IT Legends – Tech in Connecticut

OK, so I usually redirect users My Documents folders to a network share of their username. When I browse to a share that has this done, all I get are folders that read “My Documents” instead of the user’s name. Look what comes up in Windows Explorer:

And then look what shows up in the command line interface: Arrgh!

Is it so hard for your website that when someone gets to your product page via a Google search you actually have a support link for the product right there on the sales page?  Why do I have to click on the support navigation button and enter in all the details of my unit.  I’m already on the page!

So I have this great 32″ LCD HD TV from Vizio in my office at work.  So my partner and I decide to buy a mini computer and turn it into a streaming video machine.  I thought I’d try hulu.com on it. Burn Notice doesn’t look so good – very choppy even at full buffering.  Just to check to make sure the PC can handle the 1920 x 1080 resolution on the TV, I decided to try and watch some Daily Show clips off Comedy Central.  They are not choppy at all – the resolution leaves something to be desired, but the playback experience as a whole on the Daily Show was a lot better than on hulu.com.  I’ll update to see if different shows on hulu.com from different producers looks any better, but I am beginning to think that hulu.com just won’t be what I want it to be because the content makers are hampering it (it’s not a hulu.com technical difficulty – its just that the content providers still don’t get it).

OK, so I use a nice VPN solution that works through every public WiFi I’ve ever encountered.  Great – no problem (which one you ask?  My Astaro Security Gateway…  but its implementing OpenVPN which is open source so anyone could set their own up withour the UTM).  So I’m not too concerned about running my Virtual Desktop (Windows XP Pro, virtualized onto VMware Server 2.0) because the connection from my laptop to the Virtual Desktop is encrypted.  So when using non-encrypted public WiFi, the traffic that others can see freely is encrypted.

Enter the All Ways On Wireless at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, DC.  Its a pay-for public WiFi, I’m not against paying for it.  Its actually running quite nicely and the regular, non-VPN enabled all-day pass works just fine with my VPN (another reason I like OpenVPN).  However, when I went to purchase my day of access, it led me to a non-encrypted web page to type in my credit card details.  Seeing as the radio frequency traffic between my laptop and the wireless access point is not encrypted and completely open to anyone that knows how to look, I essentially broadcast my credit card details out for that potential someone to steal.

Be wary of public wifi access spots that make you enter credit card details without leading you to a secure web page (that’s when you see https:// in the address bar, or that little padlock in the status bar of your browser).  I don’t think my details are now in the hands of some nefarious identity theif, but its a lot more possible now that I’ve given them out over unencrypted radio transfer.  Someone taking this information wouldn’t even be recorded as a data breach in the All Ways On Wireless financial system – since essentially they didn’t hack into their database they just listened to the freely broadcast, unencrypted traffic.

When will companies start taking security of information more seriously?  I tried to go to their website (www.allwayson.net) but strangely enough, you can’t even get to their website from their own public wifi gateway.  I wonder if its even up anymore, or if it changed and noone set up any forwarding address.

A client of mine received a letter (conveniently organized just like a bill) to renew their domain with a company called the Domain Registry of America.  I only found this out when I mentioned to them that their domain registration was up for renewal in February 2009 and I wanted to make sure we transferred the registration to them instead of having it registered to my company.  Well, that is when they let me know that they already sent a check to this DRoA company.  I’m thinking – what!?  No way!  Your registrar is Dynamic Network Services.  How did you stumble upon this?

Well, they are just one of many people that have been targeted by this company.  What they do is scan the registrar records of known domains and send letters to all the contacts that are listed with the domain.  These letters look a lot like bills, even though there is a small place where they state “This notice is not a bill”.  Take a look at what this guy, who registers a lot of domains in his online marketing company, went through with this company.  He also recorded his conversations!  Conveniently available for you to listen in MP3 format.  Also, check out the Google search for “Domain Registry of America scam”.

In my opinion, DRoA = dirty rats!  Also, please read everything on a “bill” before sending them money.  Especially if you have to create a new vendor for them in your payment system.