT TO MISS THIS.

"What the fuck? 'You're not going to want to miss this'?" Shirley says, and Louisa's gaze snaps up to her.

"Is that what your message says?"

Shirley makes a face, turning slightly and holding her phone closer as if Louisa were trying to spy on her. "Yeah?"

"I got the same one," Louisa says.

Coe holds his phone up, the screen facing out. "Me too."

"It's a phishing scheme," Roddy sighs, sounding bored.

Louisa ignores him and opens the message. "All there is is a link."

"Definitely phishing," Roddy says. "You don't click on strange email links. Everyone knows that; this is basic stuff, babes."

"The same phishing link to all of us at the exact same time?" Louisa raises an eyebrow. "You don't think that's a little bit weird?"

"Fuck it, I'm opening it," Shirley says and then, a few seconds later, "Oh, shit."

Louisa thinks, for a second, that she's joking, pulling Roddy's leg, but then she looks over and sees the pale, wide-eyed expression on Shirley's face. Whatever she just opened, it's serious.

"See?" Roddy is saying, the smirk evident in his voice. "I told you, you stupid--"

"Roddy, shut the fuck up!" Shirley snaps, then looks at Louisa. "You'd better open it."

Louisa is already clicking the link.

The video is the slightly grainy black-and-white of CCTV footage. She recognizes the place; it's only a few streets from Slough. River is there, standing on the corner waiting for the light to change.

"What is th--" she begins, but the question dies in her throat and she nearly drops her phone.

The footage shows River crossing the street, making it halfway through the crosswalk before a car speeds into frame and collides with him. He goes up onto the hood, his body cracking the windshield, before rolling back onto the ground. And then it gets worse, because three people get out and it's immediately obvious, by the masks and gloves, that they aren't getting out to help. They drag River into the car before it takes off again.

"Oh, my god."

Someone had targeted River specifically, had known his route to work and timed it so that they would be nearby when he used that particular crosswalk. They'd hit him deliberately, knowing that the cameras would catch all of it. The fact that they'd been able to get a hold of the footage and send it to the Horses' emails speaks to a level of planning and access that makes Louisa feel sick to her stomach; whatever they've got in store for River, it can't be good.

She turns, is about to yell for Lamb, when his office door bursts open. Louisa can tell by the look on his face that he's seen the footage, too. Likely anything that's crossed her mind has crossed his, too. He looks ready to bust heads.

"Ho, get down to your office, now. Find me that car."

Roddy blinks. "What--" He looks over Louisa's shoulder at her mobile, where the video is playing on loop. "Oh, shit."

"Move!" Lamb barks.

Roddy nods, hurrying toward the stairs. "On it, boss."

"There are other people in that video, which means witnesses. Someone will've talked to the police. Guy, Dander, go down to the station and get whatever information you can from them. I wanna know everything they know. As soon as you two are finished, come straight back here."

"Right," Shirley says with a wide-eyed nod, heading for the door. "Louisa, you coming?"

Louisa forces herself to look away from her mobile, darkening the screen and shoving it into her back pocket. Even though she's not watching it anymore, the video keeps playing in her mind, the image of River being hit by the car and then dragged away stuck on repeat.

"Yeah."

"Guy," Lamb says, and Louisa turns. He fixes her with a serious stare. "I'm trusting that you can stay focused. That footage was sent with the intent to rattle."

Of course I'm fucking rattled, Louisa doesn't scream. She thinks it, though, and it's obvious that Lamb can tell.

"If I get the sense that your head's not on straight, I'll bench you without a second thought," he says.

"I've got it," Louisa says. It takes everything she has not to hiss it through grit teeth.

Lamb doesn't look fully convinced, but nods. "Go on, then."

xxx

River doesn't know what's going on. He doesn't know where he is, or who brought him here or why. He doesn't know how long he's been here, either, since he's been unconscious for bits of it. What he does know is that his right leg is fucked. There are other aches and pains throughout his body – bruising and scrapes from where the car had hit him, and where he'd hit the pavement. But his leg is by far the worst, a sharp, sickening throbbing from his knee down that makes him want to crawl out of his body. He hasn't broken a bone since that time he fell out of a tree as a boy, but he remembers the incident well enough to be able to recognize this particular kind of hurt.

