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Vantage Newsletter: August 2006 Welcome to Vantage Point for September, your newsletter from Vantage IT Solutions, the provider of high quality IT support and products. Isn’t it great that Summer Version 2 is here, since August showed Version 1 had a bug in the form of rain? So, don’t put away the barbecues just yet! Now the kids are back at school, the weather’s bound to improve. We’ve been asked to give a reminder of our incentive scheme for recommending new customers. We are always looking for other companies to help, so do please recommend us to any business that you feel could benefit from high quality IT support. There could be £100 in it for you! 
More Padding RequiredWith the new changes to air travel arrangements, taking laptops on planes as hand luggage may become impossible, even though restrictions have been relaxed. As we all know how delicately our luggage is handled, having your laptop placed in the hold of an aeroplane is something that will probably fill any traveller with dread, so there are some precautions that can be taken. Firstly, a standard laptop carry case will not give enough protection, so a heavy duty bag is essential. Secondly, due to the potential risk of physical damage and theft, it is vital to make regular back-ups of your data. Also, due to the risk of theft, it is worth considering software that encrypts your hard drive to prevent unauthorised access of your data. For regular air travellers, a ‘rugged’ laptop could be purchased for added peace of mind. For details of data encryption, rugged laptops or carry cases, please click here. It’s a Trojan, but no Wooden Horses are Involved The BBC has investigated the increasing risk of ‘Trojans’. These are not deliveries of interesting-looking boxes containing lots of people wielding swords, but small pieces of software that can be installed on a computer without the user’s knowledge. They get the name Trojan as they do contain a nasty surprise, which is they provide a backdoor to your computer through which people can steal its contents. 
An Israeli couple based in London were jailed earlier this year for developing a sophisticated scam that fooled many people into loading the malicious software on to their own computers. They would contact companies saying they were interested in a business deal and send a CD with details. Once the CD was run on the user’s computer, the Trojan would be installed without the user realising.
Many people believe their computer holds no data worth stealing, but to a competitor, the data could be invaluable. Additionally, most of us are fairly trusting, so there is the potential of this happening to any of us. The above example is unusual, as a more common route for Trojans is to be hidden in familiar files, such as Word documents and to arrive as email attachments, or as links to web sites within emails themselves. It shows that you can never be too careful. Remember: do be cautious about what you load on your computer and what emails you open - if in doubt, don’t touch it! Beware the Webcams A webcam in Liverpool was being viewed by a man in Texas when he noticed some men acting suspiciously. He called Merseyside Police who sent some officers to the scene and arrested three men for attempted burglary. Webcams can be setup by anyone, anywhere, so remember there could be someone the other side of the world watching you right now! 
What’s the Point? A wine tasting robot has been developed in Japan to taste and identify wine. Why on earth would you want to delegate that type of work to a computer? That’s one job we’re more than happy to do! The Entertaining Bit You will need PowerPoint or the free PowerPoint Viewer to see these signs. Please click here to download the free Microsoft PowerPoint Viewer. |
Vantage IT Solutions Limited Unit 2 Airfield Park, Cheddington Lane Long Marston, Tring, Hertfordshire, HP23 4QR |
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