Avoid Internet Investment Scams

Where the Frauds Are. The Internet allows individuals or companies to communicate with a large audience without spending a lot of time, effort, or money. Tens of thousands of people can be reached by building a web site, posting a message on a bulletin board, entering a discussion in a live "chat" room, or sending mass e-mails. It's easy for scammers to make their messages look real and credible. But it's nearly impossible for investors to tell the difference between fact and fiction.

Online Investment Newsletters. Hundreds of online investment newsletters have appeared on the Internet in recent years. While legitimate newsletters can help investors gather valuable information, some are just tools for fraud.

Companies pay the people who write online newsletters cash or securities to "tout" or recommend their stocks. While this isn't illegal, the federal securities laws require the newsletters to disclose who paid them, but many scammers fail to do so.
Some newsletters falsely claim to independently research the stocks. Others spread false information or promote worthless stocks. The most notorious sometimes "scalp" the stocks they hype, driving up the price of the stock and then selling their own holdings at high prices and high profits.

Online Bulletin Boards. Whether it is newsgroups, usenet, or web-based bulletin boards they have become a popular forum for investors sharing information. While some may be true, many turn out to be false – or even scams. Scammers will pump up a company or pretend to reveal "inside" information.

E-mail Spams. Because "spam" is so cheap and easy to create, scammers increasingly use it to find investors for bogus investments or to spread false information about a company. Spam allows the unscrupulous to target many more potential investors than cold calling or mass mailing. Using a bulk e-mail program, spammers can send personalized messages to thousands and even millions of Internet users at a time.

How to Use the Internet to Invest Wisely. If you want to invest wisely and steer clear of frauds, you must get the facts. Never, ever, make an investment based solely on what you read in an online newsletter or bulletin board posting. Do your homework, 1 - Get financial statements from the company. 2 - Verify the claims. 3 - Call suppliers or customers of the company. 4 -

Check out the people running the company. Good ‘ole Google.
Bottom line, don’t believe everything you read. Being on the Internet does not make it true and there are many out there who would love to part you from your money.

Author Chris Kaminski is head web designer at Lone Bird Studio, an Asheville web design and SEO company located in North Carolina.

How a Website Works

Ever wonder how a website makes it to your computer? Well, several things happen after you enter or click on a web address, I’ll explain.

First let’s start with that web address, actually it is called a URL (Universal Resource Locator) and has 3 basic parts. Part one is the “protocol” (http, ftp). Think of this as the instruction set of the requested document. Second is the server name (www.lonebird.com). And third, the name of the file requested (index.html).

When you hit enter you computer sends a request for this address to your ISP (Internet Service Provider) who forwards it to DNS.

What is DNS? Only the most important part of the Internet and yet, almost invisible.
Domain Name Servers store the location of websites. If one server does not know the address of a website it forwards the request down the line to the next one. This happens until one responds with an IP address (street address of the website) and sends your request to that server where the site is stored. This, in turn sends the information to your computer. The DNS system forms one of the largest and most active distributed databases on the planet. Without DNS, the Internet would shut down very quickly.

The real amazing part is how fast the process completes. You can click on a web address located on the opposite side of the world and have the information in seconds. Even if you have dial up and it takes half a minute, it is still pretty amazing when you consider what has to be done.
So the next time you are tapping your foot waiting for a page to load just remember your request may have had to search the world to find it.

Author Chris Kaminski is head web designer at Lone Bird Studio, an Asheville web design and SEO company located in North Carolina.