Got Spam? Don't Unsubscribe

We all get them. No matter how good our spam filters are they get through... SPAM.

At the bottom of all these messages is a nice enviting link telling you that if you do not wish to receive any more messages from whoever sent it just click.

Wait... DON'T DO IT.

When you do click to unsubscribe (as if you were subscribed) what you just did was tell the sender that in fact he / she does have a good address.

Now that verified good address will be added to other spam sender lists, even sold to yet even more companies who send unsolited email.

So just delete the message.

If too many of them are getting through take a moment and forward it to your email provider so they can take steps to add the sender to the spam filters.

Do not allow your browser to store passwords for you

The fact that browsers and mobile devices store user names and passwords may be convenient for you, but they drive corporate and internet security people nuts.

Stored passwords allow anyone who can access your machine to log in to your web accounts as you. In addition, there are numerous utilities that can expose that hidden information and actually reveal the password. If you've reused that password for other logins, many systems or web sites could be compromised.

When prompted by any service, device or browser if you would like it to save your password select 'no' and the option to never ask you again.

Security Shortcut: Lock your workstation with one click

 Here is a great way to quickly lock your Windows computer if you are going to away for a few minutes.

 

Everyone knows of the CTRL-ALT-DEL option, but this puts a shortcut on your desktop and even your shortcut bar.

 

Here are the steps you need to take:

1. Right click on an empty area of your desktop.
2. Click 'New'
3. Click 'Shortcut'
4. Type the following:
• rundll32.exe user32.dll, LockWorkStation
5. Click Next
6. Name the shortcut; something like "Away From Desk"
7. Click Finish

Now when you step away from your computer for a few minutes it is a quick double click and your computer is locked.

 

There are other methods too, stay tuned for those as well.

Cybersecurity Becoming No. 1 Concern for GCs and Directors

Here is an interesting piece of information.

63% of the individuals surveyed by Law.com ‘s Corporate Counsel believe that the General Counsel needs to take charge of cybersecurity and not their IT departments.

Link: http://urtak.is/NJFOu1 

Now this is going to come about through the Corporate Governance or Corporate Compliance areas of the corporate legal department. The skill sets that currently are located in the Information Technology departments will be absorbed by the GC. One group will be putting together the standards (governance) while the other (compliance) will be testing and checking.

Born from this will be additional national standards much like the ISO 9000 movement in the early ‘90s..

Cybersecurity Becoming No. 1 Concern for GCs and Directors

ColdFusion - List Functions

I thought I would pass on a little trick to those programmers who also have to design the data structures behind their applications.

If you plan on using table primary keys (usually a sequential number) as something to use in sub-queries or list structures consider starting you numbers at 1000 instead of 1.

Typically when creating a table I start the primary key with 1:

CREATE TABLE SomeTable (
     TableID int NOT NULL PrimaryKey IDENTITY(1,1)
     )

This works great except when you want to put the result set of returned values from a SQL statement in a string:

<CFSET SomeString = #ValueList(QueryName.TableID)#>

And then search that string for matching records:

#ListFind(SomeString, ‘3’, ‘,’)#

Sometimes you run into a situation where the first three (3) that is found is actually in a value like 103 or 33. The Find functions consider everything an alphanumeric and cannot restrict itself to numeric value only.

OK… here is the trick.

Start your numeric value in the primary key field with “1000” instead of “1”.

IDENTITY(1000,1)

If your data table is going to have thousands or hundreds of thousands then consider using an initial number even higher than 1000.

This will truly make your FIND operations run more smoothly and take the opportunity to mix up numbers every once a while.

Adobe ColdFusion 9 * Functions by category

URL for Sale

I'll be listing one of my URL's on Flippa.com for bidding next month; the web address CONSULTANTMONTHLY.COM is for sale.

Apple Warms Up to Hackers, Plans Presentation at Black Hat

Tables are turning.

For years users of Apple computer products felt themselves protected against hackers and computer viruses. Seriously looking down their noses at PC users flaunting the bullet proof boxes as exhibit number one.

Yet, programmers then, and now, use the PC platform to be productive with. Windows based machines still dominate internet servers, programming platforms, database farms, individual productivity machines and more.

Why?

Because with Windows based machines we know what we have. We are aware of the obstacles that we have before us that we need to either over come outright or at the very least be aware of as we move along.

Now the age of hand held and tablet sized devices are ruling the end-user world. Heck, I have an iPhone, iPad and all those modern things too.  But when it comes to being productive, writing applications for corporate America I still choose the Windows platform with keyboards I can bang away on and mice to point and double click with.  We still need those things to be productive.

We opt for modern hybrid cars, but tolerate (understandably) eighteen wheelers to get the products we make and buy to market.

Anyway, back to Apple finally feeling the wrath of the rest of the world. Every PC professional on the planet knew this day was going to arrive. Apple, now that they are bigger than Microsoft and have more devices world-wide will become more and more of a target of those who need to prove their ability to bring others to their knees.

Yup, the tables are turning – targets are changing – and Apple users are now looking at us for assistance rather than distain.

Apple Warms Up to Hackers, Plans Presentation at Black Hat - Bloomberg