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Google Applications

By on May 16th, 2011

When other tools aren’t available, many employees simply use a variety of Google apps to satisfy their need to collaborate with peers, customers, and other business partners. In some cases, management actually authorizes the use of easily-accessible programs like Google messaging, Google Docs, Gmail, and Google Calendar because these programs are seen as useful, free resources that solve a legitimate business need. At other times, frustrated employees turn to these familiar apps out of frustration. Every business owner should examine this practice to decide if these cloud-based technologies provide enough security to safeguard their company’s sensitive electronic resources.

Although using these Google apps actually means that company resources are stored on non-proprietary servers in the “cloud,” Google assures everyone that the data is both safe and secure. In fact, this Internet giant uses a multi-disciplined approach to safeguard all data stored on their servers whether it is personal or business in nature. Here are the primary methods used by Google to accomplish this goal:

Corporate Policies
Google’s commitment to information security is documented in a detailed set of corporate policies that each employee must read and agree to follow. The corporate security policy is reviewed and updated on a regular basis. Employees are also educated frequently on best-practice security procedures for the Tech Industry as a whole.

Organizational Security
Google has hired a team of leading experts in the fields of information, network, and application security to make sure each and every security policy is followed and that all facets of the infrastructure include state-of-the-art security features. This team monitors all Google networks for suspicious activity to quickly recognize and correct any security threats. Google also performs internal audits as an additional safety point and has a highly-trained team of physical security experts to keep all Google facilities safe from physical intrusions.

Asset Control
Google uses a widely-distributed network of servers to ensure that no single machine is a point of failure or a dedicated storage device for all the information owned by a single account or enterprise. All requests for access are verified, authenticated, and authorized to ensure each one is valid even within Google’s own network. Access to the production environment by Google staff to perform maintenance tasks is always controlled by secure shell authenticated connections. Google uses a three-phased approach to media disposal to ensure data is completely eliminated.

Personnel Security
All Google job candidates are subjected to an extensive background check in addition to signing a confidentiality agreement prior to officially becoming a Google employee. Every employee is given security training relative to their position in the company.

Physical Security
Google is composed of many different physical locations so that a single breach wouldn’t compromise the entire organization. Each building is safeguarded with a variety of different security measures depending on its location and the area’s perceived risk. These measures may include alarm systems, security cameras, software systems, and security guards. All facilities are restricted to authorized employees, visitors, and third-party agents.

Operational Security
Google takes every step possible to prevent malware from infecting its user’s computer systems. This involves both automated and manual monitoring as well as blacklisting. Google employs several teams including vulnerability management, incident management, network security, and operating system security to ensure a safe infrastructure for both Google employees and Google users.

Controlled Access
Every Google employee is required to use a unique user ID to access the system. This ID is used to track their activities and to control their access. Google requires the highest level of password strength and immediately disables each account when an employee leaves the company.

Systems Development
Google evaluates the security impact of every new system in addition to modifications to existing applications. A dedicated security team reviews each change and implementation plan to ensure that all security policies are followed. Software developers are trained to follow the latest security measures, and the security team is available for consultations if any questions or problems arise during the development process.

Disaster Recovery
Through data replication, regular backups, and geographical diversity, Google has minimized the chances of any wide-spread outages due to a localized event. The company also has a continuity plan in place for its Mountain View, CA headquarters to cover any major disaster in that area.

Compliance with Regulations
Google follows all privacy regulations when faced with third-party requests for data access. The Google Legal Team thoroughly evaluates each request to ensure it’s valid before releasing the information. Except for legal requirements and emergencies, the owner of the data is notified. Google has developed a strong privacy policy and has passed a SAS 70 external security audit.

Although Google has implemented a well-rounded set of security precautions to safeguard user data, there is always some level of risk when corporate data is stored on non-corporate servers. While this risk may not be acceptable for mission-critical data, the level of security may be sufficient for non-confidential communications in exchange for the cost savings of free applications.

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Virtual Storage

By on January 12th, 2011

While it’s true that information is king, he’s definitely a greedy ruler! As the business world continues to demand the storage of more and more data for longer periods of time, the need for increased amounts of disk space grows exponentially larger each year. To compound the issue, the low price of storage space means that many software developers no longer feel the need to make their products space efficient, and government regulations seem to increase legislative requirements for the retention of critical information each year. As the business units see the price tag on servers and disk space become more affordable, they can’t understand why adding just one more should be a problem. They fail to recognize that the cost of a growing computer room includes more than just the initial cost of the storage units.

