Just A Reminder

I was trying hard to earn money online so I joined a website called Amazon Mechanical Turk. It is a decent site that pays you to complete simple tasks like taking surveys, answer multiple choices for some school research, choose the best picture in the group for a photography site, etc. The tasks are called hits. The payment I had for each hit was between $.05 to $2.50. I did that for quiet some time and I earned more or less $40. I was pretty happy until I got a notification from Sprint Network.

I was not sure how or what happened but I received a text message stating that somebody was trying to change the information of my Sprint account online. The text message was asking me if I authorized the change. I was confused because I had not touched that account for years. I called Sprint and asked them what was going on and they said that somebody changed my address from Colorado to Atlanta, Georgia. I was shocked because I have never been to Atlanta. I told them to close my account online as soon as possible. Weeks later, I got a text message again stating that somebody was trying to add a line in my account and ordered a new cell phone. I called Sprint again and they confirmed. Again, a person from Atlanta tried to do it. Sprint was able to stop the transaction but I was still upset because somebody was able to get in my account even though I told them (Sprint) to close it.

Later I realized that while working as an Amazon Mechanical Turker, I gave out my phone number (maybe) and the network I was with. (Shame on me!!!) That person probably figured out how to use that simple information to get my pin to sign in online. Some hits in the Amazon Mechanical Turk actually asked for the IP Address as well. I am glad I never gave that out. I found out recently that some hackers can actually access your computer remotely with just your IP address. I learned that from the movie on Lifetime.

So friends...never give those information out to anyone. I learned my lesson. $40 is not worth it.