Coincidently, a couple of days after I had posted the blog entry about spammers now targeting cell phones, I received a couple of unsolicited text messages. I don’t really use texting, since I have a Blackberry and prefer email and IM instead. Consequently I don’t subscribe to any texting plan. I had previously made a mental note to check what anti-spam tools my cell carrier - Verizon - had available to control the inbound text message stream. Now was a good time to follow-up on that.

Read the rest of this entry »

If you are new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. An RSS Subscription will deliver new Blog posts automatically to your computer.
Thanks for visiting!

We all receive emails from automated services such as payment reminders, news alerts or other opt-in communications. The emails are computer-generated and the sender typically includes a notice asking the recipient not to reply to the message, since the sending account is not being monitored. Apparently, some companies go one step further and put an invalid return address in the message envelope.

Read the rest of this entry »

It was just a matter of time before spammers would try to exploit the fast growth of text- and email-enabled cell phones. The Washington Post picked up on the issue of text-message spam in this article earlier this week. While many of us are enjoying the benefits and convenience of BlackBerrys, iPhones and other SMS capable devices, scammers are already working hard on ways to get their unsolicited offers for questionable wares to our phones.

Read the rest of this entry »

Yet another reminder for me of how dependent I (we) have become on IM for daily business tasks. Microsoft’s Windows Live Messenger, Hotmail and possibly other services were largely unavailable yesterday due to a widespread problem with their Live ID logon service.

“According to the Redmond company, the problem involves Windows Live IDs, which are used to log users into its services.“

I use a number of public IM services, including the one provided by Microsoft, to communicate with business associates and friends. Yesterday’s outage, while not more than a nuisance to me, proved once again that it is wise not to rely on a single service or provider for business communications.

Technorati Tags: hotmail outage

As the readers of this blog already know, email has become business critical for most companies. That means even the slightest disruption or delay in email delivery or problems with employees’ access to their mailboxes have significant impact on worker productivity and a company’s bottom line.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ken Gartner filling in.

Rumors, urban myths, scams and other undesirable communiques have a remarkably long shelf life on the Internet. Periodically they get ‘rediscovered’ and disseminated as if they were hot news, worthy of everyone’s immediate interest. When this happens with an inflammatory email broadcast widely in a business environment, the results are, sadly, quite predictable. The message and its ensuing forwards and replies take on a viral spike initially, and periodically latecomers to the party add their 2 cents to reignite outrage, flame wars and general ill-will among the populace. Email takes rumor mongering and kvetching at the corporate water cooler to a new extreme.

Read the rest of this entry »