The Shocking Cost of Maintaining Storage Units
Most non-IT workers would be shocked to find out that the cost of managing each storage unit can be as much as four to 10 times the original purchase price. In addition to putting a big dent in the IT budget, ever increasing storage units lead to server sprawl and a constantly declining operating efficiency. Increased maintenance can also be disruptive, expensive, and burdensome to the entire enterprise. To solve this problem, system engineers have been working on file virtualization methods to eliminate these issues. Their goal is to reduce storage and server inefficiencies while permitting infinite growth. Let’s take a look at exactly how they intend to accomplish this lofty goal.

Breaking the Tight Connection between Clients, Servers, and Storage
The old strategy of tightly coupling storage space with clients and servers is a big reason that adding a new storage unit becomes expensive to maintain. When machines from a variety of vendors are added to the network, they may not all integrate seamlessly creating individual islands of storage to manage. When applications are physically mapped to a specific server for storage, any changes, including additions, require modifications to this complex mapping algorithm. In some cases, adding a new device or moving a system to a storage unit with more space requires expensive and annoying downtime. This often leads to an under-utilization of the actual storage space, an expensive proposition, because system administrators over-allocate space to minimize the need to take an outage. To break free from this outdated methodology, file virtualization relies on the ability to remove this static mapping process to allow storage resources to freely move between applications as needed without restricting access to the data.

Adding a Layer of Intelligent Design to the Network
File virtualization adds a layer of intelligence to the network to decouple logical data access from the physical retrieval of the actual files. This separates the application and the client from the physical storage devices so that static mapping is no longer needed. With this change, the existing bank of servers can be maintained without disrupting the core system or the user’s access to valuable information. After implementing a file virtualization strategy, many IT shops find that they can consolidate storage units and increase their overall utilization. In this way, they may be able to simplify the system configuration by decommissioning older storage devices that are no longer needed or that they can go much longer than anticipated without adding additional disk space.

In today’s IT world, most shops are finding that using a file virtualization system is not only a “best practice,” it’s a must-do to continue operating. IT shops with budgets that continued to rise each year just a short time ago are seeing their available funds shrink more and more each year. With increasing pressure to reduce costs or keep the flat, file virtualization is also a virtual requirement.

Anthony Ricigliano No comments yet

Tarpon Fishing in Puerto Rico

By on May 19th, 2010

What spirit possesses the tarpon? A fierce fish, known to taunt fishermen by hiding in the depths, only to finally take the bait and thrash its way upward into trees, onto shore, and on occasion even onto a boat, the tarpon is a kind of living enigma, passionate and utterly unpredictable. Anglers remark that the fish’s tendency to struggle and its notable size tires them, but if they are honest with themselves, there is something in the tarpon’s fighting spirit that proves irresistible. Catching a tarpon is the true measure of a fisherman’s strength and soul; without tenacity, flexibility, and courage, a man can never hope to land such a fish.Record Tarpon-Anthony Ricigliano

Baby tarpons usually weigh under 15 pounds, while the majestic full sized silver king can register at 150 pounds or more. Different fishing wire is recommended for each size; a 20 pound line is best for the heaviest fish, while a 12 pound will do for the smallest versions. Research has shown that tarpons do not even need to the rise to the surface for air; they do it partly out of adolescent reflex, and partly because they like to. When they are in the mood, tarpons emerge onto the surface of the water in a process known as ‘rolling.’ Sometimes, they do it in groups, with many hundreds of fish popping up for a quick roll in the sun. To try and bait them during this process is an exercise in frustration; a tarpon can be a single-minded creature. When a tarpon is rolling, biting is generally not on the agenda. However, when a tarpon does bite, a fisherman will need every ounce of concentration to bring the fish in. The tarpon’s considerable size makes each jump and thrash a difficult weight to bear.

Fishing for tarpons in Puerto Rico is an especially pleasurable way to spend time and energy. Chartered tarpon fishing expeditions occur on a regular basis, and are recommended for those fishermen who are unfamiliar with the area. The San Jose Lagoon and the Torecilla Lagoon are favorite haunts of the fish, and offer a relative abundance of baiting opportunities for the reclusive tarpon. This is partly due to the fact that the lagoon covers a former airport runway, which provides a shallow channel 22 feet at its deepest point. Bait fish swim in these trenches, often attracting a squadron of tarpons who pursue them mercilessly.

