SUMMER NEWS LETTER #4

APRIL 29, 2009



Roger & Doris Stansberry F32 April 23

We received a phone call from Jim Pool, he is the son of Duane & Mary formerly 629. He said Mary passed away April 17th at 8:52 in the morning in Marietta Memorial Hospital. She had a congestive heart failure. She was being buried on Monday the 20th at Beverly Cemetery in Ohio. They were here for a short time this last season and sold their unit so they could go back home and have surgery. Duane had his surgery and he is doing fine from it and Mary never did get her surgery. She will be greatly missed.

Duane Poole Formerly Lot 629 April 24

I really appreciate all of you, my dear friends. You have all been such good friends to Mary and she loved you all so much. Thank you for holding her dear in your hearts and remember to pray for her.
Please remember me in the days ahead. I am going to need your love and support. Send me e-mails, give me a call, check in on me and say a prayer.
Duane

From John Abbott A 9 April 26

Greetings Neighbors - where ever you are,

Many of us in Bentsen Grove received a letter from a former park member. The letter originated from London via her personal GMAIL account. The letter explained that she had had her purse containing her wallet, credit cards and personal identity stolen. She was without cash to pay her hotel fees and was requesting a personal load for $2,500.

Those who know Terri well recognized it as a fraud almost immediately. Then there was the concept of Teri traveling with cash and not traveler's checks. And finally she would have requested funds and credit card replacements from her bank. So hopefully nobody reacted. The email has been turned over to the FBI and the support staff at Gmail.


But how did this happen? I wasn't there but I imagine that Terri used that handy Ethernet connection in her hotel room. A snooper sitting on the same Ethernet simply copied her information as she logged into her Gmail account. Now having access to that account with passwords the rest was easy - simply send an email to everyone on the list with the sad story.


There is a human or humans on the other end of that email. One couple here in the park replied, then sent a message saying the money had been sent to a London Western Union <favorite mail drop for scam artists> and a few hours later the scammer sent back a note asking for the identification numbers from the wire transfer. At that point the couple decided not to risk further contact.


The case in point here is that you are never totally safe on the Internet. But when you are using a public connection from a hotel, ship, or Internet cafe you are the least safe possible. Virtually every keystroke you enter on a public Ethernet connection can be read by anyone else on that connection. So if you open your bank account to check the balance - the crooks have all the information required to set up a wire fraud. If you open your email account the scammers have enough of a weapon to begin gathering the remaining data for identity theft.


Your banking institution forces you to change your password on a regular basis (yearly as a minimum, semi-annually as an average) and with good cause. Banks are specialists at security and they know that if you use the same password long enough it will get compromised. It is a good idea to change your financial institution passwords frequently (I do ours every four months). And if you use the same password for all your financial accounts you are simply multiplying your chances for a compromised password.

A final word. Folks, the cyber-crooks are not dummies. They have a great deal of skills that very few of us can match. There are corporation sized gangs that make their entire livelihood from identity theft. They brainstorm on methods for breaching accounts and then share the winning ideas with a network. You are an individual and no match for them. So use every precaution available to you - firewalls, encryption, filters and all the security you can get your hands on. My Linux system (most secure of the 3 O/S) sits behind 3 firewalls - one hardware and two software. And I would never use my computer on a public network.

SHIRLEY KEMP - W191. April 28 -- My sister, Faye Ryan, asked that I send the following message.

On Thursday April 23 doctors decided to operate on Carl. They believed that the upper lining of his left lung was cancer. The surgery proved different. He had a tumor "which none of the many tests detected” glued to two of his ribs and the upper part of his left lung. Doctors removed the tumor, part of the two ribs and the top part of his lung. Tumor was cancerous but at the present time they can find no other source. He is in Doctors Hospital at the present time but should be released in a day or two. Thank you for your prayers and good wishes.

From Bonnie Newboles W153 April 29 I am home and beginning to feel like a human being again! Any questions about sonic testing, e-cam's, ultra sound, heart cath, gall bladder surgery, let me know, I think I had them all. I want to thank so many people, those that sent cards, brought angel statues, stuffed animals, came to visit me in the hospital, the telephone calls. I got home on Friday, the 17th, (I think). Also want to thank those that have been to the house to visit me, the cards, the food, and running me back and forth to the Dr.'s. What would a person do without all the B. G. friends? Doris took me to the heart Dr. yesterday, (Monday). I only have one blockage of 30%. He released me, and I don't have to go back to him for 1 year, then he wants a checkup. Today, was an appointment with the surgeon, the staples was removed, said I came thru the gall bladder surgery fine, and he also released me. I have one more appointment with my family Dr., then maybe I can rest for a while. After he releases me, I go back to pain management to have an MRI on my right hip, and I hope and pray he finds that problem and gets it fixed also. I want everyone to know how VERY MUCH I APPRECIATED all the help from all of you to help me thru this crazy 2 weeks. I also, really was glad my daughter did not listen to me, and came down anyway. She stayed a week, what a big help that was.

I can never thank all of you enough, but from the bottom of my heart, THANKS!

Bonnie



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