He also knows, from the tiny red light blinking high on the wall across from him, that he's on camera. And whenever there's an especially nasty jolt of pain, he remembers that someone is watching, and he grits his teeth and doesn't make a sound.

xxx to be continued...

[pureshadough]

hey btw since this is prevalent as fuck lately if you ever see someone's art reposted by one of those bots in the maintags don't click any of the "read more" links (it's phishing), just hit report post, block the account n let any artists you recognize know

[zoobus]

Like maybe I'm overthinking the people laughing at that last post but this isn't leopard face eating (a sentiment that i feel has a tendency to turn people's brains off). Everybody knew there weren't enough physical office desks before they mass stopped federal remote work - that was an issue before 2020.

The reason they're making thousands of people suddenly come into work regardless of logistics or their ability to get work done, the reason they send illogical emails on Saturday nights demanding responses from the entire workforce within 48 hours, the reason the Loser sends tweets stating if you don't answer those vague emails that look like phishing scams you're fired (and your leadership only able to confirm this isn't true eight hours before the deadline) is because they know the average person capable of getting a less poisonous job will. People recognize these guys fucking with their livelihood aren't likely to stop anytime soon and opt out. There will be stalwarts but there will be people who can't afford the risk of the coming bullshit when it's already this bad.

It's not efficient but that's not the point - it's to make them leave en masse. The administration does not care you noticed their hypocrisy, we are long past 2000s Daily Show-era political snarking

[lookismaddict]

Kouji + Reader (Sister) Headcannons

A/N: This is a familial relationship between you and Kouji. Don't be weird about it lol.

Kouji can be a mean brother who teases his sister a lot, but he tries not to overdo it

He's recognized as the genius kid of the family, and he would point that out to you as if that were obvious. But, he also tries not to do it often and he doesn't want you to feel insecure about it since he still cares about you.

Kouji is super protective over you, especially whenever you use his computer at home

One day, you were curious, wondering why he’s always so addicted to using his PC (computer in the day, computer at night) so you decide to snoop through his computer when you got home from school before him

While passing through his login on his computer, you look through his desktop on his computer and you find normal files relating to school, gaming applications, and… a spreadsheet document that’s titled “Money Log”, which you don’t find too suspicious. (He’s just a teen who wants to properly organize his money. How is that suspicious? 🤔)

Nothing seems to catch your eye, so you decided to look deeper by going through his history of accessed documents, files, and software installations

You noticed a software installation called “VPN” and a folder that says “Private” on there. But, his private folder was locked and it was under password authorization

While you were still trying to figure out his password, Kouji would catch you right when he came home from school and ask you what you were doing on his computer with a stern face, trying to hide his nervousness. However, when you cut him off and asked about how you so happened to find a “Private” folder on his PC, he immediately admitted that it was p*rn for you to shut up about it. (Is he really telling the truth though? You can't tell.)

Obviously, Kouji can also be secretive towards his sister, but also wary of what he does online and at home whenever you decide to crash and hang out in his room

The both of you would often play PC games together like horror games like "Welcome to the Game" (totally up his alley), Minecraft, Roblox, Valorant, etc. He usually does the game controls for you, while you sit there with him and watch him do all of the work. But, if you ask him if he can take control of the gameplay, he lets you but he teases you by saying, "You suck at this." which then leads to a never-ending banter between you two.

However, you don't just play PC games together, but also multi-player mobile games like Genshin Impact (he doesn't want to admit to you that this is his favorite game), Among Us (yes on mobile), and Stardew Valley.

Whenever you guys are bored together, you'd go on weird websites like Omegle or Chatroulette. Often times, he'd try and hack the other person on the other side of the screen ("just for fun" he says) and you had to scold him and try to convince him not to do it for the sake of the poor person on the other side. Most of the time, he just ignores you and just does it anyway. He justifies his own actions as some sort of necessary justice by pointing out, "See? These people are sick, just look at them! Nasty old geezers..."

