tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-63310435920599518552024-03-13T23:57:16.878-07:00Reverse Cell Phone Lookup | Phone Number Lookup | Reverse Phone LookupFind personal information of virtually any phone number owner using our cell phone lookup.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger72125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-53454514468181002742012-03-29T00:00:00.000-07:002012-03-29T00:00:58.150-07:00Cell Phone Radiation Proven to be Harmful to Mice Fetusesstudy from the Yale School of Medicine recently discovered that pregnant mice exposed to cell phone radiation affected the offspring’s behavior later. The offspring were found later to be hyperactive, have more anxiety and poor memory. <br />
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The study placed the cell phone centimeters away from the mice which caused abnormal development of the brain in the mice offspring. When the brain is developing, it is susceptible to lots of environmental problem including alcohol, tobacco and now possibly radiations from cell phones.<br />
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Mice are obviously very different from humans, and the distance from the human ear to the womb is not measured on scale by putting cell phones centimeters away from the mice. In addition, mice gestation is much shorter than human gestation. The conclusions of these tests are the first to lead us to believe that there is a connection between cell phone radiation and the development of the brain though. <br />
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"The rise in behavioral disorders in developed countries may be, at least in part, due to a contribution from fetal cellular telephone radiation exposure," the Yale Study wrote. "Further testing is warranted in humans and non-human primates to determine if the risks are similar and to establish safe exposure limits during pregnancy."<br />
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<b>Previous Studies with No Definite Answers</b><br />
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There have been other studies that are trying to find out if cell phone radiation can affect human’s health negatively. There is no conclusive data so far, but cell phone companies all put warnings on their packages. <br />
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A study in 2010 found that the likelihood of behavior problems was increased in 28,000 Danish children with the presence of cell phone both before and after birth. The study wrote that the results did not necessarily mean that the cell phones actually caused the problem.<br />
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"That's clearly not what we wanted to suggest, and we think that there is no reason that pregnant women should be very alarmed at the findings we have," the lead author, Dr. Jorn Olsen of UCLA, told ABC News at the time the study was published.<br />
There are also studies that are examining any possibility of mobile phone use causing cancer. There are no conclusive results for these studies either. The World Health Organization recently concluded that mobile phone use may be linked to cancer. The American Cancer Society says that there is likely no link.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-81432809660284441622012-02-25T23:33:00.001-08:002012-02-25T23:33:41.680-08:00Phone Line Established for Patients with AlzheimersThe phone number 734-936-8803 connects those diagnosed with Alzheimers,their families and friends directly to services that will assist them. The line was established by University of Michigan Health Systems and leads patients to the U-M Memory Connection. <br />
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Patients frequently have to make lots of phone calls to get the information they want to know after being diagnosed with Alzheimers, and the situation is stressful enough without knowing who to turn to. Lots of time when patients call to get information they are directed to another phone number, and this cycle continues until they finally give up without any answers. <br />
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"We need to do a better job of helping our patients and families find their way," says Henry Paulson, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Michigan Alzheimer's Disease Center and professor of neurology at the University of Michigan Medical School.<br />
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The U-M Memory connection informs patients of what they need to know. It designed to be a one stop destination for information about dementia services and memory loss. Memory loss services are then provided to patients from the line in an easy and non-stressful way, or at least that is what the U-M Memory Connection is aiming for. Services like the Silver Club Programs at U-M Geriatrics Center, community programs and social workers are provided to the patients. Patients can also be connected to research studies on different topics involving memory loss. <br />
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"This is a huge health problem that affects all of us. We need to do a better job of making the diagnosis but also implementing care … it can be very difficult for patients to navigate their way," Paulson says.<br />
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Patients call are answered by trained professional who has comprehensive knowledge about mild memory loss, Lewy Body disease, Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, and vascular dementia. The line is open to phone call Monday through Friday, 8:30 am to 4:00 pm, and patients who leave messages will be gotten to the next business day or sooner.<br />
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"Many people experience changes with memory as they age. Some changes are normal, but other changes could be a sign of memory loss and we know it is important to understand that difference. Our call center specialists can answer some of the difficult questions you may have at the time of a diagnosis and beyond, " says Cassie Starback, coordinator of the Michigan Alzheimer's Disease Center.<br />
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U-M Memory connection was put together by the U-M Dementia Consortium that was founded by the Michigan Alzheimer’s Disease center. The composition of the consoritium includes various U-M departments, including Neurology, Geriatric Center, U-M School of Social work, U-M school of Public Health and local chapters of the Alzheimer’s Association.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-51747367710730875242012-02-02T04:03:00.000-08:002012-02-02T04:03:25.938-08:00Police Track Cell Phone to Catch Perp. In DenverWhen is it okay for the Police to Resort to Tracking Date from cell phones of citizens?<br />
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Two men point a gun at the worker of a Lakewood convenient store and told him to empty the cash register. The owner gave them the money, but the robbers made the mistake of also taking the victim’s iPhone. <br />
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The next day, a team of local cops and Denver cops had caught one of the men by tracking the iPhone. The cell phone provider AT&T released the information to the cops as to updates to the iPhone location. <br />
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In this case the owner of the iPhone, the man robbed, gave permission to the police to track the location of his phone. The problem becomes what process do police need to go through to be allowed to track cell phones. <br />
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The Supreme Court Ruled on a vote 5 to 4 that police tracking people via their real time data from their cell phones without a search warrant was a potential violation of our fourth amendment right.<br />
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Cell phone providers can provide historical data and real time data, so should they be able to provide certain data and not others? None of these questions have easy answers. Everyone has an opinion about it. Here is one: <br />
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"Cell providers can locate every smartphone at any given moment. The question becomes who's privy to that information and under what circumstances," said Tom Raynes, executive director of the Colorado District Attorneys Council. "Because you're giving that information to the cell provider — a third party — when you buy the phone, does that invalidate a right to privacy?"<br />
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No one really has made a decision about what circumstances are okay and what situation it is unacceptable for police to check up on. In the case of the robbery, it seems like a pretty obvious answer. Other cases will not be as cut and dry. Police everywhere go by different rules, if they follow any, but there is no national standard. <br />
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Obtain cell phones data has become an initial step in many investigations, said Lakewood Police Department spokesman Steve Davis.<br />
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"Every law enforcement agency I'm aware of uses this kind of technology to locate people," Davis said. "We have technology available to us today that certainly wasn't available just a few years ago."<br />
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Even within different departments of Denver there are different methods of approaching cell phone tracking. Nationally there is no protocol, but one can imagine how much it varies. <br />
