 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
August 2004
This and past newsletters, and various articles are available on our web site. You can receive this newsletter via email.
Office 2003 SP1 is out. If you have office or outlook 2003, be sure to update. In any office application, click on the help menu, then office online. The update includes an updated spam filter, which is worth getting. http://www.microsoft.com/office
Windows XP Service Pack 2 will be out soon. It will show up as a Windows Critical Update. DO NOT update, until you have tested it with your network. This is a significant update, almost like updating to a new version of XP. It automatically installs a personal firewall, which can break office network applications, and will significantly affect performance of network based database applications. It also changes the way certain web applications work, and could affect custom web based client applications.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/sp2/preinstall.mspx
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1630961,00.asp
I got my first phishing email this month. Phishing is the term for attempts to steal personal information using bogus emails or web links sent to your computer. It looked like an official message from Citibank, titled “Citibank Identity Theft Solutions” The email asked me to update my Citibank ATM pin online by clicking on a web link. The link is to an IP address, not a Citibank url. Be careful of anything you receive by email requesting personal information. If in doubt, call the company and verify that it is legitimate. Phishing grew by over 50% in the last month alone.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/08/06/32secadvise_1.html
Double layer DVD drives are out. They double the capacity of the DVD disk to 8.5 GB. The disk media are still expensive (about $15 ea.) and hard to come by.
http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/Articles/Specific.asp?ArticleHeadline=Philips+DVDRW885K+DL&Series=0
If you are working from home, be sure to include home computers in your company security and technology plans. While they are connected, they are a part of your network, and need to be managed to insure that antivirus software is being updated, passwords are secure, and home wireless networks are not wide open to the neighborhood.
FireFox is gaining popularity as an alternative to Internet Explorer, partly due to the large number of security flaws in IE. (There are more this month – be sure to update). It lacks compatibility with some web sites written for IE.
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/ie_no_more.asp
Tim Torian
Torian, Group, Inc.
http://www.toriangroup.com