Tuesday, November 23, 2010

The investigator waited until midnight, when the plant was empty, and thousands of computers had “slipped into screen-saver slumber.” Furtively, he sat in front of a colleague’s personal computer. In half an hour, the detective made an exact copy of the colleague’s hard drive. Then, using a program called Encase, he uncovered hundreds of pornographic images, which eventually cost the coworker his job.



Workplace computers are company property, so employers may inspect their contents. Only in Connecticut must employers inform workers of computer monitoring. According to the American Management Association, 45 percent of our nation’s large companies use “computer forensics” to electronically monitor workers’ computers. More about forensics at Johns Tech Blog .



The number of employees involved in Internet-related crimes or violations of company computer use policy is rising. Dow Chemical fired or disciplined 200 employees for trading dirty jokes and photos by e-mail. Then Xerox fired 40 workers, and the New York Times terminated 23 employees for similar violations.



Recently a small firm in Utah noticed that its servers were full. An employee remarked that several workers were regularly downloading music albums from Napster. The albums ended up on the servers, taking up megabytes of valuable space. An innocent (or intentional?) act had disrupted this company’s day-to-day operations.



Smaller businesses usually can’t afford the $200-450-per-hour fees charged by computer forensics consultants. But, by publishing company computer/internet policies and corresponding consequences for violations, requiring employees to sign compliance documents, regularly checking e-mail and hard drive contents, and asking employees to report infractions, small businesses can begin to police their own computer systems. Making employees aware that forensic software and personnel are available could deter some workers from wrongdoing. Call AmCheck for assistance in developing a computer use policy at 888-AMCHECK.



(Source: Miller, Greg “High-Tech Snooping All in Day’s Work; Security: Some Firms Are Now Using Computer Investigators to Uncover Employee Wrongdoing” Los Angeles Times HR News Wire.)Johns Tech Blog

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Since I started promoting my website, I came across a wide array of web directories, and I have to admit this question has been bugging me since then. Are Web Directories any good for the Internet?



Let's start by getting the obvious out of the way first. The main purpose of web directories is to promote web sites. This isn't usually done directly, by directing users through their links, since web directories don't get that much traffic, but indirectly.



The way this indirect promotion works is that, after a website is registered in several web directories, search engines' crawlers see the links and count them, increasing the page rank and search results for the specific web page.



Ok, this is fine, but what about the surfers? Let's be honest, 99 percent of the people that visit web directories are web masters that want to promote their web sites by getting a few extra links. Web directories have never been too attractive to surfers. But can they become attractive? Well, my guess is they can. And the only way to do so is to become more user friendly and to provide surfers with useful content.
What I mean by this is that web directories can become popular websites if, instead of providing a list of mediocre websites, ordered by the ammount of money each one of them payed for their listing in the web directory, they would provide a list of the top websites the internet has to offer for each category. Such a list should be maintained by the web masters, by searching the web and choosing the top websites.
Of course, this means that you can't just wait for people to submit any websites to your directory. You will have to get working on finding the websites surfers might be interested in. Another cool thing one could add is to allows userse to rate the websites that are listed. This is a very nice addition, since it adds an interactive element to the website and orders the websites by the ratings given by surfers. More Directory info at Johns Tech Blog
My previous experiences with web directories or 'Top 100' websites have been appaling. All of those websites were filled with second grade links, the kind of websites you are expecting to receive malware from to be honest. Well, this type of 'Tom's top 100 websites' linking to 'Jerry's top car magazine', containing 2 months old news simply doesn't work. This is not what surfers want to see. Neither the MS-Dos type graphics in 32 colours, nor the sponsored links or suggested websites.
I really hope that the future will bring better web directories to the scene. Let's be honest! There are so many great websites out there that surfers don't know about, and so little places where you can find out about them.




Well, this is my opinion on web directories. I hope you enjoyed reading it!Johns Tech Blog
The investigator waited until midnight, when the plant was empty, and thousands of computers had “slipped into screen-saver slumber.” Furtively, he sat in front of a colleague’s personal computer. In half an hour, the detective made an exact copy of the colleague’s hard drive. Then, using a program called Encase, he uncovered hundreds of pornographic images, which eventually cost the coworker his job.



Workplace computers are company property, so employers may inspect their contents. Only in Connecticut must employers inform workers of computer monitoring. According to the American Management Association, 45 percent of our nation’s large companies use “computer forensics” to electronically monitor workers’ computers. More about forensics at Johns Tech Blog .



The number of employees involved in Internet-related crimes or violations of company computer use policy is rising. Dow Chemical fired or disciplined 200 employees for trading dirty jokes and photos by e-mail. Then Xerox fired 40 workers, and the New York Times terminated 23 employees for similar violations.



Recently a small firm in Utah noticed that its servers were full. An employee remarked that several workers were regularly downloading music albums from Napster. The albums ended up on the servers, taking up megabytes of valuable space. An innocent (or intentional?) act had disrupted this company’s day-to-day operations.



