Google has developed their own web browser and it is ready for download. It’s an open source browser called ‘Google Chrome’ and utilizes components from Apple’s WebKit and Mozilla’s Firefox. One feature I’m looking forward to is the ’sandbox’ approach where each tab acts independently and will not crash other tabs or the browser as a whole. You can download the new browser here.

If you’d like to learn more, click here.

Alliance Technology Group, along with Digital Vision Design proudly prepares to launch the re-designed website for Hinsey-Brown Funeral Service. We are making final preparations to launch, so check back for a link to the new site. Hinsey-Brown also signed up for SimpleCMS - our customized content management system. Check out the screenshot below;

We developed the site using ColdFusion MX, CFC’s, and jQuery. We are utilizing a SQL Server 2005 database.

This Firefox add-on is great for any junkie who loves etymology, looking up words, or just doesn’t have a great vocabulary. Hyperwords allows a user to select a word or phrase, displays a menu, and allows the user to select from a number of searches as you can see the image below;

Well, this is finally it for the once popular Netscape browser who had dominated the browser market with over a 90% share. I recall preferring Netscape Navigator over Internet Explorer, however I haven’t used it in quite a few years. All good things must come to an end though.

Goodbye, Netscape.

It looks like support ended on March 1 of this year. The good thing is, Netscape will more or less “live on” through Mozilla Firefox, which I highly recommend. Firefox uses the same code base as Navigator. If nostalgia keeps you from switching, there is good news. I hear there are Navigator themed skins for Firefox!

We all get it. If you have owned an email address for even a short amount of time and actively use it, it’s only a matter of time before you become a victim of spam. It’s a frustrating sight…seeing several new messages and none of them are from someone you know. From replica watches to enhancing body parts, no one is exempt.

How does my email address get on these lists? Spammers use several tactics to get your email address.

The first is what is called email harvesting. Spammers have small applications called ‘bots’ that crawl your web pages for a specific anchor used for email: the ‘mailto:’ anchor. They then grab the email address that follows this tag and add it to their spam database. Here are several ways to prevent email harvesting;

• Don’t include your email address on your websites. Use contact forms.
• If you don’t know how to create a contact form, ‘obfuscate’ your email address; yourname [at] domain [dot] com instead of yourname@domain.com. There are other ways to obfuscate your email address, but for the sake of simplicity this is the easiest.
• Don’t include your email address in signatures on blogs, forums, or anywhere it can be viewed or searched upon.

The second tactic a spammer uses to get your email address is called a dictionary attack. A dictionary attack is most widely known as an attack to guess a password. This tactic is similar for spammers. It’s used when a spammer guesses your email address. It’s simple, let’s take the fake domain ‘www.fakedomain.com’. The spammer will guess widely used usernames like ‘webmaster@fakedomain’, ‘info@fakedomain’, ‘help@fakedomain.com’ and ‘support@fakedomain.com.’ They can also use common first names, or the combination of first name initial and full last name. How many jsmiths (John Smiths) do you know? The easiest way to avoid this is to try and think of an uncommon email address. Unfortunately those at corporations may not have the choice.

The third tactic a spammer uses to get your email address is simply by buying lists of email addresses. Once your email address is on one or more of these lists, it’s a sure thing that your spam will increase. Your best bet, if possible, is to ditch your email address and start all over. Some ways to avoid getting on these buying lists are:

• When signing up or registering on a website, use a secondary email address specifically for that purpose. Also, don’t check the box that will allow them to put you on a mailing list (unless you trust this website) or for them to share your information with other companies.
• If you receive spam, don’t ‘unsubscribe’ unless it’s from a trusted company. There are tools that will notify the spammer when you click on anything in the email and at what time. Simply delete the email, don’t let the spammer know the email address is actively being used.
• Ask to be removed from any forwarding lists. Typically friends and/or family will want to forward certain messages to you and many others. While this is a great gesture, your email can be forwarded and replied to, and seen by hundreds of people by the time the message no longer gets forwarded. This is also an easy way for a spammer to get your email address in the spam database.

Where do we go from here? By implementing some of these steps your chances of spam will decrease but unfortunately won’t stop it completely. If you’ve been successful in keeping one step ahead of spam, please feel free to comment.

Hey - as you can see we’ve updated our website to be more usable. Instead of a static website, we decided to put it to use as a tech blog with tips & tricks of IT professionals, an online help desk, and the thoughts of IT professionals in the different areas within IT. We hope you enjoy the new ATG tech blog. Please bear with us as we continue to make changes with the website.