Here Phishy, Phishy, Phishy

Now before you get all excited, this post has nothing to do with the alternative-rock band Phish. Instead, it has more to do with "phishing emails", those unsolicited emails that you get in your inbox that appear to be from a legitimate company, but instead try to lure you into providing them with your personal information. Yet another scam.

Well, last week I nearly had to cancel my credit card over a phishing email. Late one evening I was checking my email in a drunken stupor. I got a message that appeared to be from PayPal, discussing that there were security issues with my account, and that I was being asked to confirm some of my information that they keep on-file. The email appeared legitimate, as there were the proper graphics, and proper links embedded within the email.

At this point, I did not know what to think of the email message that was sent to my inbox. It seemed rather convincing, though vague. I clicked the link, where I suppose it would have taken me to a secondary webpage where it would ask me to "confirm" my account information. Then the warning light went on. Thank the maker for Firefox, as it displayed a warning that I was on an unencrypted page. PayPal would not dare operate without unencrypted pages.

Then the 30-watt bulb that sits idly inside my cranium went off. The email was sent to my Yahoo! account. I have no PayPal account at that address. This was a blatant scam, and I nearly fell for it! I did a quick search on the web, and sure enough, this site told me everything I wanted to know about this scam.

Fraud Watcher International is a good site to bookmark, especially if you get a lot of unsolicited mail in your inbox. If you are like me, I get so much spam that I can hardly sift through it all. I luckily have spam filters on my email accounts, so I can spend more of my time reading legitimate email rather than sifting through all the garbage. This also means that I do not check my junk-mail folder for legitimate emails that were mistaken for spam.

While you're at it, ditch Outlook Express, and try Thunderbird. It has a pretty snazzy filter that has the ability to "learn" to automatically detect spam. Better yet, I would ditch everything that bears the Micro$oft logo. But that's my humble opinion.

Is There No Legitimate Way of Making Easy Money?

I, like almost everyone out there, have the occasional feeling that they do not earn enough money. Almost everyone I know slaves for 40-plus hours a week and make salaries in every tax bracket. Many of my friends have budgetary problems, and spend more than they earn. This appears to me as a common staple of the North-American family. Look no further than your television to see ads for corporations offering their products with no money down; or no payments for six months, plus all the payday loans, and credit card companies offering you credit at the cost of an arm and a leg. We are a commodity-based society, as I mentioned in my last post, where happiness is measured in the number of toys you have when you die.

I try my best to keep my spending under control. I am at a point in my life where I am trying to become self-supporting. Every month I make more than I can spend (though some months are close to break-even). I manage to put away some money in the bank every month, which would mean that I am doing better than many North-American citizens. There is the problem that I feel like I may not be making enough in the future. What happens when I have a mortgage? What will happen when I have children, and not only will I have to support them, but provide a post-secondary education to them? It will certainly not happen with the income I have today.

Then there is the aspect of emergencies. Many people barely make enough to survive from one paycheck to the next. What would happen if their vehicle broke down, and they could not afford to repair it, or purchase another vehicle? Obviously, many of us would agree that an operational vehicle is necessary for them to get to their workplace. If I did not have a vehicle, I would soon end up unemployed. Then, there are medical emergencies. I work in a small company, where I am not lucky to get medical or dental coverage. If I were to get ill, or require a great deal of dental work, I would end up spending all my nestegg due to my medical expenses. This is certainly not a way to live, but I expect a large percentage of us live in this manner, ignorant of the fact that if disaster struck, they would all be up the creek.

So I had been looking for a way that I might be able to earn 500-1000 dollars per month without too much investment of my time or money. You may or may not know that I am a small-business owner, in addition to my full-time job. When I say "small-business", I mean exactly that. My small business equates to about 20% of my gross income. I have a bit of that entrepreneurial spirit, and would love to improve my financial situation by expanding my business interests.

To increase one's income, you have a few options. Switch careers for a higher salary, take on a second (or third) job, go back to school and receive training in a field that pays more (delayed investment), or if you are a business owner, find new ways to market your company, cut expenditures, and increase profits. I must not forget to mention, that there is the stock market, mutual funds, and other forms of risky investment, that might reap you excessive profits, or might leave you entirely broke.

I decided to do a little web-hunting and did a web-search for "easy money". I should have been a little smarter than that. Thousands of web pages were registered, most of them scams, and the sites that weren't scams were informational websites dedicated to exposing and preventing fraudulent activity. The old cliché holds true: If a money-making proposition seems too good to be true, it probably is. I finished my web searching more discouraged than enlightened.

I am left with few options. Undertaking another job is unrealistic, since those who know me, already know that I am strung out. I have worked 50-plus hours a week for the last three years, and I don't know how much longer I can hold out. I still have 30 or 35 years to go before I retire, and when I do, I can be assured that there will be no money left in the pension fund for me, or anyone else for that matter.

Another option would be to invest my money. Obviously, no one has been able to make any money in interest in their bank account for at least twenty years. Even back then, you would have to have a substantial amount in the bank in order to live off the interest. I suppose I could invest in the stock market or in mutual funds, but like I said earlier, you should be prepared to throw away that money. I only have enough money saved that I could consider investing in penny-stocks, which are even higher-risk anyway.

Investing in real estate is one of the smartest moves anyone can make. Given the circumstances of my life at this time, it is not possible for me to invest in property or real estate, since I don't know if I will remain in this city for any substantial amount of time to make money off any property investment. Generally, any property should appreciate in value once you sell it. This is not always the case, but I don't plan on going into details here.

The only thing I can do is either invest more time into my business, or change careers. Changing careers, of course is a risk. You may end up getting a job you hate even more than the one you have. You may end up being fired for little reason within the first three months, and given no severance.

As for my business, I may increase my rates, or increase my clientele. Both are treacherous terrains. I may lose clients on the basis that may prices are no longer competitive, conversely, I lose precious free time if I increase my clientele. Like I have already stated in this log, I am already strung-out, and I don't get enough sleep.

Such is the life for most of us. We would all love to have the freedom of making a ton of money, and being able to retire early, afford luxurious vacations, and have a standard of living that's a cut above the rest. Does such a thing exist? Yes. Is it easily attainable? No.