How does a PayPal hacker use or turn the Paypal balance he hacked to real cash?

1) Trading the PayPal account balances

    The hacker will sell the PayPal money to a willing buyer. If the hacker is selling Paypal balance in dollars then it would be at a low exchange rate and / or less the service fee. Selling in dollars is less suspicious as they can just justify that it was something earned from providing services to foreign clients who pay in dollars.

   To do this the hacker will likely do a "Sent Payment" transaction to the PayPal account of a legitimate buyer who does not know he is dealing with a hacker. The buyer upon receiving the amount will then send the money using local money transfer services.

   If the owner of the hacked account makes a claim, the one at the losing end will be the buyer of Paypal money from a hacked account. Because he has no way of retrieving the cash he has already sent to the scammer after PayPal reverses the "Sent Payment" transaction done by the hacker. The buyer will also be charged a penalty by PayPal for accepting the money taken from a hacked account.

2) Use Paypal to buy stuff

   A second option  is that the hacker will use the money to buy something expensive online. For sellers it is best to ask your buyers who pay through PayPal to confirm their identity by providing a contact number where you can reach them. This should be a must if the buyer is using a newly created accounted and suddenly pays through PayPal. Check also if the buyer has used a verified PayPal account. You may also like to wait 1-2 days to let it clear because if the money used in paying is from hacking then it is likely to be reversed by PayPal.

3) Transfer the money to a bank account

    Another option is the hacker may also try to add his own bank account into the hacked PayPal account and transfer the money into his account. Or if the hacker is desperate or just openly boasting his skills that he won't get caught he will move all of it directly to his own PayPal account and likely try to deposit it to his bank account. Transfer however of money to bank accounts should take 2-4 days to clear so chances are this would be the final option he would take.

Here are tips in knowing how to make a strong password

Upon learning about the pitfalls of password creation in a previous post you should next learn about how to create strong passwords.

1) Think of a long phrase and use all that as a password.

This comic from xkcd should help explain why long passwords are better than short passwords.

example:
iloveeatingicecreaminthemountain
007isjamesbond

2) You can make it longer by putting a hyphen or special characters in between the words
example:
barney-is-purple
hello!world?

3) If you are limited with the character to use make use of  capital letters and special characters and character substitutions.

example: bornwild = B0rnW1ld3r
in here the first characters of the word are in capitalized, vowels are substituted with numbers. You can make your own rules.

Go ahead and make you password changes now. Feel free to test out your new passwords with Microsoft's password checker.

Common pitfalls in using passwords

Passwords are needed to secure your identity. You need a good password to ensure hackers will be kept away from getting precious information that will help them steal not just your identity but also the money from your credit cards and  bank accounts.

However it is easy to succumb to some bad habits when it comes to using passwords. Here are the common pitfalls you should avoid


1) Don't use the same password across all accounts

Make sure your computer passwords, email, bank account, online wallet (like PayPal, AlertPay etc) , social accounts (Facebook, MySpace, Twitter), messaging accounts (Skype, Yahoo Messenger, etc) and such important accounts have different passwords.  It may be hard to remember them all but the precaution is still worth it. Any case there is always the option to recover password or you can do it old-style and write it in a notebook which you could keep safely tuck away always in a safe place and always away from prying eyes.

2) Avoid using a short password

Hackers typically try to guess what your password is. They make use of programs that can try hundreds of possible combination in just one minute. The shorter the password the easier it is to guess because the lesser the combination the computer has to test.

3) If you must share your password change it afterwards

You might have asked someone to check your email for you or post a photo online on your behalf. Even if you know that person very well it is still good practice to change your password. It is possible that although they will not do anything bad but what if they have accessed your information from an infected computer that has a keylogger which logs keyboard strokes and send this information to a hacker? If the account used for that password like your email may contain sensitive information then it is better to be on the safe side and change your password.


 4) Taking things for granted and not regularly changing your password

You never know who is trying to hack your account. By regularly changing your account like as often as every 90 days or  at least once a year helps deter hackers who try to brute force their way into your accounts.

How to turn-off conversational or threaded view in Gmail

Conversation or threaded view in Gmail is very handy because it groups together emails with the same subject. However if you are trying to determine the order of how different emails went inside your inbox then the conversation or threaded can make it a little difficult.

Here is a list of steps to help you turn-off conversation view in Gmail.


1) At the top right section of the screen beneath your avatar picture look for the gears icon. Click on it and select "Settings".













2) In the Settings go to General Tab  and look for Conversation View section.

3) Select the "Conversation view off" and this will disable the threaded view of the messages.

4) Just click the Inbox on the left side to confirm if it is indeed complete.