Symbols on Facebook

Facebook symbols are Unicode-encoded special text characters. Many people wonder how their friends inserted these small cute hearts, smiley, symbols and musical notes into their facebook status updates, messages or comments. You can also insert these symbols for facebook into your status or messages. Follow these step by step instructions and you will also be able to decorate your facebook status with cute smileys, emoticons or symbols or you can generate your own designs with use of symbols.

How to insert Facebook Symbols into facebook

There are two ways you can use these symbols and decorate your facebook profile.

1. Just copy and paste facebook symbol codes from the list below into your name, status or messages. You can insert them into facebook chat as well.

2. Or you can use your computers ‘right side number pad ‘ and ‘alt’ keys to type these symbols.


Desktop computer instructions for Facebook ALT symbols:

• Press and hold left Alt key on your keyboard.
• While holding Alt key enter one of the codes below to get the corresponding facebook symbol.
• Important note: You need to use numbers on the right side of the keyboard for entering code, not the numbers on top, otherwise they won’t work.

Laptop instructions for ALT symbols:

• Press and hold left Alt key on your keyboard.
• While holding Alt key also press and hold Fn key.
• While holding Alt and Fn key enter one of the codes below to get corresponding facebook symbol.
• Important note: You need to use numbers that are usually written next to letters U, I, O… and in different color, not the numbers on top, otherwise they won’t work.

ALT Symbols List

These symbols are called ‘alt symbols’ as they can be produced by using ‘alt key’ on your keyboard. Here is a list of alt symbols code with corresponding number. You can create these alt symbols on facebook, myspace or in emails.

Alt Symbols for Facebook

ALT code	Symbols	Description
Alt + 1	☺	Happy smiley symbol
Alt + 2	☻	Sad smiley or black smiley symbol
Alt + 3	♥	Heart symbol/ facebook heart symbol
Alt + 4	♦	Diamond symbol/ Facebook diamond symbol
Alt + 5	♣	Club symbol
Alt + 6	♠	Spade symbol
Alt + 7	•	Bullet 1 symbol
Alt + 8	◘	Bullet 2 symbol
Alt + 9	○	Bullet 3 symbol
Alt + 10	◙	Bullet 4 symbol
Alt + 11	♂	Men sign or Men symbol
Alt + 12	♀	Women sign or Women symbol
Alt + 13	♪	Quaver
Alt + 14	♫	Joined Quaver
Alt + 15	☼	Funky sun or star symbol
Alt + 16	►	Play forward
Alt + 17	◄	Play rewind
Alt + 18	↕	Up and down arrow
Alt + 19	‼	Double exclamation
Alt + 20	¶	Carriage return symbol
Alt + 21	§	Paragraph
Alt + 22	▬	Dash
Alt + 23	↨	Up and down arrow
Alt + 24	↑	Up arrow
Alt + 25	↓	Down arrow
Alt + 26	→	Right arrow sign
Alt + 27	←	Left arrow sign
Alt + 28	∟	Tab marker
Alt + 29	↔	Right and left arrow
Alt + 30	▲	Bullet
Alt + 31	▼	Bullet

Bot attacks Linux and Mac but can't lock down its booty

From the department of cosmic justice comes this gem, spotted by researchers from Symantec: a trojan that targets Windows, Mac, and Linux computers contains gaping security vulnerabilities that allow rival criminal gangs to commandeer the infected machines.

Known as Trojan.Jnanabot, or alternately as OSX/Koobface.A or trojan.osx.boonana.a, the bot made waves in October when researchers discovered its Java-based makeup allowed it to attack Mac and Linux machines, not just Windows PCs as is the case with most malware. Once installed, the trojan components are stored in an invisible folder and use strong encryption to keep communications private.

The bot can force its host to take instructions through internet relay chat, perform DDoS attacks, and post fraudulent messages to the victim's Facebook account, among other things.

Now, Symantec researchers have uncovered weaknesses in the bot's peer-to-peer functionality that allow rival criminals to remotely steal or plant files on the victim's hard drive. That means the unknown gang that took the trouble to spread the infection in the first place risks having their botnet stolen from under their noses.

“Even though it's encrypted and even though it was written in Java to make it cross-platform, it was still vulnerable to basically a directory transversal exploit,” Dean Turner, director of Symantec's Global Intelligence Network, said. “From a technical perspective, it goes to show that even if you have all those things where you're building in a secure platform, if you're not building application security into your malware, other bad guys will probably take advantage of it.”