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Are Smart Buildings Really Smart? by Anthony Ricigliano

By on August 19th, 2010

News and Articles by Anthony Ricigliano: It’s actually surprising that the United States has the third largest ecological footprint per capita, behind the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. While we try to do the right thing we still face huge challenges in overcoming our environmental deficit. Sustainability comes in many forms with one of them being “smart buildings.”

What we need to do to truly make positive changes in terms of how we treat our environment is to consider the big picture of our actions to see whether we’re actually headed in the right direction. Let’s take a look at smart buildings and their role in reducing their inhabitants’ carbon footprint. Unfortunately, smart buildings may sound great in theory but could be falling short in a number of areas. In terms of sustainability and shrinking carbon footprints smart buildings fail the test under the following circumstances, according to TED.com, a non-profit organization devoted to “Ideas worth spreading”:

• Employees are required to commute over long distances.
• The energy they consume is carbon-intensive.
• Their technology is too complicated to use or too difficult to maintain.
• Their impact stops at the property line.
• They deny the use of pre-existing infrastructure or building fabric.
• They are conceived in isolation from larger, systemic environmental change.

By looking at the big picture, a smart building could actually do more harm than good simply by moving further away from the people that work there. Even a building that is self sufficient to the point of being off the grid will have a higher carbon footprint than a dilapidated old building if it encourages or requires dependence on an automobile to get there. To wit, shortening the daily commute of a typical person by six miles can save as much carbon as a 50 percent reduction in energy use for home heating.

“Green” buildings and green initiatives in a vacuum are not enough to make a material difference. What is required is a big picture approach to avoid the common practice of doing some good and then undoing it with an action that cancels out the position actions which preceded it.

In short, we must make the most of what we already have and be aware that all of our actions can have an impact. We have to get over the feel-good perception that going “green” and leaving it at that is the answer to all of our problems. By analogy, (also from TED.com) “the electric hybrid Toyota Prius is an energy-efficient car. However, when accounting for the energy used to manufacture a new Prius, one would actually save more energy by continuing to drive a mid-’90s Geo Metro.” This probably isn’t what Prius owners want hear but you get the picture.

Going green must become a behavior or a lifestyle as opposed to a series of isolated actions. It’s not going to easy and, by the way, this isn’t meant to diminish isolated actions. It’s often these very actions that act as the seed of change in our overall behavior.

By Anthony Ricigliano

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Plugging Data Leaks Continues To Be a Worrisome IT Issue

By on November 1st, 2010

Plugging Data Leaks Continues To Be a Worrisome IT Issue

October 31 2010 admin No comments

IT News by Anthony Ricigliano: The topic of data leaks has been making headlines in the world of IT professionals for some time now. With each passing year, it seems that more ways are being found to punch holes in security systems from both external and internal sources. As more companies become more conscious of their potential security risks, those seeking to circumvent the system are busy finding new ways to thwart their efforts to secure their data.

One of the easiest ways for even amateur hackers to gain access to your data is from emails sent by your employees. Perhaps an employee makes an inquiry by email regarding the availability of an item needed for the office. The vendor replies with a quote, and your employee responds with an email containing the company credit card number. By the time it is discovered that the number has been leaked, there can be thousands of dollars charged to the company card, requiring many hours to rectify.

Perhaps the company has employees who work from home or travel. Documents sent via email that contain information on an upcoming bid structure and amount can fall into the hands of the competition, who can then undercut your bid. Discussions of proposed acquisitions can destroy all chances of the purchase.

Your customers might innocently request that confidential information be sent as an email attachment. Perhaps you are an accountant, and the client would like to review his tax returns before you file them. He may request a list of his prices under a competitive pricing agreement that would create ill will among other customers if they knew he was receiving preferential pricing. The client can also initiate the data leak by emailing you information such as his social security number or bank routing information.

Many employees routinely email files to their personal email accounts so that they can access the data from home. This may be legitimate, as when he or she merely wants to work over the weekend or needs instant access to data when out of the office. However, it can also be a case of an employee providing the information to your competition.