You noticed how he's a Discord addict who's a part of a bunch of servers online with various aliases. He's a Discord mod for many servers, whether those servers serve as a purpose for gaming and hacking communities. But most of the servers he's on, he mostly hacks into them to troll people online through phishing links and sends random files in group chats that are actually malicious.

You have a strong feeling that he occupies his time doing something more than just trolling online users and playing video games. Since he's so good at hacking and online security, you have to admit that your brother is a technical genius. If that's the case, then you would assume that his hacking capabilities might exceed more than just surface web level. Even if that possibility might lean towards him exploring the Dark Web. (He's your brother. Of course, he would.)

Sometimes whenever he would take a break from using his computer all day doing God knows what, he would join you on the couch and watch a horror movie or a game show

While watching that movie/game show, he would criticize the show or movie by saying, “They are so dumb. I mean, why can’t they just run?” or “Why can’t they get such a simple question right? Are they stupid?” And your only answer for him is: “They just aren’t as smart as you, Kouji.” and your responses always boosts his ego, even if your replies were a bit sarcastic

While watching TV together, he would often eat candies or sweets and he would share them with you

In the living room whenever you two are free from homework or just so happened to be bored, you'd challenge him to play Super Smash Bros. on the Switch. And every single time, he'd mostly beat you in every single round by using his favorite character to fight: Ness (Of course he would use him. I call this canon.)

While playing Super Smash Bros, he would call you out for choosing weird characters to fight like Isabelle, the Villager from Animal Crossing, the Pirahna Plant, and even the Wii Fit Trainer (YES, THE FUCKING WII FIT TRAINER.), and he would call all of them weak. "What the hell? Out of all of the characters you chose, you decided to fight as them? No wonder you died so quickly." His insults didn't stop you from challenging him for rematches.

Whenever you ask him to help you on your homework, he would begrudgingly help you. (Basically, you’re the only person who he would help without blackmailing or without charging you with anything in return for his service.)

Kouji would eat the treats you bake, whether that be cookies, cakes, and other desserts. Especially, the strawberry cakes that you'd make and you would share it with him.

Whenever you mention a boy or a male friend, he would seem very nonchalant about it and dismiss the subject. But you wouldn’t know that he would do research on the poor boy, social engineer to hack into that boy’s accounts (financial accounts or not), and commit cyberattacks on him (viruses, DDoS attacks, phishing, etc.)

Whenever the both of you end up in an argument, you apologize a few days later by sneaking into his room and place sweets on his desk with a bottle/can of grape soda in front of his computer with a little note that usually says small messages like, "Truce? :)" or "I'll give you this peace offering if you let me off the hook." and he would usually accept the gifts and reluctantly eat them.

You would dye his hair purple for him, whenever he asks you to do it and recolor his hair once in a while.

As siblings, you'd do each other a solid at home with the typical "you owe me" exchange. This is your own little way of showing how much you care and look after each other.

You're aware that Kouji has a job, since you caught him one day with a check in his hand that had a bunch of 0's for its amount. You asked him, "Where'd you get that from?" and he would simply say, "My job."

You were a bit shocked to hear that he has a job so your conversation with him ended up being sarcastic and blunt. This is how it went:

"What job?"

"The job that I work for."

"No shit. I meant, where do you work at?"

"Some company."

"Some company? Bullshit. And they'd actually hire someone as young as you? You're barely 16."

"And? The other people that they've interviewed before me were all a bunch of idiots in the first place."

"Huh... I guess that makes sense."

Finally, you two left it at that and decided to never tell your parents about it. After all, what are siblings for anyways?

[dragonmarquise]

So rumor has it, the current Teraleak for Pokemon stuff only happened because a Game Freak employee fell for a phishing scam. More specifically, the employee was supposedly using their work email to try and sign up for porn sites.

It's ridiculous enough that it's prrrrobably not true. But if it is true, three things to point out:

I will be shocked if the employee somehow doesn't end up fired. Like, Game Freak and Nintendo are gonna be looking into this to figure out how it happened in the first place, right??

