Firefox and IE both have site blocking (or at least, site warning) built into their current iterations. Google also does site blocking now. All do site blocking based on some metric, known only to them, that tells them that a site is more likely than not to be a malicious site, such as a phishing site, or a site loaded with spyware. The problem with site blocking browsers and site blocking search engines such as Google is that sometimes they get it wrong.

You know what I can’t stand? When I click on a link on a website – to go to another page – and it ends up being a PDF download instead. Now, I have nothing against PDF downloads, but I do have something against finding myself downloading and opening PDF files without warning. C’mon people, put a “download PDF file” or “read PDF file” link there, or at least a warning that says “clicking this link will download a pdf file.” (In case you are wondering “What is a PDF file?” or “What does PDF stand for?”, ‘PDF’ stands for “Portable Document Format”, and it is a format that was developed by the Adobe corporation.)

We in the anti-spam field have known it all along, but the events of this week confirm it: spammers are worse than prostitutes, pimps, and those involved in plying the human traffic trade. Clearly that is the only way to interpret the actions of former N.Y. Attorney General and soon-to-be-former Governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer. Spitzer this week was linked to – and has admitted to – ties to a prostitution ring spanning several countries, and boasting some of the highest-paid call girls in world – some commanding more than $5,000 per hour. But that was chump change for some of the extremely wealthy clients of the ring, which operated through a group and website known as the Emperors Club VIP

Melanie McGuire has been dethroned as holder of the “most stupid use of the Internet for criminal activities” by Ann Marie Linscott, who posted a help wanted ad on Craigslist seeking a hit man to kill her lover’s wife.

Have you tried to access your Charter.com email only to find that it’s all gone missing? Can’t even log into your Charter email account? Have you suddenly discovered that your Charter email is lost, and your account shut down? Well, you’re not alone! In fact, this past week Charter accidentally deleted some 14,000 customer email accounts!

Microsoft’s sexy Santa Claws instant message buddy bot started spewing bad Santa porn to a couple of young girls who had sent a special letter to Santa bot. During the Santa chat session, the girls offered Santa Clause some pizza. But when told to “eat it”, the dirty Santa responded with “It’s fun to talk about oral sex, but I want to chat about something else… ” (Santas little helper, perhaps?) At this point the girls’ uncle stepped in and told the evil Santa that he was a dirty bastard, and that naughty Santa responded “I think you’re dirty bastard” (apparently he was also drunk Santa, or, at least, inarticulate Santa). Must be Santa bot had a flaw, for never before in Santa Claus history has he been known to be a perv!

There are plenty of reasons for a site – such as a newspaper site – to demand your personal information (and most particularly your email address) before they let you access their goodies (such as online content in the case of a newspaper). This is known as an email squeeze (they squeeze your email address out of you before letting you have access to the stuff you want). Some see this as a reasonable way to do business, others see it as an unreasonable cost in order to read content on the Internet. Obviously, your email address is one of the most valuable commodities there is to an online marketer. And of course that’s why many end users see it as an unreasonable demand.

It’s like all those foreign movies with bad translations that you like to laugh at, only this time it’s real – journalists in Israel used the Babelfish free online translator to translate an email request to the Dutch foreign ministry – and in the process insulted a Dutch dignitary’s mother and created an international incident. Who in their right mind would let Babelfish translate a message – let alone send a Babelfish translation – to members of a foreign government whom they wished to interview??

The NBC show “Fear Factor” counts on a lot of things, including its gross factor, and human fascination with rubber necking from a distance. But when they decided to air an episode in which they incite “junkyard dogs” to attack the human contestants, they apparently didn’t count on the backlash from the dog-loving Internet community.

Remember that when you commit something to writing, people may read it. A lot of people. This is a lesson which new law school graduate Dianna Abdala is in the process of learning after having declined a job with the law firm of William Korman in a series of unusual and bizarre emails.

A website calling itself “My Free Implants” allows women to register, create a profile (no pun intended), upload pictures, and allow men – complete strangers – to donate to help them get free breast implants.

What do you get for the person who has everything? Well, if you, or they, or hopefully both, have a good sense of humour (or..something..), perhaps you might want to get them the ear wax which is currently up for bid on eBay. Yes, really. Oh, the woman who is…

Reporting on a study which found that as many as thirty-nine percent of all email users admit to clicking on the links contained in spam, the news site The Inquirer has christened the spam link clickers “email retards”. Interestingly, the report, put out by Radicati Group, is the same report…

Remember that study that said that Internet addiction was not a big factor in online gaming? Well maybe Internet addiction itself isn’t, but surely online gaming addiction has to be a factor in the rise in issues surrounding the “ownership” of online game ‘property’. And when we say “issues”, we…

Gary McKinnon, the extra-terrestrial-seeking Nasa hacker who was apprehended last month, has explained how he managed to hack into Nasa’s computers, along with those of several other government agencies, and what he found there. According to the 39-year old Londoner, he simply searched for senior network administrators who didn’t use…