Jnanabot's P2P feature is designed to make botnets harder to take down by providing multiple channels of communication. After sending an infected machine a single GET request, a website can discover all the information needed to upload any file to any location on the host's file system. Attackers can then install a simple backdoor on a user's machine by, for instance, writing a malicious program to a computer's startup directory.

Attackers can use the same vulnerability to steal files on infected machines.

Turner said the number of Jnanabot infections so far is “measured in the thousands,” rather than the hundreds of thousands for some of the better-known trojans. Still, infection statistics gathered by Symantec in December are surprising. They show that about 16 per cent of infections hit Macs. They didn't show any infections on Linux machines. Turner said that Jnanabot attacks on the open source platform weren't able to survive a reboot.

Source: Symantec

The bot was discovered spreading over Facebook posts that planted the following message on infected users' Facebook pages: “As you are on my friends list I thought I would let you know I have decided to end my life.” An included link leads recipients to a cross-platform JAR, or Java Archive file that can run on Windows, Mac, or Linux. Once the recipient is infected, his Facebook page carries the same dire warning.

It's not the first time that malware developers have built gaping vulnerabilities into their wares. In September, researcher Billy Rios disclosed a weakness in the Zeus crimeware kit that makes it easy to take over huge networks of infected PCs.

Symantec has more about the trojan here, here, and here.

Test Your IPv6 Connectivity

You may have seen an increasing number of articles about IPv6 in the past year. IPv6 is an Internet Protocol that has been designed as the successor of the currently used IPv4 protocol. IPv4 has been in use since the 80s and it is quickly coming to its limits. The main problem with it is that IPv4 runs out of available IP address space as its limit is around 4 billion IP addresses which servers, ISPs, Internet users, devices and websites have to share.

IPv6 offers a larger address space. The move from IPv4 to IPv6 is difficulty as it requires a coordinated effort from all parties including Internet users. Users with improperly configured computers may experience slowdowns, timeouts or other connectivity issues when the Internet moves to the IPv6 protocol.

Will you have troubles? You can find out if you run the IPv6 test. The test is an Open Source script that runs using JavaScript. Just visit the website http://test-ipv6.com and wait until the test has finished. The IPv6 test runs a series of tests including the browser’s IPv4 and IPv6 capabilities, IPv4 and IPv6 connectivity with and without DNS records and a test that checks if the ISP’s DNS server uses IPv6.

A click on test data reveals details about the tests.

Another click on Technical Info leads to a page that offers technical information about each test which may provide clues to troubleshoot the issue.

The most important test at this point in time for the majority of users is the dual stack test. There will be a transition period where websites and services can be reached via IPv4 or IPv6. The user’s computer now needs to pick one of the protocols and use it for the connection which means that devices that only support IPv4 at this time can still connect to the websites. Connectivity issues occur if this is broken.

Major services and websites will switch to IPv6 for a 24 hour period on World IPv6 day on June 8. Among them Google, Facebook and Yahoo. That’s where the dual stack DNS record support can be tested in a life environment.

Mobile Content Bits: Google Goggles; Layar; Mobile Twitter; Admob

—Google (NSDQ: GOOG) Goggles: Google has released a new version of its “visual-search” app that expands the kinds of content that the app can scan and search. The 1.3 app for Android can now scan barcodes on products and return reviews, comparative prices and in-store availability of an item (presumably the last of these, though, is only for participating merchants). Meanwhile, the new version for both iPhone and Android is now able to deliver search results based on any advertisement appearing in a “major” U.S. magazine or newspaper from August 2010 onwards. And for fun, the new app can now also play Sudoku, from a picture of the puzzle. (Blog post)

—Layar: More activity in the augmented reality space… Layar has released an updated version of its iPhone app. The 4.0 edition features support for the iPhone 4’s gyroscope, which helps objects move in “closer sync with your motions,” says the company. “This creates a much smoother experience and takes Augmented Reality another step towards the blending of the digital and real world.” The new app also includes enhanced functionality for the Camera View, as well as the ability to multi-task between Layar and other apps. (Blog post)

—Mobile Twitter: A stat that underscores how significant mobile is for Twitter’s business model: over 40 percent of all tweets are made from mobile devices, according to Twitter’s CEO Dick Costolo, speaking at the CES show last week. That’s an increase of 25 percent from a year ago. He added that the growth in traffic was down to new “official” Twitter apps that have been released for BlackBerry, iOS and Android smartphone platforms. (via MarketingWeek)

—Admob: Google’s mobile advertising network has reached a milestone: 2 billion requests per day. Admob says that represents a quadrupling of traffic over the last year. It also noted that 100 million unique Android and iOS devices requested an ad each month, a figure that nearly doubled over the last six months. (Blog post)