(1) I experienced an outage Verizon Wireless Broad Band (VWBBie) network from 2230 Saturday 26 Jun 10 until 0547 Sunday 27 Jun 10. please explain?
(2) When was 24 hour support eliminated?
(3) Why does the 914 error point me to a non-working number?
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | 
SERVICE | Tagged: Not Recommended | 
Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
What’s wrong with the “security” people at the UK Mail Online?
They don’t set expectations and they don’t know that a password is a shared secret?
Argh!
I wanted to make a comment on one of their stories. Doesn’t matter which one. But here’s the saga.
Comment box asks for Name and Location.
OK, that’s not bad.
Then, to get it published, you have to give them and email and a password.
OK, that’s not too bad. (I have a page of one time passwords. But how many folks do? Most just reuse the same one.)
Then, it doesn’t like my password length. (I like 12; it wants 5 to 10. Do you think you might mention that on the page that asks for it. I feel like I’m playing gotcha!)
OK, that’s not too too bad. (I drop the last two characters to get to 10. No big deal!)
Then, it doesn’t like that I have a special character in it. (I like 26 letters, upper and lower and special characters at random — 26 lc + 26 uc + 10 digits + 4 specials = 66 ** 12. I always score strong on most password ratings.)
OK, that’s not too too too bad. I drop the special characters and readd the two characters I dropped before.
Then, it says we’ll email you a link.
OK, that’s not too too too too bad. I’ll just wait for the link.
Then, I find the email after a short wait — hey it’s a long way across the pond. It has the huge multiline link to click. But being a member of the “I NEVER click email links” church, I faithfully copy the link to my plain text editor, cntl a, cntl c, and got my browser and paste.
OK, that’s not too too too too too bad. I get a message that they’ll post my comment if they see fit.
Then, I read the rest of the email message and I find my password, my “shared secret”, my “carefully generated but mangled by their rules” password in the clear for any system or mail administrator to read. With the subject, “Welcome to Mail Online”. (Not to hard to id that!)
OK, that’s bad.
How many “security rules” did they break? How many “human factors design principles” did they break?
Now I have to go back and change my password, just incase someone wants to post something under my name.
Ok, that’s very bad.
I could ramble on to make more lines with “very very very bad”. But I’m bored with the topic. And, my ADADHDD is kicking in.
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Begin forwarded message:
From: communication@mailonline.co.uk
Date: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
To: YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Subject: Welcome to MailOnline
Thank you for registering with MailOnline
To authorise your new user account please click on the link below.
If comments on this article are unmoderated, your comment should appear shortly. If comments on this article are pre-moderated then your comment will be checked in advance and will be queued for checking. We receive thousands of contributions every day so please be patient. If your comment does not appear, this may be due to the volume we receive or your content.
To find out if comments under a particular article are pre-moderated or not, look just above the comments to see if they are “pre-moderated” or “unmoderated”.
If the above link does not work, copy and paste the link into the address box on your web browser.
Your log in details are shown below:
Email: YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Password: XXXXXXXXXXXXX
You can update your details at any time – just tick the box marked ‘Update my details’ next time you log in.
Terms: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/terms.html
House Rules: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/house_rules.html
Privacy Policy: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/privacy.html
Contact: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/contactus.html
mailonline.co.uk
# – # – #
*** begin quote ***
Thank you!
Thank you for adding a comment to MailOnline.
Comments on this article are being checked in advance. We aim to publish as many as possible. MailOnline receives thousands of comments every day, so please be patient. If your comments do not appear, this may be due to the volume we receive or due to the content of your comment.
Why not get the latest News from Mail Online delivered via RSS?
*** end quote ***
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Leave a Comment » | SERVICE | Tagged: INFOSEC | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
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Service Update: New MobileMe Mail, Find My iPhone, and more.
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Leave a Comment » | NOTRECOMMENDED, SERVICE | Tagged: NOTRECOMMENDED | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2010/06/14/the-rewards-of-routine-maintenance/
The Rewards of Routine Maintenance
*** begin quote ***
I used to make fun of my cousin, Nick, for this. Nick has tens of thousands of dollars in the bank, yet he’s always getting late fees for things like the electric bill. “What the heck?” I asked him once. “How can this be possible?” He shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “I get the bills in the mail, put them on the table, and then I forget about them. They get buried under other mail. It’s only three or four months later that I find them again.” This used to baffle me, but now I understand.
*** end quote ***
May I make an unusual suggestion? (It’s unusual for me. Not that I’m making a suggestion. I am after all a “know it all” and never leave a suggestion unexpressed. — “That’s supposed to be a joke, son.” Yosemite Sam — I try ONLY to suggest things that are free. This ain’t free.)
