Turning 40!! Getting naughty!! Well, many of my friends and relatives teased me on my 40th birthday. And, I wondered why?! A lot has changed since I looked (young) the way I felt (young). It all seems like yesterday, but 2 decades of adult life has gone past in just a flash. All of a sudden in life, you feel a pause as if it was destined to happen to awaken you from the dream. Man, it is a rude awakening!! Friends of my age, who used to goof around all the time get philosophical over a drink. You start receiving wedding invitations from babies that you used to carry around several years back. Your own kids start talking about their plans for their teen life!! And, that does it. The last big bang of the bell reverberates through your ears so much that you start looking exactly (old) the way you feel (old). Welcome to the 40s!!
A sense of wisdom seeps in your life and you feel a bit serene. At times you start questioning your own convictions on "life" based on which you had taken many critical decisions in your life. You feel that you have not achieved anything although you have not done all that bad. You muster courage to face all the mistakes in life and let go most of the timid false-beliefs or empty-pride. When your kids are old enough to reason over an argument with you, they help you confront your own deepest secrets or weaknesses. Unlocking those gates of darkness gives a sense of comfort and freedom that makes you feel enlightened. Ultimately, you loosen up a lot!!
A very close friend of mine who is a quintessential person of the Catholic Faith (even during the school days), used to intrigue me with his unquestioned, unconditional faith. I never understood his convictions of faith very much many years back, but now I could relate to what he was talking about and it has made an amazing impact in my life. I feel completely free and no fear (almost). The altitude and the horizon of your comprehensive capabilities on the bigger aspects of life gets higher and wider that you start drawing parallels between this blind faith and the ideas that you come across everyday. One of my favorite attitudes (parallel drawn) from the movie, 3 idiots, is the "Aal iz well". Incredibly simple, yet amazing!! It guarantees to get rid of fear in your mind, like the blind faith. And, I wish I had had this faith 20 years back when my close friend used to shower me with plethora of faith related information with an earnest intention of saving another soul (mine).
Although I wanted to be an Engineer even as a kid, I wonder why I wanted to become an Engineer. I wish I had explored other areas of interest rather than to have just followed the crowd (in a way). The movie, 3 idiots, has been an eye opener for many youngsters and "Aamir Khan" is more of a cult these days. Glad to see a cult-trend for something good. It has definitely been an eye openner for me!! The movie does not portray something that is new or revolutionary, but it is just that we have never dared to digress from our conventions. I just loved the last phrase of the entire movie that sums up all: If you chase excellence, success will chase you with its pants down.
Especially, on the "woman" front, you wonder: Oh man, only if I had known so much about women 20 years back!! I am sure a lot of guys my age can relate to it.
For many years until I hit 40, I looked (young) the way I felt (young) and, at 40, after the wisdom has suddently dawned on me during the fateful pause-in-life, I definitely look (old) the way I feel (old). But, hey, it does not matter. In a nutshell, as long the spirit is young we never age. And, to feel young one needs to set challenges every single day to feel alive every moment and raise the bar for the next day. I pat myself on my back to cheer myself for having attained the right attitude at 40 for attitude and not aptitude will determine our altitude.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Basic steps to survive the cyber menace
One day my friend posted obscene and hurtful messages on the facebook-walls of his close friends. Well, that is according to Facebook. But, in fact, he did not!! Welcome to the untamed world of internet. My friend’s facebook credentials were compromised by a hacker and the rest is history. Thanks to the automated security controls of Facebook, my friend was alerted to reset his password. However, the damage was already done. It is not uncommon to hear thousands of similar incidents everyday around us and yet the awareness among the public is shockingly dismal to the extent of people sticking a post-it, with userid/password written on it, on the computer monitor.
Information Security is more like Global Warming which is a disaster waiting to happen and the world citizens are not prepared to face the inconvenient truth. In today’s world, although there is an overload of information over the web, especially pertaining to real-life security incidents, it is natural for readers to be attracted towards more entertaining Hollywood websites. Who cares until it hits me? Right?
