1. Having trouble reading the text on the page? Hold ctrl and scroll your mouse wheel down to increase the size of the font on in the current window.

2. Want to open a new tab? First you have to make sure that you have the tab bar visible. You can do this by going to Tools -> Options, then click on Tabs, and check the “Always show the tab bar” checkbox. Now anytime you want to open a new tab, you can double click on the tab bar and a new tab will open.

3. If you want to close a tab, click your mouse wheel on the tab and it’s closed.

4. To open multiple homepages when you launch Firefox, go to Tools -> Options, then click on the main tab, and in the homepage bar, simply type all the pages you want to open separated by the | character (shift + backslash)

5. You can also set keywords for your bookmarks so you don’t have to go searching through them every time. Go to Bookmarks -> Organize Bookmarks, then right click on any bookmark and select properties and you’ll see a new dialog box. Near the bottom there will be a text box that says keyword: All you do is enter the keyword you want associated with the bookmark and hit OK. Now anytime you want to go to that bookmark, all you do is type the keyword into the address bar and hit enter, and you’ll be taken to your bookmarked location.

So there you have it, just a few tips and tricks to make your internet browsing with Firefox quicker and easier.

If you don’t have Firefox, you can get it by clicking this link

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If you look at the image below you will see a cut-out from AOL’s top news section with the first link highlighted (I don’t know why my cursor is missing from the screen shot, but you can see that the URL is underlined)

Since we know we are on AOL’s site, all the links should resemble a non suspicious looking URL containing AOL and some subpage from AOL, which you can see by simply holding your mouse cursor over the link in question.

Hold your mouse over this link and see what your browser shows as the location, it should be a link back to Easy Tech Talk’s homepage.

It’s amazing how simple this is and if everyone could get in the habit of doing this if they’re not sure of the link, then we would avoid Myspace hacks, email scams, viruses, and other nasty bad behavior on the internet.

When you hold your mouse over the link, its destination is shown at the bottom left of your browser, as seen in the picture below.

See how it say “news.aol.com”? That’s how you can tell it’s a legitimate link. If you see some crazy letters and numbers, or some other location other than AOL, then the link is bad and you shouldn’t click it, simple as that. The same goes for your email, you’ll be able to hold the cursor over the link in your email and see where the link leads to. If you for some reason don’t see the location in the browser, you can always right-click on it and select “Copy link location” (for firefox users) or “Copy shortcut” (for internet explorer users), then all you do is paste the link in the address bar at the top of your browser to see what it says, if the link looks good, the hit enter and you’re on your way. If you paste the link and it looks wrong, don’t go any further.

If you get an email saying your bank information is incorrect and you suspect it is a scam, go to the banks main site by typing it into your browser on your own, without clicking any links. Typing it in manually will guarantee that you are going to the site you want to. Each and every bank has a link to report fraud and you should forward the email to them, they will let you know if it is a scam and how to protect yourself.

That’s pretty much it, I hope this helps everyone out and if we can spread the word to everyone that doesn’t know this, everyone’s information will be safer and we’ll force these people running the scams to come up with other ways to try and get our info, but hopefully deter them enough to get out of the business and try something else.

[UPDATE 10-14-07 11:41pm PST] Click here to visit fakechecks.org, a website to help identify and avoid scams involving fake money orders or checks, which can be received online or through regular mail.

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