If you shopped at Target between 11/27/2013 and 12/15/2013, congratulations. Your credit or debit card info is one of around 40 million up for sale in a thriving underground marketplace complete with wholesalers, distributors, retailers, and easy to use websites. Replace your card right now before bad things happen. Brian Krebs broke the story in … Read more
This story is one example of many for what the best IT professionals do to keep our skills current. The story started in April, 2013 when an opportunity to deliver a project based on a software product called RHN Satellite from a company named Red Hat came along. Large companies use RHN Satellite for activities such as automated builds, … Read more
My family is OK with health insurance coverage for now and I live in Minnesota, which has its own website for navigating the local healthcare marketplace, so I don’t need to deal with the US healthcare.gov website to find health insurance. But I was curious after looking at the news the past several days. I … Read more
I woke up today around 4 AM when one of our cats jumped on my stomach. By now, it’s a pounce and jump operation because he knows if I catch him, I’ll throw him across the room and bounce him off a wall. So he pops up from the floor to the window pane, pounces on my … Read more
I just finished wading through 471 new comments from the past 3 days on my blog post from late March titled, “How to spot a phishy email”. The good news, I guess, is my blog post found its way onto the search engines and is getting some visibility. The bad news – every single one of those 471 … Read more
I did a presales call with a small dentist office a few months ago. I have some dentist customers, so I’ve come to understand a little bit about how dentist offices operate. But this office was, well, different. The “server” was really an old, failing Windows XP PC tucked away in a dusty corner of … Read more
In part one of our computer detective saga, the story opened with a few users unable to access their emails. Similar to a Hollywood detective story, we followed the clues through several unexpected twists and turns, with each clue answering questions and generating new questions. Continuing in the style of great whodunit detective mysteries, … Read more
I spent an awful day yesterday with Microsoft Office 2013 Home and Business Edition. Full disclosure – my company is a Microsoft Registered Partner and this blog entry won’t make me any friends in Redmond. But right now, I am frustrated beyond belief and I will have trouble sleeping until I put electronic pen to virtual … Read more
Big versus small may be one of the oldest debates in business. Big companies are perceived as safe, stable, predictable, comfortable. Small companies are the opposite; just prefix “un” to all those adjectives. This debate is especially contentious in the IT industry, where everyone wants safe, stable, predictable, and comfortable. Full disclosure – Infrasupport is currently … Read more
This story is personal. It is one of the best examples I’ve seen where poor IT security practices and the physical world collide and leave a trail of destruction. Way back in 2006, I registered my name with the Norm Coleman for Senate campaign. Although the US Senate election was two years away, I felt … Read more