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This will be an issue to keep an eye on. How much do you want cops being able to poke into your lives without a search warrant or even probably cause?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-27154132715404605162011-09-23T02:34:00.000-07:002011-09-23T02:34:00.108-07:00Mobile Operators Are Set To Lose Voice Services To Mobile PlatformsWith the tendency now being for services to move away from the traditional SIM card login services and move towards more mobile login authentication methods like the ones used on iPods when linking up to iTunes services. <br />
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What the future holds nobody can be one hundred percent certain of what the future will bring for mobile services but there is no doubt that customers are looking to improve the simplicity of connecting up with all the online services such as email, Facebook and Skype. The ultimate plan is to allow a customer to purchase a phone and as soon as you turn it on you would be able to log into your Google / Apple account; then you would have the phone ready to use for voice calling through Google Talk or Skype and instant access to email, Youtube or Facebook. <br />
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When you get home with your phone it will automatically connect up to any WiFi you have in your house and will connect to any of the available 3G networks, without a care which specific network it joins to; instead focusing on the problem of the best and cheapest service coverage; finding decent service hampers a lot of people’s usage and being able to log on to whichever service provides the highest level will solve a lot of issues.<br />
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Taking a look into the future sees the potential abolishment of phone numbers instead using the already heavily used Facebook profile and just dial directly to that instead of traditional methods. The change is almost inevitable and could start soon; all it would require is for one of the carriers to crack and provide bandwidth available to purchase by either Google, Microsoft or Apple and the floodgates will have opened and be unable to close again. As soon as one sells they will all have to; it is simply impossible for one carrier to stand alone against a giant company.<br />
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It may take a while for the transition to occur but eventually the mobile network will turn into one as all services begin to merge into one account offering the best service and also value for the customers and after all the customers drive the business in the direction that they want and need.<br />
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There is lots of money to be made when the change does begin to happen but it may well be a case of the company that jumps first either wins out, or faces the risk of being isolated out of the market. Nobody quite knows exactly when the change will happen, but all we do know is that it is coming.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-73718352933249904432011-09-21T09:34:00.000-07:002011-09-21T09:34:29.607-07:00Cell Phone Tracking Proved UsefulCell phone tracking have a big yes tick for one mother whose daughter was two hours late coming back from Miami. For a long time there has been back and forth between the positives and negatives of tracking cell phones with safety concerns pushing for it and worries about it being invasive to privacy holding it back. For one mother it turned out to be a huge positive after she worried about whereabouts of her daughter who was over two hours late coming back from Miami late on a mid-July night. The girl’s mother recalled that less than a week beforehand her daughter had signed up to a service at LocateUrCell.com, which claimed to be able to quickly track down the location of the cell phone. After a few questions, the site’s owner Frank Rabbito said he had tracked the cell phone’s position to Alligator Alley. She was all okay and it turned out that she had just run out of gas. “There was no lights; it was dark and she was in a dead cell zone” said Rabbito. The girl was just in one of those unlucky flukes where everything that could go wrong did, but she was fine and with the help of LocateUrCell was tracked down, which meant no more worry for her mother.<br />
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The website (LocateUrCell.com) was launched in mid-July by Frank Rabbito and he said that the goal of it was not to make money, which he made enough of from his last career, but to help find people when they are lost and vulnerable. The idea for the site originated for Rabbito when he was talking one night with his wife about public notifications for missing seniors. Rabbito instantly thought “there’s got to be a way to find these people” and then followed the discovery that 98 percent of people had a cell phone and it might be possible to combine that in some way with tracking them. <br />
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He started LocateUrCell with the help of a programmer, Dan Grable and they quickly set about coming over the obstacles like negotiating with the networks to gain access to them to gain the information required to track the phones. Most use GPS to track the devices to within a few feet, but with Verizon they use triangulation technology which is a little less precise. People can sign up online and then track their phones on the website. The best thing about the project is that it is aimed at not purely pushing a profit – 40% of the proceeds go to charities meaning not only is it helping find lost and vulnerable people but it also helps the wider community. It has already had success in finding not only people, but used as a tool for finding misplaced cell phones as Corena Salazar found when she lost her phone at her grocery store!<br />
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The future looks good for LocateUrCell with the initial aims to be to break even and then start distributing the proceeds to charities.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-58812806052759826452011-09-07T05:51:00.001-07:002011-09-07T05:51:42.560-07:00Need For New Ways To Manage Networks To Stop Tsunami Of Data Causing HavocWith Nokia Siemens Network releasing a blog post called “Wake up Call: Industry collaboration needed to make beyond 4G networks carry 1000 times more traffic by 2020” it was seen as a call to arms to force fear and reality into the major operators as demand for mobile broadband services is set to massively outstrip the providers capabilities. The largest provider AT&T wireless is preparing itself for the barrage of demand, not only at the outer reaches of its network, but at the very heart where most of the demand will be as the world moves into the next generation with an all-IP upcoming service which will come complete with video services.<br />
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Coming straight from the middle of the AT&T Labs, Krish Prabhu said “Over the next five years, our traffic volumes tell us that when we launch LTE each one of our 11 regional cores will have a throughput of two to three terabits, and the national core will have a throughput at least 10 times that. … We are very involved in the solution to that problem. We’ve identified a layered approach to get us there even as we support the launch of our LTE network and get LTE to 90 to 95 percent of our end-users. That to me is the biggest challenge.”<br />
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This highlights just the magnitude of the problem facing provider as demand rockets to never before seen levels. The drastic rise in demand is mostly due to the transition from simple voice traffic to data; bringing not only an influx of extra transmissions but a requirement to change the way in which it is handled. Data traffic is often unpredictable and harder to anticipate where peaks will occur, which could lead to overflowing of the network. The providers are all working hard to see how apps act on the network and monitor their dataflow in particular as they search for a way to control the possible data rushes that may happen.<br />
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Instead of simply raising fear by the issue of the blog post, Nokia Siemens Network began to look at some potential ideas for maximizing every airwave to increase the abilities of the networks to transmit data across them, also going in the direction of looking at cognitive radios and self-optimizing networks, an idea that is at the front of many vendors suggestion as the networks become more complicated.<br />
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However the providers intend to deal with the growing situation, one thing is clear, the change is coming and it is coming fast, so they must work together to find a solution before the networks become overloaded with pressure.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-55770483489986582402011-09-07T05:50:00.000-07:002011-09-07T05:53:34.427-07:00Microsoft Face LawsuitThe issue of how large corporations are collecting and handling are data was once again thrown under the microscope after it was revealed Microsoft is facing a lawsuit after it was allegedly tracking its Windows 7 Phone operating system even after they had opted out. <br />
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The claims are that users of the Windows 7 Smartphone software are unknowingly being tracked whenever they turn their camera application on their phone on. The lawsuit action, which was filed in the Seattle Federal court, raises claims that Microsoft are continuing to collect the data about the location of the phone even after its users have opted out of the service. <br />
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Microsoft had not yet released a statement but are said to be preparing a response to the legal actions. Once again the actions of technology giants such as Microsoft, Apple and Google are being questioned. Apple and Google were brought before US Congress to explain their data and privacy policies after it was discovered tracking software was present in their phones. On that occasion Google Android phones were found to be collecting data, but only after the users of the phone gave their explicit permission; something that Microsoft has reportedly been failing to undertake, instead collecting data even after users have opted out of the tracking.<br />
