After Amsterdam, Groningen and The Hague were launched on Google Street View, yesterday Mister G launched a great number of other cities in The Netherlands. This meant a lot of folks were searching for the funny shots they could find. One great tourist attraction of The Netherlands is the Red Light District of Amsterdam. And although this is the best known outside of Amsterdam, there are many more red zones throughout The Netherlands.

Prostitution in The Netherlands is legal. I’m not always particular proud of the fact that almost all people outside of The Netherlands start asking me about the way prostitution is legalized. First thing in a conversation when you say you are from Holland, is probably marihuana, porn or prostitution. Nevertheless, here are some screenshots from the red light districts around The Netherlands found on Google Street View.

Red Light District Eindhoven

In Eindhoven, you could find a DHL delivery man taking a break at the red zone. I highlighted the address in the different screenshots.

Between the trees, you can clearly see the red and yellow uniform. Red and Yellow are the DHL colors.

He is walking towards the entree/exit of the red light zone in Eindhoven…

Where his large DHL red/yellow truck is parked at the entrance. Do you think he was delivering something…?

Red Light District Deventer

In Deventer, a whole street has been photographed in the red light district.

It must have been on a warm day, as a number of the ladies have their door wide open. Maybe they do this to make it more inviting to enter, as it seems to be pretty slow this day.

Or did the men know that Google Street View car was passing by today? I bet these guys didn’t…!

The ladies are bored. They are either calling on their cell phones, or taking a nap in the chair behind the window.

In the window you can even see a reflection of the grey Google car making all the photo’s.

Red Light District The Hague

Only one picture of the Red Light zone in The Hague, but somebody would probably whished he stayed at work that particular day. The picture is probably clear enough for anybody who knows the man calling on the left side to recognize.

On a blow up version, you can see more, although I decided to make his face unrecognizable.

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What If You Were Snapped On Street View Walking The Red Light District

The Real Truth About GMail Security.

How Safe Is Your Email?

Short excerpt: Below are three examples why you should not use GMail for your personal or business sensitive emails. Apart from Google checking the content to place relevant ads, there might be more people reading your confidential emails. What are the real costs if the information most valuable to you fall into the wrong hands?

Do you remember the story a bank sued Google to get the account information from a Gmail user the bank sent sensitive client information to.

A Wyoming bank sent an e-mail containing sensitive customer data to the wrong Gmail account, and now wants Google to reveal the identity of the account holder who received the data….

…The employee, however, inadvertently sent the e-mail to the wrong Gmail address. Additionally, the employee had attached a sensitive file to the e-mail that should not have been sent at all.

At the end, the two companies settled the case out of court, Google shut down the account, and the bank was happy. Lesson learned: Be careful using Gmail for your personal or business sensitive email! You don’t want to have your Gmail login and password information compromised by anybody with malicious intend.

I would state it even more aggressively: Do not use Gmail for ANY personal or business email! Reason being, your personal email is not secure. Apart from the fact Google is reading all of your email to determine the right ads to show, your email could end up in somebody else’s inbox without your knowledge. With the city of LA implementing Google Mail for it's 30.000 employees, there is enough reason to be concerned about email security.

Over the years I have seen a number of instances where I received mail that was not meant for me. However, the last couple of weeks I’ve seen an influx of email delivered in my inbox, while meant for other people.

All emails I receive are replies to emails send by somebody who has chosen a Gmail email address that is similar to mine. I have had my Gmail account since the launch of the service by Google. I’ve been blessed (-or cursed) with a short, common first name email address. The emails that I receive are all variants of mine, using numbers proposed by the system when you sign up. If yourname@gmail.com is already taken, the system might come up with yourname1745@gmail.com, based on your address or your birth year.

Background

According to the Gmail help documents, there are a number of cases why email can get delivered in your inbox, while it should not have been. These include:

1. 1. Your address is similar but has more or fewer dots (.) or different capitalization. Sometimes you may receive a message sent to an address that looks like yours but has a different number or arrangement of periods. While we know it might be unnerving if you think someone else's mail is being routed to your account, don't worry: both of these addresses are yours.
   2. Your address isn't listed at all. If you don't see your email address in the To: or Cc: fields of the header, the sender has probably mailed you a 'blind carbon copy,' or Bcc:. The Bcc: field isn't displayed in the header of received messages. This means that you won't see your email address at the top of any message you receive as a blind carbon copy.
   3. You're receiving spam that's not addressed to you. The message you received was probably the result of a common practice among spammers called 'dictionary spamming.' Dictionary spammers often use a software application to randomly guess email addresses based on words in the dictionary.

Although most cases in the Help Forum can be explained using the above use cases, I can only attest there are a number of use cases which are not as described in above snippet of the help section from Gmail.

