Because it could cost you your job and it’s definitely true.

These days, Google and the rest of the search engines (eg. Live, Yahoo!, Ask and so on) have become the central location where everyone can find information about anyone or anything:

According to a recent survey by CareerBuilder.com:

One in four managers now ‘Google’ potential employees and 51% of applications were rejected because of what was found.

When asked to divulge the types of information discovered on the Web that caused them to dismiss potential employees, hiring managers pointed to the following:

* 31% - candidate lied about qualifications
* 25% - candidate had poor communication skills
* 24% - candidate was linked to criminal behavior
* 19% - candidate bad-mouthed their previous company or fellow employee
* 19% - candidate posted information about them drinking or using drugs
* 15% - candidate shared confidential information from previous employers
* 12% - candidate lied about an absence
* 11% - candidate posted provocative or inappropriate photographs
* 8% - candidate’s screen name was unprofessional

Hiring managers said the following information discovered on the Web helped to confirm their decision to hire a candidate:

* 64% - candidate’s background information supported their professional qualifications for the job
* 40% - candidate was well-rounded, showed a wide range of interests
* 34% - candidate had great communication skills
* 31% - candidate’s site conveyed a professional image
* 31% - got a good feel for the candidate’s personality, could see a good fit within the company culture
* 23% - other people posted great references about the candidate
* 23% - candidate was creative
* 19% - candidate received awards and accolades

I often find myself Googling (for employee, business or general research reasons) e-mail addresses, names, businesses. That’s the case for other employers too. Most of them search your name in the search engines, trying to find online references and discussions, simply because they know how to do it and because they found that this works brilliantly to their advantage. Those online references make his decision about you easier and shed some impartial light on his opinion about you (other than your interview or CV references).

So be careful what you write on the Internet. If your CV states perfect C# programming skills (or Expert Search Marketing Consultant) and your employer finds you on the Internet asking how to install Visual Studio (or how to search inbound links in Google) or swearing and harassing people for no reason (like I do, but at least with solid reasons) that won’t be in your best advantage right ?

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One in 10 internet users may be lured into handing over sensitive personal information such as a credit card number, by fraudulent “phishing” emails, research suggests.

A phishing message closely resembles a legitimate email from a genuine bank or online shop. It typically encourages the recipient to click on a link that leads to a bogus version of that company’s website, where they are asked to enter their account information. This data is then captured and can be used to pilfer a bank or shop account.

Previous studies, including a telephone survey conducted by US research company Gartner in 2004, have indicated that about 5% of all internet users have fallen for phishing messages.

But Markus Jakobsson and Jacob Ratkiewicz at Indiana University, US, suspected this was an underestimation. The reasoned that some survey participants may not have realised that they have been stung by a phishing scam, or may simply be too embarrassed to admit to it.

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Internet privacy? Google already knows more about you than the National Security Agency ever will. And don’t assume for a minute it can keep a secret. YouTube fans–and everybody else–beware.

Over the years, Google has collected a staggering amount of data, and the company cheerfully admits that in nine years of operation, it has never knowingly erased a single search query. It’s the biggest data pack rat west of the nsa, and for good reason: 99 percent of its revenue comes from selling ads that are specifically targeted to a user’s interests. “Google’s entire value proposition is to figure out what people want,” says Eric Goldman, a professor at Silicon Valley’s Santa Clara School of Law and director of the High Tech Law Institute. “But to read our minds, they need to know a lot about us.”

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Less than two years into the great cultural awakening to the vulnerability of personal data, companies and institutions — such as the data broker ChoicePoint, CardSystems Solutions, Time Warner and dozens of colleges and universities across the land — have collectively fumbled 93,754,333 private records.

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The malware headache began for Robyn when she saw a MySpace bulletin from a friend inviting her to view new photos. She knew the friend in real life, so she went ahead and clicked the link. The site looked like a photo-sharing site, but one she had never heard of. Then her computer practically froze. A few days later, her MySpace friends received photo-viewing invites that seemed to come from her.

“It definitely wigged me out,” says Robyn, who asked that her last name not be used. She hasn’t touched that computer since.

Like pickpockets at a festival, money-minded malware authors are drawn by the huge crowds visiting social networking sites. In an August report, Internet security firm ScanSafe states that, on average, one in every 600 pages on the sites hosts some form of malware. The report says Facebook tended to be more secure given its previous member restriction to those with educational e-mail addresses, but the site has since opened its doors to everyone.

And these days, those viruses and worms are after your wallet. “There’s a great deal of money in it for people to be able to get your personal data,” said Lysa Myers, virus research engineer for McAfee Avert Labs, in an e-mail interview.
Poisoned Banner Ads

One major attack took place in July, when iDefense, a research and security company, discovered a poisoned banner ad that appeared on MySpace, Webshots, and many other sites. The new type of attack ad downloaded adware onto an estimated million computers, according to iDefense. The threat went after low-hanging fruit by exploiting an image file (.wmf) vulnerability. It’s a vulnerability that was reported and fixed way back in January. But in the huge numbers game of social networking sites, the attack still found plenty of victims.

And the game is growing ever larger. MySpace ranks as the sixth most-visited site in the world, according to Alexa.com, which analyzes Web traffic and puts Flickr at number 39 and Facebook at number 69. Most social networking sites more than doubled their user base between July 2005 and July 2006, according to comScore Media Matrix.

It’s not just eager teens visiting the sites, either. The ScanSafe report found that social networking sites now account for 1 percent of at-work Web browsing. This may not seem like much, but consider just how much Web traffic goes in and out of most every business in the nation.
Good Defense Necessary

Even if the site maintainers are on the ball–MySpace generally gets decent marks for closing new-found holes and threats on its site–the sheer number of people involved can present an irresistible target for crooks. To keep your system safe, make sure you’ve got a layered defense with good antivirus and antispyware programs, and a firewall. PC World’s Spyware and Security Info Center contains the latest security software reviews and rankings, and a link to our Internet Safety Tool Kit.

In addition, Dan Moniz, a security consultant in San Francisco, recommends using a browser other than Internet Explorer. “The way that Internet Explorer is hooked in with the operating system can cause some problems,” he says. The July banner ad attack targeted Internet Explorer.

As if downloaded malware weren’t enough, future attacks could twist things so that the browser attacks a site. At the BlackHat Internet security conference in Las Vegas this year, Moniz and HD Moore, head of the Metasploit project and a well-known hacker, presented a novel proof-of-concept hack. It showed that a poisoned site could infect a Web browser using Javascript such that the browser becomes an attacker and infects visited blogs or social networking sites. It could spam links to malware downloads or overwhelm blogs with casino advertisement comments, for instance.

Like many proof-of-concepts, this one might never become a real threat. It still has to find an open security hole to infect the browser in the first place, and it might never interest malware writers who have plenty of other profitable methods currently in use. But it’s one more example of a party crasher just waiting to spoil the fun.

source (yahoo! news)