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The lawsuit follows a letter to congress by Microsoft claiming that any data taken from the phone was always taken after permission was taken from the users. If the claims are proven then Microsoft would have to respond to congress again on why false information was provided in previous discussions. <br />
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The claim was filed by Rebecca Cousineau, who says that Microsoft collects and transmits data including the coordinates of the phones location when the camera is turned on. Reportedly affected are phones such as the HTC 7 Mozart and the Samsung Omnia 7, which both carry the Windows Phone 7 software.<br />
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Earlier in the year in its representation to congress, Microsoft said that tracking its users’ location helped deliver a more useful and relevant experience to its users. It went on to say that “To provide these rich experiences, Microsoft collects limited information necessary to determine the approximate location of a device. Collection is always with the express consent of the user and the goal of our collection is never to track where a specific device has been or is going.” And followed up by saying all the data gathered was not sensitive information and only be used as a tool for the user to aid their experiences.<br />
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It is still to be seen exactly how Microsoft will respond to the action, and just how far they have been pushing the boundaries with regards to tracking their users.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-87170853040791509002011-08-29T22:33:00.000-07:002011-09-02T02:59:41.778-07:00UK Start-up Company Looks To Link Up Third World CountriesMovirtu, a UK start-up is planning to help more than 3 million people in underprivileged countries gain access to mobile services by using a revolutionary method of offering their own personal mobile number but not an actual device.<br />
It is planning to do this by partnering with a UN scheme known as Business Call to Action (BCtA). Instead of requiring an expensive handset, Movirtu allows a user simply to own a number, or identity that will be available through the mobile carriers in developing countries throughout South Asia and Africa. The identities can then be used by logging into other phones and then will gain access to their prepaid talk time and data usage packages – eliminating the need to have access to an expensive device whilst still allowing the use of a phone.<br />
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The savings are twofold, coming from the obvious lack of device costs, which even at just 15-20$ is a expensive price where the wages are typically just a couple of dollars. On top of this by using their own prepaid package they eliminate the costs involved when borrowing a phone. Typically, it is expected you will borrow a phone if you are in need, but you will pay a fee for the lending of the phone.<br />
The scheme, which will target areas where phone uptake is obviously slow due to the costs, is expected to bring a number of benefits to the areas. It will allow access to services such as farming assistance, insurance and mobile banking, which are usually restricted to the owner of the phone; now these mobile identities will be accepted opening up a whole new world of possibilities to these deprived areas.<br />
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Movirtu has said that it hopes to induct at least 3 million new users initially to the service in Africa and South Asia and to continue to grow it where possible by using its link with U.N agencies and NGO’s, targeting 12 markets within 2 years. The first pilot rollout of the scheme is underway in Madagascar, which has good network coverage by its chief provider Airtel but is not widely used because of the costs of buying a phone. Once the service begins in earnest it is hoped to gain at least 50 million users, which is still a small drop in the ocean when compared to the 1 billion people in Africa and South Asia who rely on using borrowed phones.<br />
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The company is very hopeful for the future and hopes that the service will be a success and offer the chance for deprived areas to connect with the rest of the world, in particular targeting at woman users who are much less likely to own a phone when compared to men, either by choice or not. Ramona Liberoff of Movirtu said “Providing mobile identities in the developing world is Movirtu's primary business model” indicating just how hopeful they are that this service will take off and provide much needed links for poorer people in the targeted areas.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-30284697021206130892011-08-26T22:30:00.000-07:002011-08-29T22:31:13.901-07:00Cell Phone Networks Jam As Panic Spreads After QuakeA lot of the east coast were left in the dark about what was going on after a large 5.8 quake hit just outside Richmond, Virginia. As people desperately tried to find out how the ongoing situation was affecting friends and family they were met with a contact brick wall as the cell phone service was jammed, leading many to believe that many improvements still need to be made to help mobile phones remain active in the aftermath of emergency situations.<br />
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All the main cell phone service providers (Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint and AT&T) reported disturbances to their services after the earthquake hit on Tuesday 23rd August. Despite the fact that no damage actually occurred to the cell phone towers, because the quake was felt all along the east coast it was felt by millions in large cities such as New York, Boston and Washington D.C. leading to a rush of people trying to contact each other to find out about the situation elsewhere, which very quickly began to overwhelm the lines and eventually jammed them.<br />
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Even with all the improvements that have been made to the networks and the technology used, huge blasts of usage are still enough to bring the networks to standstill, because of the limitations of how much traffic the towers can handle, CITA (the wireless trade industry association) said after the quakes hit. Customers were also urged during the loss of service, and for any future situations, to send messages and emails to avoid clogging the lines up for vital calls. This message was echoed again by the leading service providers. <br />
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As for the future, cell phone companies are aiming to extend the 4G services all over the country and increasing the number of antennas to reduce the impact of high usage periods which may lead to jammed network services being a thing that only happened in the past. <br />
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The role of social media is becoming more and more obvious and with stress on the mobile networks still proving to be a problem, services like Facebook and Twitter are options to take over where mobile networks fail. Even during the quake last week people were using Twitter once the cell phone networks fell out of use, with the use extending to the network provider Sprint who informed customers to avoid using their cell phones for calls in anything but emergencies and instead use text messages.<br />
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How the situation will be resolved will be seen over the coming months and years, but until it is truly tested again in a real emergency we will not know exactly how effective the methods being used have been.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-67040180359492395542011-07-25T13:05:00.001-07:002011-07-25T13:05:41.415-07:00Basic Business Use Of Mobile Text MarketingModern people can't imagine their lives without cell phones, they carry them just everywhere. Once they're are forced to switch them off on let's say a plane or in a hospital, they feel uncomfortable, since they feel as though they lost contact with the world. They don't even have to wait for any important call or a message, they just want to feel "connected" with all other people and cell phones give them this comfort. Having this fact in mind, we can think of a very simple conclusion - why not to use cell phones for your business?<br />
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Although for many people mobile text marketing reminds only about spammy campaigns of ringtone companies, there are quite a lot of uses of mobile phones for your company. No matter if it's a startup or a well established business looking for new opportunities to meet their customers needs. Imagine a situation when you need to send your customer a very important notification regarding some emergency. You can send an e-mail and it can work for many people who are able to receive e-mails on their cell phones, but there are still majority of wireless phones users who really don't have this feature in their devices. So why not to text them? You will be sure that they have received the message immediately wherever they would be.<br />
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This is just one possible use of mobile text marketing and there are several others which you should know. Just think how great opportunity it would be to send special discount offers directly to your customers cell phones. Most of these devices have nowadays access to the internet, so you will be able to send them a link to your landing page and track which customers are actually interested in your offer. Although you can think that it's just the same as with e-mails, you should remember that an average men receives much more advertising e-mails than texts which means that the probability that he would open such a message on his cell phone is much higher when comparing to e-mail marketing.<br />