Your employee data security can also be compromised easily. An email attachment of your employees’ names, home addresses, and phone numbers can be an issue if intercepted by an unauthorized user. If you add the employees’ social security numbers, birth dates, or anniversary dates, virtually everyone on the list is at risk of identity theft.

Fortunately, there are ways to prevent data leaks. The first step requires almost no expense and is simply a matter of implementing policies designed to protect your company’s information. Establish policies on who can connect, when it is allowable, and from where they can connect. Forbid logging in from public computers, such as Internet cafes or airport kiosks. Define a policy for file transfers to removable devices such as laptops, disks, or memory sticks. Include an audit trail so that you will be able to track who has downloaded what. Create a list of approved devices to help prevent hackers from downloading data.

Encrypt files at both the file and disk levels. Files that are encrypted while they are in motion are less likely to be of any use to a hacker even if intercepted. It also allows you to monitor your most sensitive data and see where it has been and who is accessing the files.

Establish a secure perimeter around your network. All data being sent out should be scanned for patterns or keywords that could identify a potential leak of sensitive information. If a match is found, the system can block the transmission.

Think of the business world as a desert through which you must navigate if you are to be successful. Now imagine that your company data is the bottle of water that will keep you going on your trek. As long as the bottle remains intact, you will be able to use the contents when needed. If it begins to leak, however, you are losing the lifeblood of your business. Other denizens in the desert can use the water you lose to sustain their own existence. They may be scavengers seeking an easy drink or predators out to cause you serious harm. Either way, your loss is their gain. Once the contents of the bottle have been leaked, the water is contaminated, and even if you can scoop it back into the bottle, you are likely to get a great deal of debris you do not want.

Anthony Ricigliano

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Information Technology Security

By on October 26th, 2010

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While most companies have several security defenses in place to guard against threats, such as firewalls and antiviral software, a very important question is still left on the table: Exactly how effective are these measures? Although it is a deceptively simple question, every company must find their own answer to this essential question. Without this critical information, your organization could be left wide open to incoming threats because of unknown vulnerabilities. Let’s investigate a few ways to effectively evaluate your organization’s data security:

Penetration Tests
A penetration test, or pentest, is basically an attempt to hack into the system from outside the network. This simulated attack analyzes the system for any potential vulnerability points that could result from configuration problems, hardware or software defects, or poor operational procedures. A penetration test will typically look for vulnerable points not only from outside attackers, but also from the inside. If an employee can view unauthorized data, it can be just as dangerous as allowing a hacker to gain access. Penetration tests can be classified as either Black Box, the tester knows nothing about the system, or White Box, the tester has complete knowledge about the system infrastructure. Of course, some installations have used modified rules and referred to it as Grey Box testing. Every system that connects to the internet or allows access from any other external source should use penetration testing on a regular basis.

Network Discovery Assessments
A network discovery assessment analyzes your network’s infrastructure to identify every device that is connected to your network and search for configuration weaknesses. By clearly identifying each machine within a continuous IP address range, the system engineers can detect any new or unexpected devices that are connected to the network. While an unknown machine usually occurs because an incorrect IP address was assigned or a cabling error was made, a network discovery assessment will also point out any truly unauthorized computer, such as a hacker, that is connecting to your company’s network.

Network Sniffing
A network sniffer can be either a hardware device or a piece of software that intercepts and logs traffic passing over a network in order to capture information about each packet’s final destination. Some network sniffers have the ability to generate errors within the system to test for the ability to handle error conditions. Depending on the capabilities of the individual network sniffer, it can be configured in the following ways:
• Wired Broadcast LANs – A network sniffer can monitor traffic traveling across either the entire network or on specific parts of the network from one machine. To minimize a potential bottleneck, ARP spoofing or monitoring ports can be used.
• Wireless LANs – A network sniffer can monitor the traffic on one specific channel.
• Promiscuous Mode – If the network sniffer supports this feature, the network adapter can be set to promiscuous mode to allow the sniffer to monitor multicast traffic sent to a group of machines that the adapter is listening to.
• Monitor Mode – This is a step up from promiscuous mode. It allows the sniffer to process everything that it could in promiscuous mode plus packets for other service sets.
In terms of information security, network sniffers provide value by detecting network intruders, discovering network misuse by internal and external users, and isolating exploited systems. On the other side of the coin, hackers can use network sniffers to learn information to effect a network intrusion and to collect passwords or other sensitive information.