I think it's also a safe bet that Game Freak are gonna make all their employees go through training and stuff to recognize phishing emails. My own job does refresher announcements and meetings to remind us every couple of months.

ffs don't use you work email for anything outside of work, porn or not!! Hell, don't even use your personal email imho, still feels too risky. At least be smart and make a burner email for that kind of thing. :x

[rivkae-winters]

Regarding lore.fm, an interaction with the creator through tiktok dm's

Apologies for potentially messy writing I was upset on receipt of this message and still am regarding the topic.

On the subject of lore.fm I was composing a post starting yesterday regarding the dm interaction below and their new TOS but the app is live far ahead of when I thought it would be. Since I feel I made good points regarding the TOS I’ll upload my post later tonight but I wanted to get this portion of the post up as soon as possible. Here’s the brief incident I had in direct messages with the official lore.fm account on TikTok.

I sent my initial message at 8:06pm CST on 5/10/24-

My initial post on tumblr was made on 5/10/24 at 11:01pm CST, I followed this up with a reblog later at

I apologize for the unsightly nature of the screenshots, they were left unedited for obvious reasons. I am aware of my phone's battery percentage in the clarifying screenshot I took just now- I know it's rough I need a new charger. Additionally my apologies for my screen reader square, it drives me nuts too, I just need to keep it at that opacity or I can't find it when my eyes start skipping around.

Transcription of this conversation:

Me: Hi, I'm an author on ao3 and me and several of my fellow authors are highly wary of your product. Further more where can I provide my official email that I wish to retract my written works from this service.

[time: 5/11/24 4:40am CST

lore.fm: hello! The email address is team at lore dot fm. Also, I've been made aware by a follower that someone with a similar username as yours on tumblr may be falsely claiming that we are a phishing scam "because of info on who.is." We use namecheap which provides domain privacy protection services and hides the personal information of the buyer to protect them and instead shares an Icelandic address. See info here: https://www.namecheap.com/blog/domain-privacy-is-changing-at-namecheap/ Every person or organization who buys a domain on namecheap can buy that same privacy protection which is why there are thousands of sites registered with the same address. We aren't affiliated with any scams, cyber criminal activity, or phishing that also use namecheap to buy domains. When the app is out we'll let people know they can search it up if they feel unsafe clicking links as well. Hope that's helpful, and thank you for understanding and not sharing libelous information against us! 

To break from the seriousness for a second: Hi lore.fm- I hope you enjoy this post just as much as the last one!

In my opinion and to my limited knowledge this was in response to a reblog I made to my initial post calling for a warning that lore.fm had the warning signs of a phishing scheme (in my opinion) and as best I could recognize them. To give an insight into how I garnered this opinion purely email collection based websites, as well as entities with a very short history online (lore.fm's website was only established on May 3rd 2024) requesting your email is highly suspicious. Once again that is all in my opinion based on my own education and the background I have in Computer Science.

I am not going to be responding on the matter they direct messaged me on as that matter is best handled offline. I am stating my opinion on the matter that my initial message was asking about.

They still did not answer my question or provide me what I direct messaged about in the first place: the email written out fully in a way that is unambiguous and serviceable as an admittedly casual proof in writing. I had messaged initially with a desire to have a clear clarification of their policies on authors revoking their consent for their work to be used in writing rather than the much more ambiguous audio. I especially, as stated above, wanted the team@lore.fm email written out in the proper way you'd type it into an email address bar.

In my opinion this response to my question, just over two days after, was in bad faith.

I am sharing this direct message since they have no reasonable expectation of privacy. They've positioned themselves in a public manner as a public figure and as a inseparable part of the brand 'lore.fm'. Everything I have shared is associated with 'lore.fm' and not the individual behind it.

In this scenario I am a consumer and in my opinion lore.fm is a company or at least they should (in my opinion) have the legal registration as such. To my knowledge having your business registered prior to advertising to the public is helpful in cases of defamation. To my knowledge as well not having a registered entity as the subject of alleged defamatory speech would make for a difficult case.

[heliopauseentertainments]

I received a weird ask with a phishing link in it that was both anonymous and from an account that I don't recognize. The user seems to just be an artist, so I'm wondering if their account got hacked. Anyone else seen something like this?