A search for Gmail+"getting+someone+else's" returns more than 150.000 results. however, the majority of the talk is about the dot issue as described above here.

Receiving Someone Else’s Email

There are two sorts of email intended for somebody else that can be bad

1. Sensitive email not meant for your eyes.
2. Email that can impact your life negatively

I have a number of examples of both of these two. If I didn’t share these cases with the people involved, both the rightful recipient of the mail as my wife, I could have ended in some weird and not so pleasant situations.

Some of the snippets of the emails below are changed to protect the innocent or to hide sensitive information. I don’t think posting these snippets is wrong, as I’m trying to make a point here on why you should not use Gmail for any personal, let alone business sensitive email.

The Bankruptcy

The first case of wrongly delivered email is quite a sensitive one. I have tried not to get involved and not to open sensitive documents, but then again, I can’t help it that I open an email which is addressed to me!

7 days ago it all started when I received a couple of emails a day. The first one is immediately pointing at sensitive information which should not fall in the wrong hands:

Can I get the code to the door on the warehouse? I am trying to hook up with the appraiser. He called this morning. I will let you know what I get scheduled.

Two or three emails later, the emails are getting even more sensitive. Here are some excerpts from it:

I wanted to update you on some more things since that was sent.
I sent a check to [name removed] for a past due attorney fees for $ 14,000
You and I discussed this and since I am still using [name removed] through this period of business closeout etc. I thought it was appropriate since the bill continues to get larger….

…I had to put $12,000 of my personal money into [company name] so that we could pay employees and payroll taxes and $2,700 of it went to pay [name removed] the company CPA for the 2008 tax return. I am working with him right now on a lot of things to get returns done for 2009 below are his charges for last year that are all paid in full. I want to pay for the 2009 returns so that I can get started on them because I will be busy later with other things. [name removed] and I feel that the returns will not costs this much because there is not as much accounting to do. I feel that about 70 % would be close to actual costs.
[company name] *$4,000* My son the other owner has no money nor does the company to put towards this as he will be filing bankruptcy also.

Heart breaking emails of people who are in financial trouble, on the edge of bankruptcy and trying to save what is left to save. This could have meant, closing the corporate email address account, and switching over to a free email provider. But with free, comes the risk of security.

I did not only receive the email exchanges between him and the lawyers, but much more. Among these:

• Login and password information of a brand new web store just launched.
• Personal correspondence between father and daughter, for which they used email
• Hotel reservation confirmation, containing personal information, address and credit card information
• Receipts for online shopping, with shipping address
• Online banking alert of change of email address

I already have received so many emails with sensitive information on this guy, that I could take on his identity probably pretty easy. As you can see, I might be receiving the online bank statements in my inbox soon, as this person just has changed his email account on his online bank.

More examples of confidential information: As mentioned above here, the login and password information for their brand new sports outlet webshop were sent to me through email. I could have taken control of the whole website and made some changes.

This, off course is not what I’m about to do. I rather send the person an email and warn him about the situation. After that, I will delete all the confidential information from my inbox.

The Cheating Husband

What if you were happily married, all is fine right? Then one day, emails start popping up in your inbox from a site called Ashley Madison. You pay no attention to these, as they probably are spam. Then one day, your wife is logging into your email inbox to check something for you while you are away. As the name Ashley Madison sounds like a women’s name, she cannot hold her curiosity and opens the email. From that moment on, your life will not be the same anymore…

Ashley Madison is not a normal person, but rather a dating site for married or attached people who want to hook up. That’s right, those people that want to start an affair or have a casual encounter with somebody else than their significant other.

Now try to explain why you are signed up for this dating site for married people, and why you receive email from attached older women, and why you have direct access to a guest account on the Ashley Madison dating site? What is your explanation on this?

I’m receiving all the correspondence of a certain individual who has signed up for Ashley Madison. It is supposed to be a 59 year old gentleman from Pennsylvania. I will not reveal any more personal data not to reveal his real identity.

Through the emails and updates I’m getting, I have direct access to his profile and mailbox on the dating site. I could have some fun, but again, I won’t.

Mafia Baseball bets

I’m reluctant to post about my third example of wrong email delivery. This third one is also the longest going on. I’m reluctant because I’m a big fan of mafia movies, and the emails I’m receiving have the smell of New York mafia family all over it. I simply don’t enjoy waking up with the head of a dead horse in my bed.

