Will curiosity kill my cat? What is this?
Hey NMGLUGers, This scenario is potentially a bit off-topic. But I'm reaching out to you for discussion because I generally like to keep it local and deal with people whom I might actually meet at some point, people with whom I might develop a degree of mutual understanding and personal investment. Call it "community" if you like. After many years of resistance I recently broke down and acquired my first smart phone, a different service provider, and a new number. Time to clean house, too much old information and random vulnerabilities floating around in the ether; lots of weird phishing and robo calls, etc. I am hooked but not enthusiastic about the new device (Moto G6, Ting). Google and Android totally creep me out, but I think I've got that aspect as constrained as is reasonably possible. (Synced Contacts being the really horrible, notable exception.) I'm keeping the old $10 Tracfone "feature phone" around until the renew date so I don't inadvertently cut off old friends and contacts I can't deal with in the near term. In the last couple of months I've received probably three very strange but similar text messages on the Tracfone. Part of the reason I finally decided to make the switch. This is the most recent: 1-400-200-501 FRM:larryet MSG: http:///20kr.Du0.s.h.icu? ee2py neckas he drew short I don't dare type any of it into a browser. Can anyone decode or explain it to me? Is it some kind of hack or is it just kids on drugs or something? Thanks, Tom
Wow, I have gotten nothing like that and I'm bugged. weird things have happened which I put out to the group a couple of years back but your stuff is really weird. Hope someone can figure out WTF it is. Best Brian On 1/9/19 12:51 PM, Tom Ashcraft wrote:
Hey NMGLUGers,
This scenario is potentially a bit off-topic. But I'm reaching out to you for discussion because I generally like to keep it local and deal with people whom I might actually meet at some point, people with whom I might develop a degree of mutual understanding and personal investment. Call it "community" if you like.
After many years of resistance I recently broke down and acquired my first smart phone, a different service provider, and a new number. Time to clean house, too much old information and random vulnerabilities floating around in the ether; lots of weird phishing and robo calls, etc.
I am hooked but not enthusiastic about the new device (Moto G6, Ting). Google and Android totally creep me out, but I think I've got that aspect as constrained as is reasonably possible. (Synced Contacts being the really horrible, notable exception.)
I'm keeping the old $10 Tracfone "feature phone" around until the renew date so I don't inadvertently cut off old friends and contacts I can't deal with in the near term.
In the last couple of months I've received probably three very strange but similar text messages on the Tracfone. Part of the reason I finally decided to make the switch. This is the most recent:
1-400-200-501
FRM:larryet MSG: http:///20kr.Du0.s.h.icu? ee2py neckas he drew short
I don't dare type any of it into a browser. Can anyone decode or explain it to me? Is it some kind of hack or is it just kids on drugs or something?
Thanks, Tom
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Tom Ashcraft writes:
I am hooked but not enthusiastic about the new device (Moto G6, Ting). Google and Android totally creep me out, but I think I've got that aspect as constrained as is reasonably possible. (Synced Contacts being the really horrible, notable exception.)
You don't need to sync your contacts either, if you don't want to; Android still works with local/only contacts. Though of course, we shouldn't assume that means Google doesn't know our contacts.
I'm keeping the old $10 Tracfone "feature phone" around until the renew date so I don't inadvertently cut off old friends and contacts I can't deal with in the near term.
I'm sure you know that you can port the old number to the new phone if you choose. But it sounds like ditching the old number is part of your motivation for this move.
In the last couple of months I've received probably three very strange but similar text messages on the Tracfone. Part of the reason I finally decided to make the switch. This is the most recent:
1-400-200-501
FRM:larryet MSG: http:///20kr.Du0.s.h.icu? ee2py neckas he drew short
I've gone through periods where I got a bunch of those, then I won't get any for a long time. As far as I know they're just random spam: ignore and delete. I'm not sure if any carriers offer spam blocking for texts; I have Tracfone over Verizon and they don't seem to offer anything like that.
I don't dare type any of it into a browser. Can anyone decode or explain it to me? Is it some kind of hack or is it just kids on drugs or something?
I definitely wouldn't tap on the link. I usually assume they lead to malware sites -- I don't worry about that much on Linux, but on Android it's a big deal since security fixes run so far behind, if you can get them at all. Though whois h.icu gives me "Network is unreachable" so maybe that one isn't a risk. ...Akkana
Tom Ashcraft writes:
I am hooked but not enthusiastic about the new device (Moto G6, Ting). Google and Android totally creep me out, but I think I've got that aspect as constrained as is reasonably possible. (Synced Contacts being the really horrible, notable exception.)
You can host your own contacts server. About a month ago I installed Radicale on an always-on machine in my apartment. On my phone and tablet I installed the DAVdroid and Simple Contacts apps, set DAVdroid to sync with my Radicale server, and told Simple Contacts to use only that synced account and never to sync to Google. You have to be choosy when installing other apps though. Personally if I ever encounter one that asks for access to contacts, I live without it. -- Anthony J. Bentley
participants (4)
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Akkana Peck -
Anthony J. Bentley -
Brian O'Keefe -
Tom Ashcraft