Microsoft has taking its fair share of criticism lately
regarding Windows Vista. Massive incompatibility issues combined with user
disorientation have hurt their image if not their bottom line. Common well
designed Windows features were taken apart and put back together in a prettier
but less efficient manner.
To address these issues and make a bigger impact on the
business community, Microsoft has planned the release of Windows 7 at some
point this year. It will, we hope, combine the best features of Windows XP and
Windows Vista into a slightly more useable product.
How it works out is yet to be seen.
E-MAIL ISSUES / PROBLEMS
By now the majority of our clients have implemented both
Internet and E-Mail access from within the office. Along with this comes the
usual slate of related problems. Viruses & Spam are just the beginning of
the problems you may encounter in this brave new world.
In the early days of corporate e-mail, viruses were the
main problem plaguing e-mail customers. When I first set up my e-mail account
with
Many smaller Internet, Web-Hosting and E-Mail providers
do continue to experience these problems from time to time however. For this
reason and because viruses are always finding new ways to get to users through
Messenger programs, Malicious Web-Sites and the like, you still need good
Anti-Virus and Anti-Spyware protection on all computers. We continue to
recommend Symantec’s Anti-Virus and Spybot’s
Anti-Spyware as a solid defence for these vulnerable areas.
The other major problem with e-mail these days is Spam.
Spam is the junk mail equivalent of the electronic age and it is a constant
problem for many companies.
Again, the better Internet providers have provided users
with Anti-Spam tools to reduce the problem. As someone that receives about 500
junk e-mails a day I have learned that no system is perfect in dealing with
Spam. Earlier end-user programs were far from perfect and cost you extra money
to boot. Newer tools are free but require your time to configure and fine tune
them.
Fighting Spam seems to be a choice of lesser evils. If
you trust your Internet provider’s tools you may be able to eliminate 98% of
Spam, but the occasional one will still get through. As you approach this
apparent utopia you will find that these programs also occasionally filter out
legitimate e-mails. Uploading your address book and adjusting filter settings
and the like may improve the situation but nothing is perfect at this point in
time.
I’ve even had an occasional new client inform me that
the e-mail they were about to send me would be flagged as Spam. I had to
deliberately set a filter to allow their e-mail to go through. This had been
happening to them for some time as they were accidentally identified as a Spam
source by
E-MAIL FRAUD
I’m sure just about everyone has received an e-mail
requesting you to confirm your bank user id and passwords. These are virtually
always fraudulent and should never be acted upon. Banks will never request
passwords and such unless you contact them first. Then there’s the one from a
lawyer that needs a $1000 or so to process your inheritance from a long lost
relative in
E-MAIL THEFT
E-Mail theft occurs more frequently than people realize.
You can of course configure e-mail accounts to leave
copies of your e-mails at the e-mail server. Many users do this deliberately so
that two or more people can view every incoming e-mail. This feature can
occasionally be used to steal e-mail without a company suspecting it.
E-Mail Theft can actually occur in two ways. Existing
employees could just forward important mail to their home or to a competitor
while in your employ. Requests for quotes, purchase orders and other important
mail are often targets for this type of theft. This type of theft is rare but
sometimes happens when an employee is contemplating leaving to work for the
competition.
More significant theft can occur after an employee
leaves and goes to work for a competitor. If they were to take e-mail account
information and passwords with them, they could setup a remote computer to
retrieve your e-mail while leaving a copy for you on the e-mail server. In this
case, the safest thing to do is to just call your provider and change all your
e-mail passwords.