Furthermore, thanks to the advancement of the bad guys, the dangers of Information Security is convoluted with terms like Malware, Spyware, Trojan Horse, Virus, Worm, Spam, Firewalls, IDS, IPS etc. It is simply mindboggling even for most of the IT geeks to get a perspective of this ocean of threats that we humans have created for ourselves in the name of advancement.
Gone are the years when cybercrime used to be a school kid’s amusement park for pranks. Today, cybercrime is a lucrative business that has got the attention of even the underworld dons and the organized crime sector. According to SC Magazine, cybercrime costs organizations $3.8 million per year on average. The overall cost to the UK economy from cybercrime is £27bn per year, according to the first joint Government and industry report. It is estimated that Data theft and breaches from cybercrime may have cost businesses as much as $1 trillion globally (per year) in lost intellectual property and expenditures for repairing the damage.
This is the plight of the big guns around the globe. Now, think of the commoner who uses an old PC at home to browse the internet. Well, the answer is obvious.
A commoner who is oblivious to the technology will be inclined to blame it all on technology. On the contrary, it is the human weakness/aspect that creates all these vulnerabilities. Most of the cybercrimes committed are because of the victims who do not take precautionary steps to protect their information.
Forget the convoluted jargons and technology. As a commoner, there are simple precautionary steps that can be taken to secure the adventure in to the World Wide Web. Here it goes….
1. Install a good anti-virus software in your PC and keep it updated on a daily basis.
2. Create smart and strong passwords. Avoid the passwords relating to your personal life: family names, date of birth, pet name etc.
3. Be smart while chatting. The person who is chatting with you may not be as sweet as he or she seems to be. Do not reveal any personal information even to known people over chat forums.
4. Beware of Phishing Scams: While chatting with you friends, someone, posing as a Bank or Tax Authority, might ask for your IDs or passwords or any identification. Remember, Banks never approach their customers to get such information through chat forums.
5. Never give your passwords or pins even to Bank authorities. If the Bank authority is asking for such passwords, report them to higher authorities.
6. Pay attention to your children’s online activities. Predators do not have to break into your homes anymore. They can break in through the internet cables to reach out to your kids.
7. Online Shopping: Before you decide to use a website for shopping, ensure that the website has a “HackerSafe” logo with current date under it and a locked padlock at the bottom right of the checkout screen.
8. Never open an email from an unknown sender. Even if the sender is known to you, beware of clicking any links or downloading any attachments as the sender’s PC might be infected with virus.
9. Backup your files regularly.
10. While using online banking, always use the virtual keyboard for entering password. With Trojans, your keystrokes on the physical keyboard can be monitored to derive your userid and password. In this case, using virtual keyboards can protect you from Trojans.
11. If you have a wireless router, change the default password. If not, a terrorist can use your internet sitting in a car parked in front of your house and, rest assured, you will be jailed by the authorities.
For some, most of these precautions might sound trivial, but brunt force of cybercrime will not be felt until it really hits you. So, venture into the web responsibly.
Information Security is more like Global Warming which is a disaster waiting to happen and the world citizens are not prepared to face the inconvenient truth. In today’s world, although there is an overload of information over the web, especially pertaining to real-life security incidents, it is natural for readers to be attracted towards more entertaining Hollywood websites. Who cares until it hits me? Right?
Furthermore, thanks to the advancement of the bad guys, the dangers of Information Security is convoluted with terms like Malware, Spyware, Trojan Horse, Virus, Worm, Spam, Firewalls, IDS, IPS etc. It is simply mindboggling even for most of the IT geeks to get a perspective of this ocean of threats that we humans have created for ourselves in the name of advancement.
Gone are the years when cybercrime used to be a school kid’s amusement park for pranks. Today, cybercrime is a lucrative business that has got the attention of even the underworld dons and the organized crime sector. According to SC Magazine, cybercrime costs organizations $3.8 million per year on average. The overall cost to the UK economy from cybercrime is £27bn per year, according to the first joint Government and industry report. It is estimated that Data theft and breaches from cybercrime may have cost businesses as much as $1 trillion globally (per year) in lost intellectual property and expenditures for repairing the damage.
