Secure Email Project

After watching a lot of Dora the Explorer as of late I all have to say is...I DID IT!! Ok that was lame. Seriously though I did. See proof!




I am working on trying to get all of my mail servers set up that way as we speak. I do however think it is important to point out a situation where emails were stolen or viewed by people they were not intended for and how that affected them.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/01/phil-jones-climate-science-emails-select-committee-hearing

According to the Guardian, many of the emails that were released that appeared to show climatologists covering up facts about global warming could have been kept secret. It would make sense that most governmental agencies would use secure email however it appears in this case that somebody was able to receive and access the emails because they were not encrypted. The media storm and fallout has been enormous. I would assume going forward this group of scientists headed by Phil Jones will find a way to keep the information they exchange just a little bit safer.

Week 14: Clearly need to do something

After watching all of the lectures for week 14 I took the quiz, watched some TV and then went to bed. As I was laying in bed trying to fall asleep the thought of a hard drive failure or fire kept entering my mind. How would my wife deal with the news that all of her pictures of our almost 2 year old son were lost and gone forever because I was relying on a Best Buy quality hard drive to keep our budget, taxes, pictures, music and just about everything you could imagine safe and secure. Needless to say it was a relatively sleepless night.

Over the past couple years there have been many commercials and advertising dollars spent by companies that backup your computer system over the internet at regular intervals. While I had always thought it was a novel idea I had never really jumped into action to make it happen. This morning I began searching. Carbonite and Mozy are 2 products that came up. Both offer relatively the same features for about $60 per month. These services have some software that you simply download and they handle the rest. Mozy actually even allows for 2GB of free storage with no cost! Well you can imagine that 2 GB won't go far. My file containing pictures on the computer contains about 3.5GB alone.

At the writing of this blog I have not actually pulled the trigger on one of these systems as I am still searching for the best option for my situation. I do however know that once I find one I will scream at the top of every hill that anybody who stores anything important on their computer needs to back it up in some manner. It may not make sense to set up a RAID 1 system in your house but I can bet it makes sense to do something.

Week 13: Clear to compute safely

Computing on a PC that is always connected to the Internet these days is relatively safe given the software that is meant to protect us. This software including virus projections and spy ware allows us to surf and download with as much protection as say Lebron James signing autographs. For most of us however our personal information especially financial information is important to us like keeping the president alive is to the Secret Service. That is why we must be detectives sometimes. Especially when it comes to making online purchases.

A wise man once said that if it seems to good to be true it probably is and another said that nothing is every free. There are many websites out today like Amazon and Ebay as well as airline and travel sites that can handle your information with the utmost security. Everyday however it seems like a new travel site or auction site is popping up with fabulous deals. It is very important for users to consider the source when dealing with these types of sites. Often the products or services offered are merely a hook for you to open the door. There is one particular scam running with what are referred to as "ghost sites". These sites are designed to look identical to the bank sites and purchasing pages that you frequent. They however are merely used to collect your password and credit card information to cause you harm down the road. According to securemyhomepc.com, it is very important to watch for certificates and do research on sites that claim to be offering something for nothing or deals that are extremely better than what you are able to get elsewhere. Taking the extra time to research these sites may be the difference between a stolen identity or a copy of Harry Potter.

The secret service does not take a step with POTUS unless it has been researched, planned, and rehearsed. Our personal information is that important to us. Don't rely too much on your software and remember, operator error can rarely be prevented with virus software.

Week 12: Clear

In week 12 we began to discuss the uses of systems and systems analysts which is actually great addition to the information covered on database management. After all it appears that systems are merely a very specific extension of basic databases that are put into terms that are easier for the user to interface. Only a couple of weeks ago I saw a headline on Yahoo that referred to systems analysts as one of the only growing career fields in this down economy. As computer systems become more prevalent it will be necessary to retain more specialists that can keep them running. It is obviously very difficult to tell a customer on the phone or in person that you are unable to do business with them because your computers are down. Especially considering our level of dependency on computers.

I thought it would be interesting to ask some of my employees some questions when they came to work on Friday. As soon as I got to work that morning I played a later April Fools Day joke on them and sent out an email telling them to be prepared that in the near future we would be closed while we remodeled a building that was less that 10 months old. As my employees arrived almost 80% had received and read the email by 8am. When they came to me to inquire about the email, I asked them how much money they had in there purses or wallets. I was amazed to learn that amongst 7 employees I was able to recover a total of $18.69. I asked them what they would do if they needed to purchase something and with the exception of one employee who had $10, they all responded they would use there bank cards.

The point of this it to show how important systems analysts can be just in the process of maintaining a platform for sales to be processed. If it came down to cash or nothing most people would have no means to make a purchase unless they could visit an ATM. Surprise to most, who do you think maintains the software for ATM's and banks?

Week 11: Muddy

I must admit that I found the information contained in this weeks reading and lectures to be very informative but yet confusing at times. The process for database building and maintenance was very in depth and contained many steps that most small businesses probably fail to work through. Even after listening to the lectures twice and reading the chapter I found myself wanting some more information. Thank you Google.

http://www.databasemanagementtips.info/

This website provided a little bit of an explanation however it didn't go into the depth that the section covered. What it did bring to light is that we take them for granted. We are so accustomed to logging on to Expedia or Bing and just typing in what we want and getting it. We take for granted the the computer systems that a teller at a bank uses to tell us our balance or transfer funds. I have been able to experience this in the past when I was a teller at a bank. I was working for a small regional bank with 500 locations and we had our own system of programs and places where information was stored. After learning this system in and out to the point that I was able to troubleshoot problems for some of my bosses, I learned that the bank had been purchased by a large international banking firm that had there very own database and operating systems to do the same functions that we did. During the course of the merger it took almost a full year to get our database to the point where they could at the least compile all of the information into a form that there database would read and eventually take over.

What many people forget is that even old information for closed accounts must be retained for every branch and every transaction. I was not privy to the process that this database transfer was a part of but I do know that the 12 months were not just because. During this time I was questioned many times about the functions of certain parts and the procedures that we used to attain this information. I am no computer programmer but I had developed a knowledge of the uses of the outdated database that gave programmers some of the information they needed to transfer the data. The whole process continues to be very muddy to me and hopefully if I am ever in a situation to need it I will be able to just hire a consultant that is a professional in this line of work

Database Project Blog Post

I have taken classes before that have briefly touched on the capabilities of what Microsoft Access can do and in the past I have been able to take that tiny bit of information and use it for something useful until you leave it alone and forget. Those classes from the past were also taken with an older version of Access. I think that I learned during the course of this project that the program is much more user friendly now and it also makes more sense the second time around. I will use the database options of this to create tracking systems for invoices as work as well as starting a customer database that each individual store can use to log addresses and contact information each time they mail out a thank you card to a customer.

The database information that I will be able to create and use rather simply will allow me to track the frequency of customers coming back, giving feedback, redeeming bounce back opportunities, and it will also give me a broad customer base to do targeted advertising periodically throughout the year. Each opportunity that I may have to show loyalty to customer is a big benefit and the report options and mail merge options of the the program allow me to print envelopes as well as address labels. With a little bit more effort I would even be able to create name specific personalized letters to go with the other contact information. Using a marketing company for this level of database and concentrated marketing could cost as much as $.60-$1.50 per household.