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There are of course some important rules which you should abide by when doing mobile text marketing. All you subscribers should be opt in and they should be informed how they can easily opt out from your list, so you're not accused of sending spam. There are very strict privacy rules in the US law which affect mobile marketing and you should always bear it in mind.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-87748197595738760022011-07-19T10:21:00.000-07:002011-07-19T10:21:34.055-07:00Choosing The Right Telecom CarrierAverage man receives at least around 6 different bills at the end of each month. Each bill means that you have to pay certain amount of money to a service provider who has been delivering certain services to your house or apartment. These can be electricity, security or for example phone bills. The sum to pay varies depending on the service type as well as many other factors. Some people notice that they actually can lower some of their bills by choosing a different service provider who offers exactly the same or very similar services for a much lower fee. In this article I will focus on telecom carriers and how to choose the right one for your needs.<br />
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My first advice is to never rush, if you are patient you can wait for some special deals which will let you save much more money. That's why it's important not to choose the first carrier which you notice, you should analyze his offer and compare it to his competitors in order to make the best choice. You should compare the monthly price of your contract and what is crucial, you should learn what is included in it. How many minutes you can use for free. If you're considering carrier's change, it will be also smart to check if they can lower the price once you choose to use the phone carrier as you Internet provider. Some companies offer such packages for a lower price.<br />
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If it's not your first service provider and your considering <a href="http://phonyphonecalls.blogspot.com/2011/07/how-to-keep-your-cell-phone-number-when.html">switching carriers</a>, I've got a good news for your - you can keep your old phone number even if you decide to switch from wireless carrier to a land line one. There are of course a few restrictions, but in most cases you will be able to do this without any troubles. It's all thanks to the LNP which stands for "local number portability". It guarantees you that if you decide to switch carriers, they can't deny your request. If they do, you can file a complaint to FCC.<br />
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Once you compare all the plans of different phone carriers, you should find some reviews of the company which you chose. It's very important, because even the best and the cheapest offer doesn't mean that the carrier is reliable. Learn more about its technical support as well as the quality of services to make sure that you will not regret your choice.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-22910396117988040292011-07-15T08:29:00.000-07:002011-09-23T02:22:40.007-07:00Is It Worth To Buy A Cell Phone Cover?It's no doubt that cell phones have become a necessity. Most people can't imagine life without them, especially since these small devices can be used not only for calling or texting, but also for many other purposes such as taking pictures, listening to the music or even watching movies. We need our cell phones to work 24 hours a day without any failures. It doesn't matter if it's dust or water, we just don't want our cell phone to be damaged so that we can use it any moment we want and we can be sure that it will be efficient.<br />
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One of the easiest and cheapest solution to protect our wireless phones is a phone case. It's usually made of a special rubber which will isolate your device from many various factors which can pose danger to it. If your cell phone falls into a puddle, you don't have to worry since the rubber has made your cell phone waterproof. If you think that it will make using the phone more difficult, you are wrong. If you choose a decent cover, you can be sure that after a few days of using you won't even remember that you have been using it.<br />
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Another great advantage of a cell phone cover is that you can easily customize your old phone and make it look exactly as you want. There are hundreds of different patterns and styles of covers, so there is no chance that you can't choose a good one for you. Just think that you can make your phone look different every day---if you've got a good mood, you may choose a bright cover, but if you're upset you can choose a dark one. Your imagination is the limit.<br />
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To answer the question from the title, a phone cover is definitely worth buying, especially if we consider the price which is relatively very low. Usually you can get a cover for around $2. There will be some more expensive, but it's an average price of a good quality cover. There is also one more thing that you should remember. When you install a cover it doesn't mean that your device is everything-proof. You should still be cautious when using it. A vover will just make it more resistant and of course better-looking.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-30950511289469944002011-07-12T11:35:00.000-07:002011-07-12T11:35:18.217-07:00Top Five Myths About Phone Numbers<strong>1. You cannot switch to a cell phone and keep your old land line phone number</strong><br />
With Wireless Local Number Portability you have the opportunity to turn your old residential phone number into a wireless with a minimum of paperwork. All you have to do is to contact your current carrier and ask about the procedure. One thing to remember here is not to cancel your land line until you have the wireless line activated, since you can lost your phone number.<br />
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<strong>2. You cannot find out the owner of cell phone number, unless you work for law enforcement.</strong><br />
This could have been true about ten years ago. Although wireless phone numbers users privacy is still protected by law, there are special <a href="http://phonyphonecalls.blogspot.com/2011/04/directory-of-cell-phone-numbers.html">cell phone directories</a> which can bring you some basic information about the phone owner. In most cases you will be able to learn his or her name, address as well as phone carrier.<br />
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<strong>3. You cannot stop telemarketers from calling you</strong><br />
This is your right to choose whether you want to receive marketing calls or not. If you find them annoying or you just don't want to waste your time for answering them, you have an easy method to stop such calls. The procedure is easy and can be done online - you should access the website of <a href="http://phonyphonecalls.blogspot.com/2011/04/registered-in-national-do-not-call.html">National Do Not Call Registry</a> and enter your phone number. Once you complete this, telemarketers will have 30 days to stop calling you. If they don't, you have the right to complain to the FTC which usually prevents all marketers from calling you.<br />
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<strong>4. You cannot opt out from a phone directory</strong><br />
This is quite obvious one, but I still meet a lot of people who repeat this myth. Keeping your information in a phone directory is your right, but not a duty which means that you can request your data removal any moment you want. However, you have to remember that phone directory operator have 30 days for processing your request.<br />
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<strong>5. Cell phone numbers are going public</strong><br />
The myths origins take place at 2004, when somebody started sending hoax e-mails claiming that cell phone numbers will soon become public information. The e-mail encouraged people to list their phone number in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Do_Not_Call_Registry">National Do Not Call Registry</a>, although in fact per FCC regulations telemarketers are not allowed to dial wireless phone numbers. This means that you can list your cell number in the NDNCR, but actually there is no need to.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-6832013766179103922011-07-07T03:47:00.000-07:002011-07-07T03:47:09.824-07:00How To Keep Your Cell Phone Number When Switching CarriersI have met a lot of people who were totally disappointed with their cell phone contracts and although they've seen much better offers on the market they wouldn't decide to switch carriers. The reason for this was very simple and most of us understand it - they wanted to keep their old cell phone number since all their friends, cooworkers, family and other people had this number saved in their phones memory. Here comes the good news - FCC has required almost all carriers to provide a LNP - local number portability. This means that you are free to switch between carriers as long as they are still in your local area. If so, then there will be no problem with transferring your cell phone number to your land line and in opposite way of course either.<br />
