Identity theft and two-Factor authentication (or Two-factor HELL)

 My Internet Identity was stolen in early June. 

This is my advice to those whose identity might have been stolen. The first thing to do is not to change your passwords etc. Immediately log into your account and note down any suspicious transaction, especially where money or resources are involved. Make sure your login access to the institution is easy and that you have alternate ways of getting verified. In my case, this was a circular reference and there was no way out of the loop. Only after making sure, you can access all accounts for which you have turned on two-factor verification (two-factor verification turned off), you should take other measures such as changing passwords, reporting to credit agencies, FBI, etc.

T-Mobile, my communication provider, strongly recommended that I should change the telephone number as the phone(s) were compromised. I immediately changed my phone number which landed me in this two-factor hell.

Although at the back of my mind, I had the feeling that I may face other problems while updating it at other contact addresses, I opted to change immediately. Ever since that date, my Office 365 has not allowed me to log in. It allows me to change provided my "Old phone numbers" can receive text messages or phone calls. This is impossible as the phone(s) have changed. There is no other option in the two-factor authentication which was never modified. 

This also created a problem with my back accounts which had two-factor authentication with only a phone for verification. Bank of America was the worst. It left me with no means to correct this issue. Finally, I had to write to them twice as the first one addressed to the bank branch manager did not respond despite my writing to him being delivered by the next morning mail. I am waiting for the other mail from BOA.

Microsoft HELP/ Support is useless as it does not address this issue. A simple recipe according to Microsoft is to log in to the app and update your telephone number. Little does it care whether a client can log in with two-factor authentication where the phone might have changed. Phone support (1-800-642-7676) is also useless as it advises you to try logging in again. There is no "human" support.

This is displayed while logging in. There is but one option, but it refers to phones that are changed. There is more information on an Akamai site which is useless.

I have tried numerous ways to find some sort of support from Microsoft and I have been unsuccessful. 

I am planning to get some help from the Microsoft Community and will have to wait it out. The company gets big, and help gets reduced as it does not care about a few pissed-off users.

Getting started with ChatGPT is easy

ChatGPT is a member of a family of language models. It may be somewhat trivializing but let us start a sentence with some blank,

for example,

John is <blank> to Japan. 

What follows 'is' not hard to guess. These are two possibilities that come to mind. 'going' or 'coming' to insert in the <blank> space. My knowledge of the grammar suggested these based on the language I know. I learned from studying the language and have seen it used many times. 

More generally, a language model uses machine learning to conduct a probability distribution over words used to predict the most likely next word based on a previous entry. Language models learn from the text that can be used for producing original text, predicting the next word in the text, speech recognition, optical speech recognition, and handwriting recognition. ChatGPT is one such language model.

The following describes how we may get it installed on a local computer: 

In order to work with chatGPT you need to get a copy of the program to your local computer. Of course, there are other ways to work without a local copy.

You use the GIT program to get a copy from the remote location to your local computer. The Git tool(program) is used to access the GitHub service. Git is a version control tool that you can run from the command line on your desktop/laptop. 

In the present case, GitHub has the files/directory for working with chatGPT. Using GIT you can bring a copy from the cloud(Internet) hosted service to create a local directory on your computer. Make sure you read the README.md file.

The following block shows all the command line arguments for the GIT command. I may write GIT or Git and they mean the same. It is a rich command and you can do a lot of stuff with it.

============================================================

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19045.2846]

(c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\TestUser>Git

usage: git [--version] [--help] [-C <path>] [-c <name>=<value>]

           [--exec-path[=<path>]] [--html-path] [--man-path] [--info-path]

           [-p | --paginate | --no-pager] [--no-replace-objects] [--bare]

           [--git-dir=<path>] [--work-tree=<path>] [--namespace=<name>]

           <command> [<args>]

These are common Git commands used in various situations:

start a working area (see also: git help tutorial)

   clone      Clone a repository into a new directory

   init       Create an empty Git repository or reinitialize an existing one

work on the current change (see also: git help everyday)

   add        Add file contents to the index

   mv         Move or rename a file, a directory, or a symlink

   reset      Reset current HEAD to the specified state

   rm         Remove files from the working tree and from the index

examine the history and state (see also: git help revisions)

   bisect     Use binary search to find the commit that introduced a bug

   grep       Print lines matching a pattern

   log        Show commit logs

   show       Show various types of objects

   status     Show the working tree status

grow, mark and tweak your common history

   branch     List, create, or delete branches

   checkout   Switch branches or restore working tree files

   commit     Record changes to the repository

   diff       Show changes between commits, commit and working tree, etc

   merge      Join two or more development histories together

   rebase     Reapply commits on top of another base tip

   tag        Create, list, delete or verify a tag object signed with GPG

collaborate (see also: git help workflows)

   fetch      Download objects and refs from another repository

   pull       Fetch from and integrate with another repository or a local branch

   push       Update remote refs along with associated objects

'git help -a' and 'git help -g' list available subcommands and some

concept guides. See 'git help <command>' or 'git help <concept>'

to read about a specific subcommand or concept.

===================================================================

Now all I need to do is run this command:

git clone https://github.com/chatgptui/desktop.git

I asked AI chat in Bing about a feature in Excel and it did not know

 I recently saw a feature in Excel pop-up all of a sudden and asked AI-Chat in Bing. It did not know about. I thought Microsoft is so busy embedding chatGPT that it may have overlooked how far it has embedded the AI features and its access to its own products.

Let me make it brief. I suddenly saw a magenta(some may call it pink) triangle at the corner of an Excel Cell on a page that had some calculations. I don't know for what reason, but I saw a magenta/pink triangle at the right top corner of a cell which gave me to communicate with some party as shown. It was a "prompt" to start a conversation. I just started one and replied to it as well.

I think when I closed it, Excel tried to get to my email. This is probably a feature for the team that uses this feature. 

Then I wanted to ask my newfound friend, the Bing AI-Chat to find out if he knew what this is about. He did not know either.

No big deal, Microsoft too busy tying loose ends with the new acquistion. 

IVG will be more dangerous than AI in the wrong hands and wrong governments

 If you think AI could be dangerous in the wrong hands wait for In Vitro Gametogenesis.

*       You can have a child of any sex and does not matter if you are certified infertile. 

*       Same-sex couples can have children bearing their DNAs. (not a bad idea, though)

*       You can have an army of sexless soldiers. The options and possibilities are endless.

Read more here:

https://academic.oup.com/jlb/article/3/1/87/1751270

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34591639/

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/babies-without-sex-researchers-are-working-on-it-ethicists-are-troubled/ar-AA1adx2b?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=13937ecb857d4984b18dfdace66dcb48&ei=22

Kissan CHAT is targetted to Agriculture and Farming related topics

 

The trending topic is Chat GPT and its variants. You can access this service on Bing as mentioned in my previous post. 

India has developed an AI-enhanced Chat service directed at farmers. India is an agriculture-based country although it has made substantial gains in other areas including defense, space, health systems, etc.

Kissan means farmer in Hindi and Kissan GPT is directed at farmers mainly but can be used by other interested parties. The nice addition the developer has made is to respond to voice commands. This is of immense use to those who work in the fields.  It is available in most Indian languages as well as a few foreign languages.

There are all kinds of fears about the misuse of AI, but this one will surely make the farmers more productive and lessen the effects of mother nature's excesses.

More here:

https://www.wionews.com/videos/kissan-gpt-empowering-indian-farmers-with-ai-583475

https://twitter.com/DBChavan/status/1644231329964343298