Steve Riley on Security

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Today’s spam: Here’s what’s in my junk mail folder today: What is up with all that? Apparently I sent a payment to myself, I initiated another payment to myself, I am a user of myself who’s received exclusive offers for January, and I received a payment from myself. Read More...
Posted 21 January 09 10:13 by Steve Riley | 12 Comments
Filed under spam, email, things that make me angry
The opt-out from hell: One problem with making your email address available (which I will continue to do, don't worry) is that folks with something to sell assume you're interested in their stuff. To wit, let's consider an email I received today (copied, headers and all, after Read More...
Posted 16 September 08 12:22 by Steve Riley | 8 Comments
Filed under advertising, spam, email, things that make me angry, public policy
FanBox: the latest in password scams: Looks like spammers have found yet another way to worm (ha ha) themselves into the computers of the unsuspecting. In my junk email folder this morning, I saw this message: From: Question It [mailto:question_it@fanboxapps.com] Sent: Monday, January 07, Read More...
Posted 07 January 08 10:09 by Steve Riley | 4 Comments
Filed under spam, email, things that make me angry, things that make me worried
Bogus Microsoft sweepstakes emails: Over the past month I've received at least three enquiries from people asking about the legitimacy of emails claiming the recipients have won large amounts of money in a Microsoft sweepstakes or lottery -- often 500,000 British pounds. This is an easy Read More...
Posted 19 August 07 03:35 by Steve Riley | 13 Comments
Filed under false claims, spam, email
Tell us about the junk email you receive: Another gem in the download center: an Outlook (2003/2007) add-in with which you can report junk email to FrontBridge. Junk E-mail Reporting Tool 1.0 for Outlook The Junk E-mail Reporting Tool submits e-mail to Microsoft when you explicitly choose to Read More...
Posted 20 December 06 03:53 by Steve Riley | 5 Comments
Filed under spam, email, malware
Did you know that you ALREADY have an e-mail policy?: An email access policy can be expressed in one of two ways: E-mail is mission critical to our business. Therefore, we permit employees to read and compose e-mail from any location in the world where employees can access the Internet, using either company-issued Read More...
Posted 10 September 06 05:34 by Steve Riley | 7 Comments
Filed under email, access technologies, security policies, risk mitigation, protection
What do YOU need out of two-factor authentication?: Two-factor authentication continues to grow in popularity and emerge as a security requirement for many people I meet with. At Microsoft, we use smartcards internally for VPN access right now; soon we'll be requiring smartcards for domain logon, too. Read More...
Posted 20 April 06 03:37 by Steve Riley | 43 Comments
Filed under identity, authentication, biometrics, email, access technologies, security policies, risk mitigation, passwords
Cluelessness abounds: So yesterday I received a rather interesting email. Subject: "INFOSEC Scholarships & Fellowships for PhD or MS + Free CISSP Exam Prep Events." Hm, I didn't know that "information security" suddenly became an all-caps acronym. How come no one asks Read More...
Posted 14 September 05 09:08 by Steve Riley | 2 Comments
Filed under advertising, spam, security theater, email, things that make me laugh