The email address for which I’m receiving the mail, does not even closely resemble mine. This is the strangest thing. I used to think somebody was playing a trick on me, especially as the mail were very mafia like. However, I dropped that idea the more email from other people I began to receive. I just need to remember, this is not Mafia Wars where I can buy my health back…

All emails for this Dennis G are about Baseball, and in particular about the New York Yankees. These guys have all gambling conversations over email, not knowing some small time punk in California is lending an ear to their betting strategies. Here is an excerpt:

I had 4 of the 6 teams going into sunday nite.  $5 to win $220.  i need the giants to win, and the yanks to win by more than 1 1/2 runs. you must know the results,  cost me $220.00

sammy sosa just hit 12, most over 400 ft, 1 was 495 ft.,488,508,509, and he had the top 10 distance homers of the night,compared to anyone else. griffey was in the finals with him and hit  2, sosa hit 9 more. a guy won a $250,000. home because of sosa. this is on mlb network. free with my cable. pretty cool. i wonder if STEROIDS had anything to do with all this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
it sure effected alot of aspects of sports.where do you take the titles away ,or not recognize them. maybe the guy should give back his home he won because sosa won the contest.  and they complained about bonds.

How do you tell a Don you’ve been reading his personal email for months, without being put on a death list from one of the big New York Mafia Families?

Conclusion

Can you trust the security of Gmail? Would you risk identify theft just to safe a couple of dollars on a year subscription for private secure email? What is the truth about Gmail Security?

Just recently, the city of Los Angeles announced the adoption of the Google email system for 30,000 city employees.

The Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously today to outsource its e-mail system to Google Inc….. Because Los Angeles will be among the earliest adopters of the Google system, council members expressed concern that the city might be signing on before Google's cloud system was fully proven.

Now that Government agencies and organizations are adopting Google mail applications, it should be more than fair to question the security of your personal information. Although the Google’s Cloud email offering is not the same as Gmail, I believe earlier problems with Google’s Cloud and Gmail security issues as described above or the Google Docs security breaches should be enough talking points for privacy watchdogs to start asking questions.

I would love to hear your thoughts or experience with security of Gmail. Please use the comments to let me know…

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Excuse me, What is your private information doing in my Inbox?

Sometimes I’m really disappointed about the Google Ads which appear next to a blog post. Not relevant, scam ads. Sometimes I’m really impressed. Just take my last point about a possible new RIM product; the BlackBerry Watch. Next to this story is a highly targeted, interactive shopping ad from CNet.

Looking closer at the Ad, you will see there are multiple ways to interact with the ad, without being taken off the site. You can read some short product review, and you can click through to read more product review or shop directly.

I have bitched a lot about Google Ads here on my blog, but all I can say about this particular Ad: I like it!

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Blackberry Interactive Shopping AD

Three years ago, I made the following picture of Mister Penis getting lucky in the Castro in San Francisco. This guy was having a foursome on the streets of the biggest concentrated Gay community in the world, with three girls…

This guy had chosen his Halloween costume with care. He has thought about the way he would like to dress up and make a statement. This guy was dressed up as a huge cock!

This might have attracted some other folks in the area he was walking in. What do you expect when you are one large prick, walking in a Gay neighborhood? This is clearly the more Adult Halloween Costume.

Every year, I see the traffic on the blog post where I originally posted this picture go up (nice choose of words in a post containing the word penis and other synonyms several times). Unfortunately the traffic is not very targeted at the content, as it is clear from the referral keywords they were looking for something else.

	Casual Canine Hot Diggity Dog Costume Md Ketchup Sale Price: $6.07 Average Rating:

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Halloween Is Comming

And once again, a social media scam is breaking out. I now get messages from Twitter profiles that only include a short URL with a sexy looking girl as a profile picture.

I’m not going to click on the link, as I suspect it will either take me to a Made for Adsense site, or to a site that will install some malware.

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Twitter Fake Profiles

Crackberry.com, the site for highly addicted BlackBerry users has posted a breaking story: Blackberry might introduce a BB watch. After we merged the phone with our laptop and introduced smart phones which can take pictures and video, now we are going to merge these devices with our watch.

All I can say: I want one of those!

Picture above from Crackberry.com

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BlackBerry Watch

Do you know what is going on with our climate? Where I live it has been the hottest summer in years. Right now, October 15th, it’s still very warm. In other laces of the world it’s colder than normal. Our climate is changing, we should be aware of the impact we have on the world we are living on.

Today on Blog Action Day,  a large number of blogs are writing a piece about Climate Change. All with the objective to make people aware of the changes that are happening in our climate. Read more about Blog Action Day here, and participate by writing a blog post. You still have a couple of hours!

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Climate Change Awareness

Are you thinking positive? Are you really? Thinking positive goes beyond the cliché of the half glass full or the half glass empty. Thinking positive is a state of mind, and showing insight to yourself and other people even without thinking about it. Thinking positive will make other people smile, be more productive, get the most out of people, lead people to accomplish wonderful jobs, encourage people to do whatever they haven’t done before and most important heal sorrow or losing somebody you love.

