Ever been freaked out by an online ad that seemed to know you that little bit too well? It’s the result of good old advertisers tracking your net-navigating habits and delivering targeted commercials to your eyeballs, but it can be prevented. Both Google and Mozilla have stepped up (or perhaps been pushed by the FTC) to try and tackle this issue of pernicious tracking cookies, but they’ve gone about it in different ways. The Chrome solution is a Keep My Opt-Outs browser extension that remembers the sites you don’t want personalized information from, while Firefox will start beaming out a Do Not Track HTTP header that should be respected by advertisers and result in you receiving generic, repetitive ads. The important commonality between the two is that they don’t rely on you preparing a cookie file with all your anti-advertiser bile contained within it (which was the FTC’s original, somewhat impractical idea). Google intends to open-source its extension and bring it to other browsers as well, though obviously it’s taking care of Chrome first, which can benefit from the add-on right now.
141 horses is a good amount of power for an average sized car. That’s what the Mission Motors “Mission R” electric superbike is putting down in a package that’s the size of a 600cc road bike — An electric bike, naturally, gives you all that power right from 0 RPM. Get a glimpse under the fairing, at the trellis frame that bolts to the MissionEVT drivetrain ahead of the swingarm. There’s naturally a big hole ahead of that, where the battery slots. The aluminum plate you see is part of that, left in place here but normally yanked from the top with the rest of the cell pack.
To bring this amazing machine to market, Forrest North and his two co-founders, Edward West and Mason Cabot, have assembled a real dream team with incredible depth and experience and whose resumés list companies like Tesla Motors, Ducati and Google.
P O W E R T R AI I N
Battery Pack High Energy Lithium-Ion with Integrated Safety
Motor Liquid-cooled, 3 phase AC Induction
Torque 100 lb-ft @ Zero RPM
Transmission Single speed, #525 O-ring chain
C H A S S I S
Front Suspension Ohlins, 43mm inverted fork, fully adjustable
Rear Suspension Ohlins, single schock w/piggyback reservoir
Front Brakes Brembo forged 4 piston calipers.
Rear Brakes Brembo, 220mm disc; single-piston caliper
Wheels/Tires/Front Marchesini forged Al 3.5″x17″, 120/70Z
Wheels/Tires/Rear Marchesini forged Al 6.0″x17″, 190/55
T A R G E T P E R F O R M A N C E
Top speed 150mph
Range 150 miles per charge (Est. under EPA drive cycle)
Recharge Under 2 hours @ 240V (8 hours @ 120V)
Features: Adjustable regenerative braking,
Intuitive/adjustable data acquisition system
Skimmers applied to card readers (think fake card readers on top of the real ones) are designed to capture debit card magnetic stripe data, while tiny wireless cameras or overlays to existing personal identification number pads are designed to capture PIN information. Once thieves capture such data, they transfer this information to blank gift cards that will be used as if they were debit cards. or sell the information on the Internet to others. Then, This just happened to me
Here is what a skimmer looks like before it’s yanked off an ATM.
Are they easy to spot or virtually unnoticeable?“
See that gray rectangular box below? That box was attached to the lighting above the ATM screen. If you look closely, you see a small pinhole in that box? There is a camera in that box, aimed right down at the ATM keypad where people enter their pin codes.
Here’s this device pulled off, sitting on the ground upside down, to show you the camera, with its Sony Lithium-Ion battery powering it.
Here is the link to a tiny battery-powered video camera found through a simple Google product search.
Look like the same one to me.
The thing that gives this away as a skimming device is that the skimmer itself appears to be a part of what we call a Dip-Reader. A Dip Reader is where you slide your card in and out, like on the card reader you see in this below picture of a Shell Gas Station card reader:
The other type of Card reader we use is what we call a motorized reader, where you slide your card in, and the machine takes the complete card, and then ejects it when you’re done with your transactions.
From the pics of this location, they stuck the housing for a dip-reader onto an ATM that has a motorized reader. That’s a huge red flag.
Even though the standard customer service rep may have no idea how to respond to your call if you try to report a suspected tampering, the bank’s ATM security people will definitely want to know. If you end up talking to a standard CSR who doesn’t get what the big deal is, try to find a way to reach the bank’s security or fraud department instead.
Some PD will hold the device as evidence while our investigations unit tries to build a case and find out who was responsible, some PD simply destroy it, it seems to vary from one police department to the next.
Perform an A.T.M. Inspection Before swiping your card, look for tell-tale signs of skimmers like visible glue marks or residue around the reader or PIN pad, loose parts (tug on the card reader to see if it comes off . You want to inspect the card reader slots first and foremost, If there’s any residual of glue around the PIN pad area or around the card slot, there’s a pretty good chance there was skimming activity in the recent past.”
Perform an A.T.M. Area Inspection make sure there’s no miniature camera hidden in soda cans or cigerette packs ontop of the atm. Check the ceiling above the A.T.M. for such cameras as well. While legitimate security cameras for the banks will be clearly overt and visible, these cameras will be hidden and about three-fourths of an inch square in size, Mr. Pearce said.
Cover Your PIN When you type in your PIN use your other hand to shield the keypad to block it from video cameras hidden in the light above the keypad or elsewhere. This can also help protect your information from “shoulder surfers,” people who stand off to the side to try to record your PIN.
Know Which A.T.M.’s to Pay Special Attention To be extra vigilant and cautious when using A.T.M.’s at heavily trafficked areas like malls, airports and gas stations. In many cases, he said, skimming can go unnoticed in such locations because there aren’t any personnel monitoring the machines. In addition, if you’re having problems using a machine, avoid any offers from help from strangers. “They know you are having a problem because they caused the problem to take place in the first place,” noting that they would ask for your personal identification number as they try to enter your card.
