Pistachio newest nut to avoid

I don't know about you but I haven't had a peanut in a while now. I just can't bring myself to do it. I can't get past the idea of dying because I had a snack.

In case you've somehow missed it, peanuts have been on the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) recall list after a salmonella outbreak in a PCA (Peanut Corp. of America) plant out of Georgia. The outbreak is still an issue and products are still being added to the list (you can find an up-to-date list at the bottom of this page). More than 690 people in 46 states have gotten sick and almost 3,900 products have been recalled.

Now there is a new nut to concern yourself with, the pistachio.

Tuesday Kraft Foods Inc. notified the FDA that it had detected salmonella through routine product testing in roasted pistachios . Kraft and the Georgia Nut Co. recalled their Back to Nature Nantucket Blend trail mix because of those test results.

Friday Kroger Co. (the grocery store chain) recalled bagged pistachios from California-based Setton Pistachio of Terra Bella Inc., the nation's second-largest pistachio processor. They voluntarily recalled more than 2 million pounds of its roasted nuts shipped since last fall. Those nuts were sold in 31 states.

A spokesman for the company, Fabia D'Arienzo, said "It will be safe to assume based on the volume that this will be an ingredient in a lot of different products, and that may possibly include things like ice cream and cake mixes. The firm is already turning around trucks in transit to bring those back to the facility."

Salmonella is the most common cause of food-borne illness. It is a bacteria that causes diarrhea, fever and cramping. While most people recover it can be life threatening for children, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems.

Conficker worm on it's way

I was reading a story this morning from Yahoo about the Conficker worm that comes out every year on April 1st. The first Conficker worm was sent out in 2008 and infected over 9 million computers. Now it's on its third version, Conficker C, and is "incredibly complicated, powerful, and virulent".

Microsoft has offered a quarter million dollar bounty on the writer of the worm and are trying to find a solution before April 1st gets here. They say:

"What's known so far is that on April 1, all infected computers will come under the control of a master machine located somewhere across the web, at which point anything's possible. Will the zombie machines become denial of service attack pawns, steal personal information, wipe hard drives, or simply manifest more traditional malware pop-ups and extortion-like come-ons designed to sell you phony security software? No one knows.

Conficker is clever in the way it hides its tracks because it uses an enormous number of URLs to communicate with HQ. The first version of Conficker used just 250 addresses each day -- which security researchers and ICANN simply bought and/or disabled -- but Conficker C will up the ante to 50,000 addresses a day when it goes active, a number which simply can't be tracked and disabled by hand.

At this point, you should be extra vigilant about protecting your PC: Patch Windows completely through Windows Update and update your anti-malware software as well. Make sure your antivirus software is actually running too, as Conficker may have disabled it.

Microsoft also offers a free online safety scan here, which should be able to detect all Conficker versions."

And from the Windows Live OneCare website:

How do I know if my computer is infected?

System Changes

The following system changes may indicate the presence of this malware:

• The following services are disabled or fail to run:
Windows Update Service
Background Intelligent Transfer Service
Windows Defender
Windows Error Reporting Services

• Some accounts may be locked out due to the following registry modification, which may flood the network with connections:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters
"TcpNumConnections" = "0x00FFFFFE"

• Users may not be able to connect to websites or online services that contain the following strings:
virus
spyware
malware
rootkit
defender
microsoft
symantec
norton
mcafee
trendmicro
sophos
panda
etrust
networkassociates
computerassociates
f-secure
kaspersky
jotti
f-prot
nod32
eset
grisoft
drweb
centralcommand
ahnlab
esafe
avast
avira
quickheal
comodo
clamav
ewido
fortinet
gdata
hacksoft
hauri
ikarus
k7computing
norman
pctools
prevx
rising
securecomputing
sunbelt
emsisoft
arcabit
cpsecure
spamhaus
castlecops
threatexpert
wilderssecurity
windowsupdate

So I thought, well, I'm safe, I have McAfee...I have Spyzooka...I automatically update and have my firewall and Windows Defender set up to run automatically...I'm good right?

Then I looked in my system tray and NOTHING WAS THERE! Windows Defender had been turned off; McAfee off; Spyzooka off. Ack! I immediately stopped what I was doing and ran every kind of scan I have. I found several viruses.

I'm glad I came across the story and checked into my own PC. I hope y'all check yours too. This could be bad, bad, bad.

Journalism with a bow tie

I noticed a few minutes ago that journalist and long-time economics correspondent for NBC News Irving R. Levine has passed away from cancer. He was 86.

From Wikipedia:

"During his 35-year career, he reported from over two dozen countries, which led to him becoming the first foreign correspondent accredited in the Soviet Union (as a result of which he wrote three best-selling non-fiction books on life in the USSR).

Back in the U.S. he became the chief economics correspondent for NBC, and Time magazine described him as a "pioneer" in economics reporting on television. He became known for his distinctive TV sign-off, slightly stressing his middle initial.

Levine was famed for his impeccable grammar and diction leading to a self-mocking appearance on Saturday Night Live. He was also known for wearing bow ties when reporting on screen. He also appeared on Murphy Brown and on David Letterman and Jay Leno's shows.

After he retired from NBC in 1995, Levine became dean of Lynn University's School of International Communication in Boca Raton, Florida."

May he rest in peace.