Checking Password Security
Because most users will choose a password that’s easy to remember, instead of one that’s hard to guess, password security is critical to overall information technology security. After all, once a hacker has a valid user id and password, much of the system is readily available. Passwords should be encrypted within the system, and rules should be put into place to reflect the potential security risk of an individual system. If the risk is low, it might be enough to require the user to create an eight-byte password with at least one character and one number that expires at 30 days. At the other end of the spectrum, the password should expire every week and require the user to use a mix of upper case, lower case, numeric, and special characters while restricting the use of any word found in a standard dictionary and consecutive keyboard characters.

Checking Wireless Security
Wireless access is a growing trend in today’s business world, but it comes with huge risks for security vulnerabilities. As long as a hacker is within the zone of your company’s wireless signals, they can connect to your system and attempt to login. If a wireless network adapter isn’t configured properly, it can leave the door wide open to attacks, and the hacker may be able to get in with a simple admin/password sign on. In addition to securing each known wireless access point, the network should be searched for unauthorized wireless ports that may have been leftover from testing, set up by accident, or created with malicious intentions.

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Fishing’s Ultimate Challenge

By on July 20th, 2010

If you’re on the lookout for a fishing experience that will get your heart racing and your adrenaline pumping, tarpon fishing should be right up your alley. These massive, prehistoric fish have been capturing the imaginations of fishermen for years. Learn more about tarpon, where you can find them – and about some of the largest catches on record – by reading on below.

Tarpon

Basic Facts About Tarpon

Thanks to their unique coloring and glittering scales, tarpon are often referred to as “silver kings.” These gargantuan fish have been around since prehistoric times; funnily enough, their anatomy suggests that they are, essentially, oversize minnows. In addition to being close relatives of herring and sardines, tarpon distinguish themselves by being the only fish that have air bladders.

The tarpon’s air bladder is a critical distinction. “Rolling,” or appearing at the surface of the water and flailing around, is a trademark of the tarpon. They don’t do it for kicks, though – their air bladder requires it of them. While the tarpon’s unique air bladder requires them to access the surface periodically, it also allows them to live in oxygen-deprived water. This ability gives them a greater range and lets them thrive in areas where other fish simply cannot. Tarpon can be found in freshwater as well as saltwater; they do well in water that is brackish or crystal-clear.

If one thing’s for sure, it’s that tarpon are incredibly resilient. The average lifespan for this fish is 55 to 60 years; the oldest tarpon in captivity lived to the ripe old age of 63. Mature tarpon grow to be five to eight feet long and can wei

gh between 80 and 150 pounds. They achieve their massive size through a strictly carnivorous diet that usually consists of crabs, insects, grass shrimp and smaller fish. Prey is caught nocturnally and is typically swallowed whole.

The Allure of the Tarpon

“Most people assume that people fish tarpon exclusively for their massive size,” notes Anthony Ricigliano, a longtime angler. “Size definitely plays a role in its popularity, but it’s not the only important factor.” What’s the other thing that makes tarpon fishing so addictive? The fish’s notoriously feisty nature. “Reeling in the average tarpon is no easy feat,” notes Anthony Ricigliano. “They are known for their fighting spirit and for their ferocity.” Although fishermen are often clued in to their whereabouts through their trademark rolling exercises, it’s nearly impossible to catch a tarpon that’s in the middle of doing so. As you can see from the included shots of Ricigliano and a 120-pound tarpon in flight – after being hooked – they are anything but tame.

Where to Find Tarpon

There are many prime places to go fishing for tarpon. Florida’s Gulf coast is a popular hunting ground for this tenacious fish. Tampa’s Homosassa Springs is considered one of the best places to find exceptionally large tarpon. The Florida Keys is another topnotch tarpon habitat. Some fishermen swear by the western Gulf Coast – South Padre Island is a prime place to enjoy first-rate tarpon fishing. Outside of the U.S., Puerto Rico, Belize’s Punta Gorda and Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula are all hot tarpon fishing locales.

Tarpon Catching Records of Note

Tarpon catching tournaments are extremely popular, especially in Florida. In fact, a 217-pound tarpon was reeled in during a June 2009 tournament in Boca Grande. For many years, the tarpon fishing record was held by a man who caught a 283-pound specimen at Lake Maracaibo on March 19, 1956. A 202-pound silver king was nabbed at Chassahowitzka, Florida not very long ago. The largest tarpon on record – a massive, 286-pound specimen – wasn’t caught in North America; that fish was caught in Africa’s Guinea-Bissau republic.