This is the plight of the big guns around the globe. Now, think of the commoner who uses an old PC at home to browse the internet. Well, the answer is obvious.
A commoner who is oblivious to the technology will be inclined to blame it all on technology. On the contrary, it is the human weakness/aspect that creates all these vulnerabilities. Most of the cybercrimes committed are because of the victims who do not take precautionary steps to protect their information.
Forget the convoluted jargons and technology. As a commoner, there are simple precautionary steps that can be taken to secure the adventure in to the World Wide Web. Here it goes….
1. Install a good anti-virus software in your PC and keep it updated on a daily basis.
2. Create smart and strong passwords. Avoid the passwords relating to your personal life: family names, date of birth, pet name etc.
3. Be smart while chatting. The person who is chatting with you may not be as sweet as he or she seems to be. Do not reveal any personal information even to known people over chat forums.
4. Beware of Phishing Scams: While chatting with you friends, someone, posing as a Bank or Tax Authority, might ask for your IDs or passwords or any identification. Remember, Banks never approach their customers to get such information through chat forums.
5. Never give your passwords or pins even to Bank authorities. If the Bank authority is asking for such passwords, report them to higher authorities.
6. Pay attention to your children’s online activities. Predators do not have to break into your homes anymore. They can break in through the internet cables to reach out to your kids.
7. Online Shopping: Before you decide to use a website for shopping, ensure that the website has a “HackerSafe” logo with current date under it and a locked padlock at the bottom right of the checkout screen.
8. Never open an email from an unknown sender. Even if the sender is known to you, beware of clicking any links or downloading any attachments as the sender’s PC might be infected with virus.
9. Backup your files regularly.
10. While using online banking, always use the virtual keyboard for entering password. With Trojans, your keystrokes on the physical keyboard can be monitored to derive your userid and password. In this case, using virtual keyboards can protect you from Trojans.
11. If you have a wireless router, change the default password. If not, a terrorist can use your internet sitting in a car parked in front of your house and, rest assured, you will be jailed by the authorities.
For some, most of these precautions might sound trivial, but brunt force of cybercrime will not be felt until it really hits you. So, venture into the web responsibly.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
My Second Speech......Have a blessed, garbage-free life!
I thought of sharing my second speech at Toasmasters. Hope you like it....Here it goes....
OPENING
Wife: Darling today is our anniversary, what should we do?
Husband: Sure darling, let us stand in silence for 2 minutes.
Toastmaster of the day, fellow toastmasters, distinguished guests…..Good evening….
BODY
That may perhaps sound like a joke but in sad reality it reflects the state of the institution of marriage today. Divorce statistics from around the world reveal that divorce is on the rise. And, India is no exception. A few years back, a divorce court in India looked like a haunted building. Now, it is one of the busiest buildings in any Indian city. Thanks to our modern India for having become the Outsourcing Hub of the world. There has been tremendous pressure on marriages in past few decades due to globalization that has induced foreign ideas across conservative cultures. Exposure to western culture triggers the human desire to explore the materialistic world. This leads to deterioration of value systems and cultures that were followed for thousands of years. And, then, the problem starts. In a nutshell, the environment that we live in creates those pressures and we gladly carry those bad energies with us home.
So, what do we do in such situations? Have we taken a moment to think about corrective steps when we lose our temper at home? Fellow Toastmasters, I would like to share a story with you today that made a radical impact on my perception of this troubled world. The name of the story is “The Law of the Garbage Truck”.
One day a man hopped in a taxi to get to the airport. The driver was driving in the right lane when suddenly a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of the taxi. The taxi driver slammed on his brakes, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches! The driver of the black car whipped his head around and started yelling at the taxi driver. The man was infuriated. But the taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And, I mean, he was really friendly. The man was perplexed and asked, 'Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!' This is when the taxi driver taught him a valuable lesson, 'The Law of the Garbage Truck.'