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This creates a great opportunity for people who are not satisfied with their offers or just want to switch for example from contract cell phone service to prepaid service operated by other carrier. The procedure is very simple and usually once you transfer the number, your old service will be automatically disconnected. However, you should remember that if you have a contract type cell phone, then you may be still required to pay fees for it.<br />
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If your carrier doesn't want to help you with porting your phone number to other company, you can always complain to FCC and ask them to take steps against them. However, this is a very rare situation and in most cases everything will be done without any problems or complications. You should also remember not do cancel your old service until you know that the new service is ready and process of transferring your number has began, since you may have lose access to your old number and hence you will not be able to transfer this number to the new carrier of your choice.<br />
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The whole process of porting a phone number from one carrier to another can take up to one week. In some cases it can take slightly longer, but usually the procedure is finished within a few days from filling a request. Once you receive the notification that your number has been transferred to your new carrier you can disconnect your old service without worrying that you could have lost access to it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-29750668265085751172011-07-05T16:33:00.000-07:002011-07-05T16:33:37.868-07:00Cell Phone Solar Charger - Why Do You Need OneThese days people try to look after our environment more carefully than they used to several years ago. Each day we hear about global warming and odd changes in our climate which are very difficult to explain since it was the first time they occurred. Many people think of some easy method which they can use in order to be at least a little bit more ecological. On the other hand, there are quite a lot of people who actually don't care about our planet but just feel that being eco is fashionable so they want to catch up with this trend usually by buying some gadgets. In this post I will introduce you one of such eco gadgets which sometimes can be really useful but in most cases remains a gadget.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/909/lenmarsolarcharger.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear:right; float:right; margin-left:1em; margin-bottom:1em"><img border="0" height="170" width="170" src="http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/909/lenmarsolarcharger.jpg" /></a></div>Cell phone solar charger is a thing which is great when you go to some place where you don't have access to electricity. I know how weird it can sound, but there are actually some places where there is no access to it or it's restricted and you can't use it whenever you want. You can also think of a situation when you're in a place where there is electricity but unfortunately due to some power outage you've lost it and need some way to charge your cell phone. When using a solar charger to charge your phone, you should expect that for each two hours of charging you will get around 20 minutes of talk. It may sound very attractive, but if it's the only method to get your cell working, it's worth considering.<br />
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Many people who hear about solar chargers say that it's dangerous for your cell phone to be exposed to sunbeams. They're totally right, but they miss a very important point. While using a cell phone solar charger you don't have to keep your device near the charger. You can just put the charger in a place where there is a lot of solar energy and wait until it charges itself and then take it to shade where you keep your cell phone and then transfer the electricity from the charger to your device.<br />
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The cost of such charger is relatively high, it's much more expensive than an ordinary charger, but on the other hand the technology used in it is much more sophisticated and all solar oriented equipment is expensive. A basic one will cost you around $20.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-19209404565104813462011-06-27T23:31:00.000-07:002011-06-27T23:31:02.295-07:00Keeping Your Children Safe With Cellphone Spyware ProgramsThe phrase "spyware program" has very negative connotations and the first impression of people who hear it is that there must be something shady and illegal involved. Usually the thing that comes to people's mind is that it must be some kind of virus which will seriously damage your computer and that it will take ages to get rid of this from your PC so to be able to use your computer in a normal way. Although it's a fact that in most cases infection of a spyware program won't have any positive effects for the victim, but there there are actually a few kinds of "good" spyware programs which will help you monitor somebody's cell phone in order to make sure that he's safe and there's nothing which constitutes a threat to his life.<br />
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Most of the parents who buy cell phones to their children usually think that it's nothing wrong when a teenager texts or calls his friends. Using the modern devices he will also be able to take and send high quality pictures, browse his favourite websites. However, if you try to imagine what can kind of pictures and texts can he send, you may start to worry that actually there might be something wrong about this. Just think of a very common situation which becomes more and more popular in the teens world - explicit messages, nude pictures - this is the stuff which teenagers are the most interested in these days. You can think that as long as they talk with their peers, there is nothing inappropriate about this, but there are a lot of sexual predators who may involve your child in a relationship which nobody would approve.<br />
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When a child turns into a teenager, you will a notice a significant difference in your contact. Most teenagers will not come to you to talk about their concerns, worries and problems, they will discuss this stuff with their friends. And even if you try to ask them about anything, they will get even more secretive. This is the major reason why you should think of employing some technical skills to make sure that your child is safe and the people who he flirts with are the people in the same age. Although I meant technical skills, you really don't have to be tech savvy in order to use cell phone spyware. There are two basic steps to start "spying" or rather observing your child's cell phone - you have to install one piece of software in his device and then access a special website where will you have to use your authorization credentials to get access to information gathered from your child's cell phone. When you access the website you will be able to choose what phone numbers you want to "watch". When you decide to watch a certain phone number, you will be notified about each and every text or call associated with this phone number. Thanks to this you can choose to observe only numbers that you don't trust and omit numbers of your child's friends who you know.<br />
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Depending on the software which you choose, you will be able to check your child's texts, calls, in some cases, if your child's device has a GPS built in, you will be able to track his position live - this means that you will see an actual map with an exact position of your offspring. The software is virtually undetectable by an ordinary child, you have to employ a lot of technical skills to find out that your phone has been infected with such spyware and thus you don't have to worry that your child will notice it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-18241445796466796752011-06-24T08:50:00.001-07:002011-06-24T08:53:46.813-07:00Faxing Directly From Your Cell PhoneHave you ever needed to send a fax but you were away from your office and couldn't find any service point where you could do it? If so, you will be very interested in a new feature available for smartphones as well as for iphones. There is an application which now make it possible to send faxes right from your cell phone. All you will have to do is to download it and pay a small fee in some cases, then you can enjoy the freedom of faxing from everywhere. However, if you want to send large faxes, it will be better to make sure that you have a good internet connection available, since it will significantly speed up the process.<br />
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<img src="http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/9443/freefaxservice.png" style="float:right; margin: 3px;" width="260px; height:180px"/>Most of the applications for sending faxes from your cell phones are very easy to use and doesn't require any technical skills. All you will have to is to read a few instructions and you're ready to go! One of the possible uses of such tool is for example faxing while you're travelling or just don't have any fax nearby. However, just think of other advantages of using mobile faxing - you can totally forget about costs of paper which is required when you want to send a traditional fax. It's not only cheaper solution, but also much more ecological. We all know that even if it's not so important today, its importance will increase significantly within years.<br />
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The principle behind mobile faxing is almost the same as with ordinary online faxing. You just send your document in whatever format you want - let it be PDF, doc or pages(it's the Mac counterpart to doc) - to a company which handles your faxing. They have special devices which translate the digital documents into ordinary analog message which can be send via phone lines. Then you just receive a report to find out if your message has been received successfully. You don't have to worry about many things such as paper jams or that you have run out of ink. All those things are handled by a third-party company which you have employed to send faxes in your name.<br />