Smaller businesses usually can’t afford the $200-450-per-hour fees charged by computer forensics consultants. But, by publishing company computer/internet policies and corresponding consequences for violations, requiring employees to sign compliance documents, regularly checking e-mail and hard drive contents, and asking employees to report infractions, small businesses can begin to police their own computer systems. Making employees aware that forensic software and personnel are available could deter some workers from wrongdoing. Call AmCheck for assistance in developing a computer use policy at 888-AMCHECK.



(Source: Miller, Greg “High-Tech Snooping All in Day’s Work; Security: Some Firms Are Now Using Computer Investigators to Uncover Employee Wrongdoing” Los Angeles Times HR News Wire.)Johns Tech Blog

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Not many users of the Myspace are capable of creating the web page required to invite more number of visitors to the site. The best way is to rebuild the background on your own every alternative week. But if the user is not technology savvy and not really keen on experimentation, then the best way is to access resources on the Internet. There are plenty of sites that offer assistance in making the background a highly successful component of the Myspace web page.



By checking the popular search engines such as Google and Yahoo!, you can trace the resources that can help you work on the backgrounds of the myspace page. There are multiple options to download the various complex backgrounds for the Myspace page. The first and foremost option is the free downloads from popular sites. The second and not most preferred option by the youngsters is the paid backgrounds, which is issued against a license. In the paid option backgrounds, there are a number of rich features and color schemes. Under the paid backgrounds, the users have the option of customizing the requirements as per their desires and plans. Once the payment is made to the service provider, tools and software codes are provided to the Myspace user to download the data for the background from the Internet site. It is common for these providers to make the user-friendly. If the tools given to the users are not of their personal preference, the users can go their own way in terms of opting for the color schemes. The paid backgrounds have multiple options and are issued on the basis of license. There are numerous unlicensed backgrounds available on the Internet, but their reliability is a big question. Find new myspace layouts at Johns Tech Blog



The backgrounds are widely available on the Internet for use and they run into thousands across all links. Go through them using the search engines and download the appropriate background. The Myspace page background is available in several formats. The two important among them are paid backgrounds and free backgrounds. The paid backgrounds are rich in features and sport a number of attractive features. Though the free backgrounds are also attractive and colored in bright schemes, the have limited options and user friendliness.



The free backgrounds can be installed on the web page as whole or set in the form of tiled manner. They can also be installed in multiple formats and schemes. Check various Internet sites offering the Myspace backgrounds and themes for additional information on their use. The color mix of the backgrounds is available in various choices. The users also have the choice of mixing colors on their own.



While mixing colors make sure that the background does not resemble a riot of colors. It could spoil the entire background apart from messing up the account. The primary objective should be to enliven the background of the account and not spoil it. Exercise restrain while choosing the colors. They have to be appropriate and relate to the profile of the account holder. Any slight deviation from the color choice could mean disaster to the account page.Johns Tech Blog

Friday, November 12, 2010

Are you interested in Internet fax services? The advantages of web fax services are many and subscribing to internet fax services is worth the money you spend on it. This article will help you to know all about internet fax services, advantages of online fax services, and what online fax service providers can offer to their customers.



The main advantage of internet fax services is that online fax technology makes sending and receiving fax easy and fast. One can even use the service even if he/she does not have access to POTS (Plain Old Telephone) as the internet fax services act as an intermediary to handle the fax sending and receiving process. This allows the users to send and receive faxes, especially those marked with “URGENT” anytime they want.



With online fax service you need not have to worry about providing an extra space for you fax machine. Internet fax services can save much of your office space and you can use utilize internet fax services to handle all of your specialized communication needs.



Internet fax services can save your hard earned money to purchase expensive ink cartridges or having the funds to pay the office supplier to send the faxes for you. You can send the fax messages at the convenience of your home or office.



The maximum infrastructure one may require is a computer, a reliable internet connection and an email ID.



Sending internet fax message is quite easy – what a user has to do is to simply type the message in the text space of the electronic mail and press the send button. The fax message will be transfer the network based server of the service provider, where it is converted into a suitable file format before eventually forwarding it to the recipient’s mail box or fax machine, whichever is applicable. Get more fax software info at Johns Tech Blog



Online fax facility is offered by several companies – most of the companies ask the users to join in any of their monthly subscription packages. There are also several companies which offer free internet fax services. In free online fax services, the user cannot enjoy all the advantages or features offered in a paid internet fax service. That is there may be limitations such as only a specific number of fax messages per month or the user can only receive messages. Therefore, selecting a paid online fax service will be better for the user to enjoy all the benefits of internet fax service.



Web faxing or email faxing is an efficient technology which bridges the gap between traditional fax machines and web based communication. Internet fax services eliminate the operational cost and complexity of using fax machines and provide the users the flexibility and easiness to send and receive fax messages. After all, internet fax service is another communicating tool which makes life easier!!Johns Tech Blog
Where Gadgets MatterWhere Gadgets Matter

Monday, November 8, 2010