Just the other day, one of my best friends texted me. The situation with her father has gone down hill, and it would not be long for him to say goodbye to his loved ones. What can you say at such a moment to your friend you have known for over 22 years. What can you say at the moment she is about to loose her father. What can you say from 5,00o miles  distance.

Sometimes it takes a fresh perspective to look at things. Just today somebody said to me, "I spend the coldest days ever in Amsterdam. It was back in February two years ago. It was so cold". I responded: "You are lucky you were there in February, you only had 28 cold days". He laughed and said: “Dennis, you are always so positive”. And before I knew it, I did it. I’d sent some positive energy into the world with the simple words of wisdom meant as a joke.

I hope I can soon tell this joke to my friend and we can laugh together again. It probably won’t be for a couple of weeks, at least not until we meet again when I travel to The Netherlands. But I’ll make sure I send her this post if the time has come. I know one person deserves some positive energy right now! I hope she can share it with her family…

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Positive Thinking

Fake TV endorsed ads, pointing to a fake newspaper site is the newest scam to lure you into taking your credit card out of your pocket and to subscribe to the most awesome get money quick program ever seen in history of the scammers.

In the ad, and on the site the ad is linking to, a number of logo’s from popular TV networks or newspapers are being mis-used. As if the system has been endorsed by these programs or journalists.

The San Diego Herald News site is not a real newspaper, it just looks like one. And although the style of the article written is really as it’s news, the site is nothing but an ad to make you buy a system that makes you post links online and make money with it…

Online giant Google is a publicly traded company and is currently worth $132.5 Billion (Yes thats Billions with a B). The company has pioneered online search and has changed the way we use the internet.

In a matter of weeks Mary and David had a steady stream of income coming in via checks that were delivered right to their home. They happened upon a system called "Google Fortune." This showed them how to make money posting online links.

Only at the bottom there is a large disclaimer, explaining the site is not a real news site, but nothing but an advertisement for the automatic money making system Google Fortune.

THE STORY DEPICTED ON THIS SITE AND THE PERSON DEPICTED IN THE STORY ARE NOT REAL. RATHER, THIS STORY IS BASED ON THE RESULTS THAT SOME PEOPLE WHO HAVE USED THESE PRODUCTS HAVE ACHIEVED. THE RESULTS PORTRAYED IN THE STORY AND IN THE COMMENTS ARE ILLUSTRATIVE, AND MAY NOT BE THE RESULTS THAT YOU ACHIEVE WITH THESE PRODUCTS. THIS PAGE RECEIVES COMPENSATION FOR CLICKS ON OR PURCHASE OF PRODUCTS FEATURED ON THIS SITE.

I hope Google will bring the hammer down on this program for misusing their brand.

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TV Endorsed Ads for Google System

Last week, when Google started to send out 100.000 invites for the new service Google Wave, a lot of high profile bloggers, technology journalists or techies were disappointed they did not got one. Robert Scoble got one, probably the Wall Street Journal got one to make a few friends with the old economy newspapers, but you… you did not.

And what do you do if you want one to be cool and an early adopter, or even an innovator? Right, you try to get one through other means. And luckily we live in a society based on open, efficient market principles, where everybody wants to get a break. So selling your invite to Google Wave, even if it’s against the user terms and conditions, is a real option.

And what better platform is there to sell your Google Wave invite, together maybe with some useless Google Swag, on eBay, the worlds global marketplace where you can sell practically anything. 

So a lot of Google Wave invites were put up for sale last week on eBay. According to policy, the holders of these invites were not allowed to sell the invite, both through the Google T’s & C’s, as for the eBay policies. From the Wall Street Journal piece:

…Mr. Blount said he received an automated message from eBay, saying that he was violating the site’s terms of service by trying to sell an item without owning the copyright….

Years ago, I too sold a couple of Gmail invites when the now popular email program from Google was still invite only. It was such a good play, selling something you got for free, unlimited invites in your early Gmail account, no shipping costs. Selling these invites for only $4 made them sell like crazy.

The keyword Google Wave was the keyword with the largest change on eBay. From 70 the week before, to 23,125 searches last week, it was clear Google Wave was of interest especially for journalists. Through linking to the search url, everybody clicking within a story or a blogpost contributed to the large number of searches for Google Wave.

In the main search box, two related searches are being displayed as well. Seems the other two, Google Wave invite and Google Wave invitation are also popular.

Still there are a large number of Google Wave invites for sale on eBay, but the price has come down significant.

Most memorable tweet I saw flying bye the last couple of days was playing into the fact that you can only extract value out of Google Wave if your network also has an account. With just 100.000 invites sent out it will be hard to find your friends on Google Wave.

RT @onehappyguy: Google Wave first impression... feels like I own a fax machine but nobody else does... I can't fax anyone else.

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Google Wave Invite for Sale