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The costs of such services vary depending on the amount of pages that you are going to send per month. Usually the fee starts at around $5 per month, however many companies let you test their services for free for some time. Thanks to this, you will find out if you're satisfied with the quality of services and you will make sure that your decision is right. Of course if you're not happy with the services, in most cases you will be eligible for a refund. It depends on the company, but nearly all providers will give you the full sum you paid.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-46961381855661662952011-06-23T04:06:00.001-07:002011-06-23T04:06:22.863-07:00Backwards Phone Lookup - A Couple Of TipsBackwards phone lookup is the other name of a very popular service called "reverse phone look up". The purpose of performing backwards look up is exactly the same, you have a phone number of somebody and you want to learn more details about this person. Depending on the type of phone number you want to reverse, the service can be free, but in some particular cases, you will have to pay a small fee to access the information. <br />
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The free lookups are available for ordinary land lines as well as business phone numbers. Those phones can be easily found with no charge for example at <a href="http://whitepages.com">WhitePages.com</a> website. They claim to offer over 400,000,000 of residential records absolutely free of charge. This means that if you type a phone number and it's found in the database, you will be able to find out the owner's name as well as his home address. However, there are phone numbers which are actually landlines but cannot be found in the public phone directories such as WhitePages. Those numbers are called "unlisted" and their owners requested their data removal from public sources. This is very common practice which is intended to protect their privacy. Although you can't find their information in public databases, you can try to employ paid backwards phone look ups to find more details about those numbers.<br />
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So if you need to reverse a number which hasn't been found in for example WhitePages, you will have to check paid services which have much bigger databases. The data for those directories is collected in totally different way and since residential records are public information, you can just ask a phone carrier for the data of his customers, but cell phone numbers as well as unlisted cannot be handled this way. Those data brokers have to ask each and every cell phone owner if they allow them to list their information in their database. Of course this is a simplification and the process is much more sophisticated but according to the current US law the company which collects such data must receive a consent from each and every person.<br />
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If you still can't find the record which you need, you can try to employ a private detective. And although this is the most effective method of find the phone number's owner, it's also the most expensive one I would advice it only to people who are really desperate to find out somebody's identity. The fees for a basic service will start at at least $300 and they might raise to even a few thousand dollars, so the costs can be enormous. However, you are assured that the information you receive is accurate and double checked.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-16509724079424992932011-06-21T12:52:00.001-07:002011-06-21T14:16:09.426-07:00When Can Spoofing Caller ID Be HelpfulHave you ever wanted to call somebody but you didn't want the other party to know your phone number? For years it was impossible due to the telecommunication structure and only law enforcement agencies could fake their IDs when calling other people. Fortunately the situation changed in 2003 when the VOIP technology became really popular and each month more and more people were starting to use it. The VOIP phones use completely different technology than ordinary land or cell phones. And thus the development of VOIP telephones made it possible to spoof your caller ID.<br />
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You don't have to posses any special equipment or expensive devices. There is obviously such stuff, but it's mainly used by professional private investigators as well as law enforcement. In some cases big telemarketing companies also employ it, but for an ordinary person who just want to hide his or her phone number from the eyes of the other person, there is a cheap and simple solution. It works like a calling card - at first you dial the number given on the card and then upon a few moments you will be able to call the number you need. The cost of such operation will be slightly higher than when calling without spoofing ID, but thanks to use of such a calling card, you can be sure that the person will not know your phone number.<br />
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Many people will think that they can use a feature built-in their cell phones in order to hide their phone number when calling. Unfortunately, this is not as effective as the calling card fro spoofing ID and can be easily tracked without any bigger effort. Which means that there is no point in making use of it if you have to stay anonymous. There are a lot of different companies who offer calling cards for spoofing IDs and you should always compare prices, since almost all the services offer the same features, so it's smart to choose the cheapest one. <br />
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There is a very important thing which you should bear in mind when spoofing ID. It will never make you 100% and when you break the law, it will not be difficult to trace you and find out your real identity. Of course, this can't be done by an ordinary person, but only by law enforcement agency with a court injunction. This means that you can safely use a spoofing ID for each and every legitimate purpose without thinking of any legal consequences.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-30475506611362329002011-06-20T04:07:00.000-07:002011-06-21T12:31:50.476-07:00Are Prepaid Cell Phone Onwers Actually Anonymous?During the past decade the world anonymity has became extremely popular. Several years ago people were unaware that they should reveal only the information they really have to in order to protect their identities. However, while the modern technology have developed significantly, a lot of new issues to remember have appeared. Most of the privacy concerning things are associated with the Internet and ever growing social networking pages where people are very eager to share their personal information with strangers. However, more and more people decide to cut down on the amount of shared data. Once they notice that they can do something to improve their so called anonymity in the internet, they will also try to look further to find other means to achieve this.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://prepaidcellphone123.com/images/float/best-prepaid-cell-phone.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear:right; float:right; margin-left:1em; margin-bottom:1em"><img border="0" height="250" width="220" src="http://prepaidcellphone123.com/images/float/best-prepaid-cell-phone.jpg" /></a></div><br />
I know quite a lot of people who use no contract sim cards, because they think that thanks to this, nobody will be able to learn their name, address or any other personal information, just by using their phone number. They believe that if there's no personal information associated with the number in the carrier's database, nobody will be able to find it using for example a cell phone lookup. Unfortunately, they're not right, buying a prepaid cell phone will not make you any more anonymous if you decide to use the phone number just like any other. This means that you will be for example shopping online using your personal information and the prepaid cell phone number or you will take part in some online sweep-stake where you have to provide your cell phone number. If you use the number in this way, you can be sure that your data will be collected and aggregated into a cell phone directory with all your personal information in it.<br />
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However, there is a easy way to prevent such situation - you just have to read the terms of service before you enter your personal details. If you notice that you agree to resell your data, you shouldn't agree, since you can be sure that after some time the information you entered will be bought by some cell phone directory and everybody who pay a few bucks will be able to find your name and address just knowing your cell phone number which was meant to be totally anonymous.<br />
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Although this is very boring and takes a lot of time to even skim read the terms and conditions as well as privacy policy, you should always sacrifice your time to do this in order to know what exactly is going on. Don't forget that it's the same contract as if it was printed and signed.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-41970967478530882882011-06-18T04:18:00.001-07:002011-06-18T04:18:53.912-07:00It's Actually Possible To Find An E-Mail Owner's Name And AddressPeople usually think that they are anonymous while using internet. They think that once they disconnect and connect again, they will have a new IP address and nobody will be able to find them again if they don't want to. If they don't want to be the person they were, they simply change their nickname or e-mail address so to create a new identity. Unfortunately, the truth about this is much more complicated and not many people are aware that there is no such thing as anonymity in the internet. I don't want to talk about the authorities who can easily track each and every internet user, but I want to introduce you a tool which will enable you to find a person's details just knowing his e-mail address.<br />