PAYRUST
It costs about 15$/month. For this, they will receive your bills by USMAIL or over the net and put it in your “inbox”. It can automatically “action” your bills; paying them in full or in part. And, it emails you weekly summaries, reminders, and such. You pay them on their site and they send the checks or e-payments.
All very organized.
I recommend it highly. Especially if you’re disorganized, travel a lot, or have psych issues with bills in the mail.
It’s a great service.
At the end of the year, they will send you a CD of your stuff for 20$. It’s all very useful.
And, I recommend it. Highly.
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Leave a Comment » | RECOMMENDATIONS, SERVICE | Tagged: Human Factors | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Rock-Solid Security
* Web Content Filtering
Cloud-based, award-winning Web content filtering from OpenDNS with more than 50 categories of content. No appliance necessary. Effective against proxies, P2P, Web 2.0, adult and more.
* PhishTank Anti-Phishing
Industry-leading anti-phishing powered by PhishTank, the most authoritative source of phishing data on the Internet. Protects your network, organization and its employees from fraudulent phishing scams.
* Malware Site Protection / Botnet Protection
DNS layer security protects the most vulnerable level of your network against the latest threats, including viruses, worms and zero-day vulnerabilities.
* Whitelist / Blacklist
Lets you decide where your users can navigate on your customized Internet. Whitelist-only functionality available.
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Leave a Comment » | RECOMMENDATIONS, RECOMMENDED, SERVICE | Tagged: RECOMMENDED | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
*** begin quote ***
Over contacts quota
Because problems can occur when you have an extremely large number of contacts in your Google Account (note that this number includes the people you’re following on Google Buzz), we’ve implemented some quota restrictions. If you take an action that would put you beyond this limit, we’ll show you an error message.
One common reason for having a large number of contacts is having many duplicate entries. We recommend using the merge tools in your Contact Manager to consolidate your duplicates and make room for new additions.
You can also back up your existing contacts by exporting to a CSV file.
*** end quote ***
Argh!
Another reason “cloud computing” won’t work. Surprises!
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Leave a Comment » | SERVICE | Tagged: cloud, cloud computing | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Don’t the ISPs have the capability to do a domain look up?
We need to revise the email handling protocols. (imho)
ISPs should insist that peers do some validation.
For example, if say COMCAST and YAHOO are peers, then, at the very least, COMCAST should not accept any email with a Yahoo return address that doesn’t originate from Yahoo. Yahoo should validate every email it peers to COMCAST has having originated from a valid email address. If COMCAST Users mark it as spam, then that fact should be fed back to Yahoo for appropriate action.
And, visa versa.
(I laugh sarcastically when I get spam with a Yahoo bogus return address.)
ISPs like Comcast and EMail providers like Yahoo could “cut off” offenders.
It would seem to be in everyone’s best interest to truncate the flow of bogus email.
Seems easy to me?
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1 Comment | SERVICE | Tagged: EMAIL | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
http://emilychang.com/ehub/app/750-words
Blog | eHub | Stream | Tags | Photos Projects | About | News | Contact
750 Words
By Kim Lau
— May 12, 2010 at 10:02 am
*** begin quote ***
Motivate your writing by committing to 750 words a day. Log in with Facebook Connect, Google or Yahoo, and earn points and badges the more you write.
*** end quote ***
We’ll see if it helps.
RECOMMENDED!
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Leave a Comment » | RECOMMENDED, SERVICE | Tagged: RECOMMENDED | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
Give Me My Data helps you reclaim and reuse your Facebook data.
*** begin quote ***
Give Me My Data is a Facebook application designed to give users the ability to export their data out of Facebook for any purpose they see fit. This could include making artwork, archiving and deleting your account, or circumventing the interface Facebook provides. Data can be exported in CSV, XML, and other common formats. Give Me My Data is currently in public-beta.
*** end quote ***
RECOMMENDED!
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Leave a Comment » | RECOMMENDATIONS, SERVICE | Tagged: RECOMMENDED | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
*** begin quote ***
Dear Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia Member
This weekend there was a patch implemented that corrected the Portal Error members have been receiving. Please go to the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia website and try to access your account. If you continue to get the Portal Error, please give Web Support a call at (866) 292-6253 Monday-Friday 8 a.m. – 6 p.m. excluding Holidays. Please reference this email when speaking to a Technician.
*** end quote ***
I’d call this “using the user as unpaid debugging help”!
Argh!
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Leave a Comment » | SERVICE | Tagged: Factors, Human | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj
You are currently browsing the archives for the SERVICE category.
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FJohn Reinke
Consultant at Technology Legacies LLC
Advisor, Computer Governance Committee at Manhattan College
Editor / Publisher at Jasper Jottings
Greater New York City Area
JJ Positraction JJ Endnotes Downsize DC
Philosophy of Liberty
I have NOT received any gagged governmental information requests
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