Huge, feisty and thrilling – the mighty tarpon encompasses all of those characteristics. If you’re after an exhilarating fishing experience, you should put this prehistoric fish at the top of your to-do list.

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Anthony Ricigliano, VOIP No comments yet

Features to Consider When Upgrading Your Business’ Phone System

By on May 10th, 2010

Advances in communication technology have made a variety of cost-effective features available to companies of all sizes. These newly available features provide benefits including greater productivity and flexibility for employees and enhanced reporting for the business. The following is a list of these new features:
* Session Initiation Protocols – Session Initiation Protocols (SIP’s) enable the control of multimedia events such as video and voice conferences on Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) networks. SIP’s also allow users to manage their phones activities including collection and deletion of voicemails, accessing call logs, and directories.
* Messaging – Messaging enhancements now allow for a variety of activities which can increase productivity.  Enhancements allow users to dial phone numbers from their browser page without the need for a modem or external dialer. Unified messaging can be used to send voicemails to emails in “Outlook” for listening as long as a sound card is installed. “Send calls exception lists” allow for the bypass of voicemail for designated users so that the recipient can receive calls directly from people on that list. This screening process allows for urgent or expected calls to be directly routed to the recipient.
* Mobility – Mobility features include Smart Phones which serve as an extension of the phone network without accessing wireless provider systems. Wi-Fi enhancements can be used for cordless phones to extend their range, freeing users from being anchored to a specific area. A twinning feature allows for calls to ring on land lines and mobile handsets simultaneously which prevents missed calls and improves both employee flexibility and productivity.
*  Corporate Features – Features include the ability to store recorded calls in voicemail boxes for use at a later time. These calls can be used for verification, training, and other purposes. Call observation allows for multiple listeners from different locations to observe calls.
* Networking Multiple Phone Systems – New networking capabilities allow for the interaction of multiple phone systems with each other. This feature can improve productivity and communication as the systems are structured to exchange user names and extensions from multiple office locations. Additionally, these networks can then serve as redundant backups for each other once integration is complete.
These new features can work to save companies money by alleviating the necessity to add entirely new systems. The second bonus is that these features can result in better bottom lines for businesses due to productivity gains.

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The Dangers of Spam

By on August 11th, 2010

Spam, named after the canned meat that has been the butt of many jokes, is the mass sending of unsolicited emails. It clutters email inboxes, makes it hard to find legitimate communications, eats bandwidth, consumes mass amounts of storage, and irritates the computer user. If the computer user makes a mistake and opens the wrong email or clicks on the wrong link, their computer can quickly become infected with a virus or spyware. Spam is considered so detrimental to normal communications that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has passed the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (CAN-SPAM) Act aimed at preventing spam.

Spam Statistics
The numbers related to spam are staggering. To illustrate how large this problem is, take a look at the following numbers:
• Globally, unsolicited spam emails account for 14.5 billion messages each day. This represents 45% of the total email volume.
• The largest volume of spam originates in the United States, with Korea following close behind.
• The top three spam categories are advertising at 36%, adult-related material accounts at 31.7%, and financial material at 26.5% of all spam emails.
• Although spam is annoying, only 2.5% of all spam is fraudulent. Identity theft, or phishing, makes up the majority of fraudulent emails.
• Annually, it is estimated that spam costs the business world over $71 billion each year in processing time and lost productivity. That number is expected to grow to $257 billion per year if spam is allowed to continue at its current growth rate.

New Generation of Email Risks
Spam isn’t just annoying, it brings many larger problems. Spam is one way that hackers can access your system. If they can convince an unsuspecting user to click on a link, they may be able to install malware on your system. Certain types of malware will provide the hacker with a backdoor into your network that they can use to access valuable information. Other types of malware will capture specific types of information and send it back to the hacker. Using these methods, your private company information or the private financial information of your customers can be easily compromised.

Another way that tricky spammers can impact your business operation is by impersonation. They will create emails that appear to be from your organization and send them to millions of email addresses hoping that someone will believe their masquerade. To take this fraudulent hoax a step further, they may even create a website that resembles the official landing page. In this way, they could trick your customers into revealing important financial information and compromise your reputation.