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Although due to the amount spam which is being sent each day, many people wish not to publish their e-mail address. However, if you ask them to give you this address, the person shouldn't have any second thoughts and would probably provide you with his e-mail. A lot of people forget login credentials to their e-mails accounts and change the address, but usually when you ask somebody for an e-mail address, he will give you his primary one. When you have the e-mail, it's sometimes possible to figure out the person's name, since a lot of people use it as a user name. However, in most cases the user name will be something like "flower34" or "joker1000" and hence you have to use some other method to obtain the person's name.<br />
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You can obviously use Google or any other search engine which can give you some decent results if the person published his name and e-mail on some website which has been indexed by Google. In this situation, you will get your information without paying anything. However, if you want to get some more detailed information about the e-mail's owner, you can use a reverse email lookup. It's quite a new service which will work with most of the US e-mail addresses. To learn how it works you can visit an email lookup website and simply enter the address in a special box. Once you hit search button, you will have to wait for a while(usually just a few seconds) to get the results delivered. At first you will be presented with just a small bit of the data obtained from database, but if you decide to pay, you will receive the full report.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-70175345442589671342011-06-02T03:08:00.000-07:002011-06-02T03:08:15.025-07:00Why Finding Friends Is Now Much Easier Than It Used To BeSeveral years ago when we lost contact with some of our mates because he moved to for example other state or city it was much more difficult to find a good way to get in touch with him. There were some traditional methods like asking your mutual friends whether they know something about this person. You always could use a printed phone directory or hire a private investigator. The first two methods usually didn't yield any satisfactory results unlike the last one. Private detective has always been the best method to trace virtually any person, but the cost of hiring one is often so high that most of the people who look for their friends simply can't afford to pay one.<br />
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Fortunately, there was a huge progress in the technology and thanks to bright engineers we now have access to the Internet. The most powerful source of knowledge which is publicly available. As the urban legends say there are hardly any things which you couldn't find in the internet, there things you will find beautiful, there are news and books which you can read online, but there are also things which we would never want to look at. That's the nature of the internet, everybody has access to it and is able to create his own content as well as browse and read stuff created by other people.<br />
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Internet would be a useless invention if we didn't have any tools for searching it. This why search engines like Bing or Google are now the most visited websites in the internet. Huge majority of people start browsing the Internet with typing some query into a search engine. People can look for some products to buy, reviews of the products they're going to buy, news and articles and many other things. And among those things there is one more which is not so popular to search using the internet - people. It can be very surprising to you, but it is possible to use internet as tool to find your old mates or just people that you want to learn more about.<br />
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Depending on the type of information that you have about the person you should use different tools to search for a person.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://whitepages.com" imageanchor="1" style="clear:left; float:left;margin-right:1em;"><img border="0" src="http://img691.imageshack.us/img691/1342/whitepageslogo.png" /></a></div><b>1. WhitePages</b><br />
If you know a land line phone number of the person, it might be possible that you will be able to find details about him for free. There are actually a few websites which allow you to perform a reverse phone look ups free of charge and their databases are quite comprehensive. My first choice for such a search would be WitePages. Once you type a person's phone number, you will be given the person's name as well as the address. Of course there is a chance, that the guy has requested to remove his record from a phone directory and thus you will not be able to find it. If you decide to look for a person by his name, you should also think of a state where he now can live, since when you type simply his or her name you will surely end up with at least a few hundreds records which you will have to manually browse.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://spokeo.com" imageanchor="1" style="clear:left; float:left;margin-right:1em;"><img border="0" src="http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/2991/spokeologo16847.gif" /></a></div><b>2. Spokeo</b><br />
Spokeo is much more comprehensive than WhitePages and can provide you with information from social networks - which means that you can learn the person's interests and see pictures of him. Unfortunately, most of those information are not available for free, you will have to pay for access to them. The basic monthly fee for this is relatively low and equals $4.95. If decide to use the free version, you will still see the person's address, some limited household information as well as family members.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://pipl.com" imageanchor="1" style="clear:left; float:left;margin-right:1em; "><img border="0" src="http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/5930/logohomeo.gif" /></a></div><b>3. Pipl</b><br />
When type a person's name into Pipl search field, you will get a list of different results from the most popular social networks, such as MySpace, Bebo, Facebook, LinkedId, ClassMates, but you will also see which websites mentions this name. Spoeko will charge you for this, but Pipl will show you pictures associated with the given name for free. The pictures will come from pictures search engines as well as from social networks. Using Pipl website you can perform a free reverse cell phone lookup, but the amount of information which you can get will be small and usually it will be just the carrier's name.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-62504120023787488562011-05-16T18:35:00.001-07:002011-05-16T18:35:30.224-07:00Making Use Of Phone Lookups In Your CompanyThere are hardly any companies which do not collect information about their customers. Usually the only difference between them is the amount and the type of gathered data. Some companies need addresses, other public records. Imagine a situation when a real estate company will want to screen one of prospective tenants to make sure he will be able to pay the rent and that he has never been accused of any criminal activity. In such case the real estate company will need to obtain access to such information. However, this is quite a rare situation and usually most businesses will need much more basic information such as confirming a phone number and address or some basic information about the customer's household.<br />
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It is of course possible to verify the given phone number by calling it, but this usually annoys people. There is much better solution for it which you can implement in your company's IT system. You can find at least a few companies which allow you to lookup phone numbers automatically using their API, so that you don't have to perform each and every check manually. This will save you a lot of time and effort. For sure there will be some records which have to be verified by a human, but most of address and phone numbers data can be checked automatically.<br />
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Even if still don't see any practical use of phone lookups in your company, consider the following situation. The only information which possess about your customers are names and phone numbers. Not much if you would like to send a Christmas card. However, you could always call your customers and ask them for addresses to send the cards. On the other hand, as I mentioned before such solution will not be consider comfortable for your customers and will generate additional costs. When using reverse phone lookups automatically, you will be able to append an address to each of the phone numbers. It is no difference if it's a cell phone or a land line. Good service providers have databases covering all of these phone numbers.<br />