He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it and sometimes they'll dump it on you. Don't take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the streets. The bottom line is that successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day.
CONCLUSION
Fellow Toastmasters, today, people start the day by pointing a majestic finger….using the French vocabulary ….honking as an act of road rage…..ignoring you as you wave at them bombarding you with venomous email or morphed mms ….
If that sounds like a morning routine around the world, how much of a culprit are we in this? Actually, most of us are no less competitive. Even if it is our own fault, we have our own set of defensive-vocabulary-kits and tactics to pay such punks back. We would find an excuse for the day to be grumpy and generously share the irritation to anyone who dares to come in our way. And, nothing makes us happier than seeing those punks getting annoyed. And when we get married, we allow this to percolate into our married lives.
MESSAGE
Fellow Toastmasters, let us change……let us be like the TAXI DRIVER….let us be wise and say, “No”, to garbage. Let us not be like the Garbage truck and make sure that we don’t carry garbage and spread it to other people because successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day.
Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets,
So ... Love the people who treat you right.
Pray for the ones who don't.
Life is ten percent “what you make it” and ninety percent “how you take it! “
OPENING
Wife: Darling today is our anniversary, what should we do?
Husband: Sure darling, let us stand in silence for 2 minutes.
Toastmaster of the day, fellow toastmasters, distinguished guests…..Good evening….
BODY
That may perhaps sound like a joke but in sad reality it reflects the state of the institution of marriage today. Divorce statistics from around the world reveal that divorce is on the rise. And, India is no exception. A few years back, a divorce court in India looked like a haunted building. Now, it is one of the busiest buildings in any Indian city. Thanks to our modern India for having become the Outsourcing Hub of the world. There has been tremendous pressure on marriages in past few decades due to globalization that has induced foreign ideas across conservative cultures. Exposure to western culture triggers the human desire to explore the materialistic world. This leads to deterioration of value systems and cultures that were followed for thousands of years. And, then, the problem starts. In a nutshell, the environment that we live in creates those pressures and we gladly carry those bad energies with us home.
So, what do we do in such situations? Have we taken a moment to think about corrective steps when we lose our temper at home? Fellow Toastmasters, I would like to share a story with you today that made a radical impact on my perception of this troubled world. The name of the story is “The Law of the Garbage Truck”.
One day a man hopped in a taxi to get to the airport. The driver was driving in the right lane when suddenly a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of the taxi. The taxi driver slammed on his brakes, skidded, and missed the other car by just inches! The driver of the black car whipped his head around and started yelling at the taxi driver. The man was infuriated. But the taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And, I mean, he was really friendly. The man was perplexed and asked, 'Why did you just do that? This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!' This is when the taxi driver taught him a valuable lesson, 'The Law of the Garbage Truck.'
He explained that many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it and sometimes they'll dump it on you. Don't take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Don't take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home, or on the streets. The bottom line is that successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day.
CONCLUSION
Fellow Toastmasters, today, people start the day by pointing a majestic finger….using the French vocabulary ….honking as an act of road rage…..ignoring you as you wave at them bombarding you with venomous email or morphed mms ….
If that sounds like a morning routine around the world, how much of a culprit are we in this? Actually, most of us are no less competitive. Even if it is our own fault, we have our own set of defensive-vocabulary-kits and tactics to pay such punks back. We would find an excuse for the day to be grumpy and generously share the irritation to anyone who dares to come in our way. And, nothing makes us happier than seeing those punks getting annoyed. And when we get married, we allow this to percolate into our married lives.
MESSAGE
Fellow Toastmasters, let us change……let us be like the TAXI DRIVER….let us be wise and say, “No”, to garbage. Let us not be like the Garbage truck and make sure that we don’t carry garbage and spread it to other people because successful people do not let garbage trucks take over their day.
Life's too short to wake up in the morning with regrets,
So ... Love the people who treat you right.
Pray for the ones who don't.
Life is ten percent “what you make it” and ninety percent “how you take it! “
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