Your company’s reputation could also be damaged if spam gets past your defenses and infects your system with a virus. The virus could use your email system to send out malicious spam to people in your address book which could also infect their systems. They will blame the original creator of the virus, but they will also blame you and your lax security procedures.

In addition to compromised reputations, other impacts represent real dollar amounts. Anti-spam technology costs businesses of all sizes a substantial amount of money in software and hardware solutions. The lost productivity experienced as employees deal with spam email translates into a major payroll expense. Wasted storage and bandwidth combined with increased internet connection costs run the spam bill up even more.

Impact on Small and Mid-Sized Business
Small and mid-sized businesses are often impacted more severely than larger businesses. They often lack the resources to implement counter-measures to detect and quarantine spam which leaves them open to risks. In addition to the loss of productivity caused by spam, the threats listed above are a larger threat to smaller businesses. Just like larger companies have the resources to fight spam, they also have a larger budget to recover from any damage done to their reputation by compromised personal information. In contrast, small to mid-sized businesses face the potential to lose a large portion of their customer base due to problems caused by spam.

Detection Methods
As new security protocols are put into place to combat spam, creative spammers are working equally hard to find a new way around them. This trend of increasingly sophisticated security threats is causing electronic security professionals to rethink and bolster protective measures. While it is fairly easy for a human to determine if an email is spam, it’s not as easy for a program to do the same. If a legitimate email is identified as spam based on a security program’s inspection criteria, it is referred to as a false positive. While there is a certain amount of risk involved with missing important messages, most spam blockers rely on identifying spam by inspecting the contents of the email.

Additional methods are being developed. Some companies rely on DNS-based blacklists where a third-party service identifies spammers and maintains a list of sites that are known to send large amounts of spam. Another method quantifies the “alienness” of strings. It analyzes the incoming email and identifies it as spam if it has a substring that has a high degree of alienness when compared to the rest of the message. Security software developers continue to try to stay ahead of the spammers and hackers, and new detection methods can be expected in the future.

Anthony Ricigliano, Investing 5 comments

Investing In Pre-1933 U.S. Gold Coins

By on July 29th, 2010

By Anthony Ricigliano: Collecting and investing in gold coins, also known as numismatics, got its start in the late 16th and early 17th century when British royalty and nobles began assembling catalogues of precious coins, predominantly from the Roman Empire. The collectors of the time were driven by the quality and rarity of the coins, as well as their history.

Like the Roman pieces which went into collections over 400 years ago, gold coins minted in the U.S. prior to 1933 offer the same characteristics of quality, rarity, and history. The craftsmanship of these coins, which were first minted in the United States in the late 1700’s, lends to level of quality that ranks them as some of the most beautiful coins in world.

There is also quite a bit of the nation’s history depicted in these coins. Both designs of the 1907-1933 Eagle and the 1908-1929 Half-Eagle coins present profiles of tribal chieftains in full headdress and regalia while the series of Carson City gold coins owes its existence to the Gold Rush in California which started in 1849.

The rarity of the coins is the result of two factors; the first being that gold coin production levels dropped to extremely low levels at times, particularly in the late 1800’s. For instance, many $20.00 gold coins issued in the 1880’s had mintages which ranged in quantities from the high hundreds to a few thousand pieces. The second factor relates to President Franklin Roosevelt’s demand during the Great Depression that all U.S. citizens surrender their gold to the Treasury. The surrendered gold coins were then melted down and turned into gold bars.

One of the most popular gold coins for collectors and investors is the $20 St. Gaudens Double Eagle. The Double Eagle coin, minted from 1907-1933 is considered to be one of the most beautiful coins ever minted. The beauty of the coin is further emphasized by its large shape and heft. Investment value aside, many collectors and investors enjoy collecting this coin just for its beauty and uniqueness. The design includes images of Lady Liberty, the Capitol building, and 46 stars which represented the number of states in the Union in 1907. Of historical significance and irony is that the coin was commissioned by President Theodore Roosevelt and then called in for melting by his cousin, FDR, twenty six years later.

The history, beauty, and rarity these pre-1933 gold coins combine to make them an excellent investment for portfolio diversity and as a hedge against inflation. The coins carry additional value due to the fact that they trade at a small percentage above their bullion value. This small premium contrasts favorably against silver numismatics, which often trade at double their bullion value.

About Anthony Ricigliano