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The last thing which can prevent you from implementing such system in you company might be the cost of developing it. Try to ask your IT office for the cost of such operation and believe me, you will be surprised that it's so low. Usually these are just a few hours of programmer's work but when you imagine the advantages you will quickly realise that it's definitely worth it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-88298858600557956852011-04-25T09:00:00.000-07:002011-04-25T09:00:02.452-07:00They Have 750 Billion Records On You. Have You Even Heard Of Them?<div style="float: left; font-size: 10px; text-align: center; margin: 6px;"><a href="http://img709.imageshack.us/img709/1037/acxiom.png" target="_blank"><img src="http://img709.imageshack.us/img709/1037/acxiom.png" style="width:250px; height:240px;" /></a><p style="margin: 0px;"><a href="http://www.acxiom.com/Pages/Home.aspx">Acxiom </a>official website</p></div>With its headquarters in Little Rock, Arkansas Acxiom is one of the biggest companies you may have never heard of. In this article I will briefly explain you why it's definitely worth for you to learn a little bit more about this company. I'll deliberately omit some useless facts about number of employees, annual turnover and so on. It's enough for you to know that these are huge figures with no doubt.<br />
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To start off I will mention that Acxiom is a data aggregation business. The euphemism means that their main purpose is to obtain as much data as possible from as many people as they can. Since the the company operates in 60 countries around the world, they collect and compile data about their residents. One thing is that these people have given away their sensitive personal information usually without getting anything in exchange, but the other is that some of them were unaware that the their data will be aggregated into Acxiom database. Just think if you have ever done any of these things:<br />
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<ul><li>bought a magazine subscription</li>
<li>registered an account for any electronic services</li>
<li>filled in an online survey</li>
<li>took part in some prize giveaway(i.e. Free iPad Giveaway)</li>
<li>given away your details in any other way and neglected to read privacy policy</li>
</ul><br />
<div style="float: right; font-size: 10px; text-align: center;"><img style=" width: 370px; height: 150px;" src="http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/8822/freeipad.png" /><p style="margin: 0px;">An example of online prize giveaway</p></div>In case you have, the probability of some data aggregation company possessing your data is extremely high. Acxiom and other similar companies cooperate closely to merge information collected from third party companies. Other methods involve buying large amounts of data from credit card issuers, retail banking companies, car manufacturers, brokerage firms, insurance and real estate companies, online retailers as well as pharmacies. They work with around 60-70% of the biggest companies in these industries. Just try to think of one single piece of information they may not know have. They know your name, address, previous address, marriage status, cell phone, things you prefer, drugs you take, financial situation(credit history, earnings), your car preferences as well as VINs. Using their software they can easily associate you with your family members in their databases. <br />
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Since it's the money that rule the world, it will be no difficult to think of potential use of such sensitive data. Each day they serve 350 millions customers around the world with their databases. Some of the customers need background checks, some of them need to reverse cell phone numbers but most of their customers demand highly targeted contact information which Acxiom surely can provide. They can quickly find millions of people who could be potentially interested in buying shiny tyres to their Chevrolet who live in Kentucky. <br />
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<strong>How To Opt Out From Such Databases?</strong><br />
In theory the procedure is fairly simple, you just have to fill in a simple questionnaire and send them to a data aggregation company. It is nothing surprising that such firms try to discourage consumers from opting out and it is proven by experts.<br />
<a href="http://www.acxiom.com/about_us/privacy/consumer_information/opt_out_request_form/Pages/Opt-OutRequestForm.aspx">Opting out from Acxiom</a><br />
If you want to opt out from all the data brokers, you should visit <a href="http://www.privacyalerts.org/data-brokers.html">Privacy Alerts</a> who created a full list of opt out forms.<br />
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<strong>How To Avoid Giving Out Your Personal Information?</strong><br />
The first and the most important thing in here is a Privacy Policy of the company which demands personal information from you. You don't have to read the whole Privacy Policy document carefully, just skim read and try to find a similar clause:<br />
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<i>We may sell, brand or share your personal information that you supply to us with other 3rd party businesses [...]</i><br />
Source: http://www.surveypanelgroup.com/privacy.php <small>*</small><br />
<small>This is not an Acxiom operated website.</small><br />
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If you find something like this, you can be sure that your personal information will be sold to 3rd parties. However, if you can't find anything like this, I strongly advice you to read the Privacy Policy again, but this time do it thoroughly. I know this no fun, but as long as your privacy is concerned you should be very careful.<br />
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Sources:<br />
-<a href="http://ivebeenmugged.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/05/acxiom.html">http://ivebeenmugged.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/05/acxiom.html</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6331043592059951855.post-27327659984462120942011-04-23T02:29:00.000-07:002011-04-23T02:31:01.813-07:00Registered In National Do Not Call Registry But Still Receiving Unwanted Calls?<a href="http://www.donotcall.gov/">National Do Not Call Registry</a> - implemented in 2004 by the FTC was aimed to contain phone numbers of US citizens who do not want to receive any telemarketing calls. Regarding to the last surveys 92 out of 100 people who have placed their phone numbers on the list report to receive less unsolicited calls. 78% of the poll participants claim to receive much less or none unwanted calls. This proves that creating such a national registry was indeed a good move of US authorities. What is important, the registration is fairly easy and can be either done in the <a href="http://www.donotcall.gov/">internet</a> or by calling 1-888-382-1222. You will be asked to give the phone number you would like to put in the registry as well as e-mail if you're doing it online. There is no need to enter any additional details such as address or even your name.<br />
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Although the provided stats clearly show that the National Do Not Call Registry prevents most of telemarketers from calling your number, there are still numerous incidents when you receive such calls while being listed in the NDNCR. Some of the calls will surely be illegal and you can easily file a complaint about them. However, before filing anything, I'd like to encourage you to read the rest of the article, where you will learn a few exceptions from National Do Not Call Registry.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cxBnpeezEUU/TbKbqFz2jBI/AAAAAAAAAT0/ZaUhrP8wMY8/s1600/register%2Ba%2Bphone%2Bnumber.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear:right; float:right; margin-left:1em; margin-bottom:1em"><img border="0" height="120" width="290" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cxBnpeezEUU/TbKbqFz2jBI/AAAAAAAAAT0/ZaUhrP8wMY8/s200/register%2Ba%2Bphone%2Bnumber.png" /></a></div>The first granted exception concerns business lines which are not protected by the NDNCR which means that even you have listed your number in the registry everybody is allowed to call you with his offer and you will not be able to complain. Second exception applies to politicians who can call you with their agitation. However, in the 2008 Congress under the pressure of Citizens for Civil Discourse discussed launching a National Political Do Not Call Registry which we would be opened to voters who don't want to be called by any politicians. Unfortunately, only three politicians actually voted for it.<br />
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You also shouldn't bother complaining when you receive survey, debt collectors or non profit organization calls. These are not restricted by the NDNCR. There is also a regulation which let companies who have been in business relationship with you for over 18 months to call you without your consent. If you wish not to receive calls from such companies, you will need to ask them individually which should surely prevent them from calling you again.<br />
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You ought to remember how much time has passed from the moment you listed your number in the registry. There is a 31 days hold period during which telemarketers are still allowed to call you. After this time they should stop calling you. Very important thing is also checking if your number actually is listed in the registry. It can be simply done by visiting a <a href="https://www.donotcall.gov/confirm/conf.aspx">verification page</a> of FTC website.<br />
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If you believe that none of the above mentioned exceptions concerns your situation, you are free to file a complain. Filing it is very easy and can be done online or simply by calling 1-888-382-1222. You will be asked a few questions regarding the phone call which you think was unsolicited. FTC has also produced a simple movie about filing a complain:<br />
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The movie is not stricly about Do Not Call Registry complains but clearly shows the proccess of filing one.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3