Thursday, January 24

Followup: Times-Union response to my privacy complaint

Mark P. Vinciguerra, Consumer Marketing Manager, contacted me via email to apologize, and to make me aware of the TU's DNC (do not call) list, which I immediately requested to be placed on.

Mark was polite, responsive and considerate. Thank you Mark, I look forward to not receiving further annoyance phone calls.

Mark's full contact info, in case anyone else finds themselves in this situation:
Mark P. Vinciguerra
Consumer Marketing Manager
Albany Times-Union
News Plaza
Box 15000
Albany NY 12212
office phone: 518-454-5703
cellular phone: 518-859-6353
Fax: 518-454-5635

Followup: Cryptographic key management

So after some wrangling with my webhost, playing with key containers, and chatting with an MS sort over on forums.asp.net, I've come to the conclusion that machine-level key stores are the proper way to store crypto keys on the server -- never use plaintext files, as I'd originally been considering.

The ASPNET and/or Network Service context should have access to store and retrieve keys from the machine-level store. You can insert them programmatically, or most host support staffers should be able to import them as well.

Saturday, January 19

Priest to be investigated was MY priest

1980s sex allegation against Troy priest to be investigated

Reverend Gary Mercure, of Sacred Heart, and St. William, in Troy, NY, has been placed on paid leave while an accusation of sex abuse from the 1980s is investigated. This priest was my priest when I was an altar boy (yes, I was an alter boy, believe it or not).

Kind of makes you sick to your stomach - not assuming that he did it, but having to WONDER whether or not he did.

RSA Cryptography Demo

RSA Cryptography Demo

I've written a simple demo application in .NET 2.0/3.0/3.5 (C#) showing how to generate and manage keys and encrypt/decrypt data using the RSA asymmetric algorithm.

Albany Times-Union violates my trust

For a few months now, I've been receiving subscription sales phone calls from the Albany Times Union. I've never been a subscriber, and they're calling me on my home number, a number issued by a private VoIP service, a number not listed anywhere, a number I've only given out to my doctor's office and, once, to the Times Union, when submitting a letter to the editor.

I can only assume the TU scrapes those phone numbers, and feeds them into their sales database. I am highly disappointed -- I feel outright violated. I did NOT opt to receive any further communication for marketing or advertising purposes.

Thursday, January 17

.NET Framework Library Source Code now available - ScottGu's Blog

.NET Framework Library Source Code now available - ScottGu's Blog

Microsoft finally releases the .NET framework source code (read only license) as promised!! Framework source debugging can be enabled in Visual Studio 2008 as per Scott Gu's linked blog entry.

Tuesday, January 15

Crypto research: Managing asymmetric keys on remote webhost

I'm currently trying to discover best practices for crypto key management on a third party web server, if container import isn't available. My current thinking is XML files in a secure directory on the web server, accessible to the website app, but not to the general web, but I'd certainly like to hear if there's a better option.

Monday, January 14

"CIO-Summit" phishing scam

I was the recipient today of what turns out to be at least an 18-month old phishing scam. Somehow they got my corporate email and phone number, but a completely mangled US Mail address.

cio-summit.net, upon clicking, forwards to http://64.41.119.180/ciosummit/. Yeah, I'm forking over $1000 to a _THAT_ URL.

Google only showed me one other site referencing this issue, but it documents over a year's worth of people encountering the scam: otherlibrarian: cio-summit.net

So head's up, fellow geeks.

Email:

Andrew,

Did you get the email I sent you last? Just in case it didn't get to you I've copied it below for your review. If you get a chance please let me know of your interest.

Thanks,
Chris


-----Original Message-----

To: Andrew Badera
From Name: Chris Jameson
Subject: Andrew, question.

Hi Andrew. On behalf of our board, I wanted to personally invite you into the CIO Summit because of your key role and experience.

The CIO Summit is an invitation-only group comprised of the very best executives and visionaries in technology management. We meet monthly by teleconference to exchange what is working, what is not, strategies and ideas. It is a confidential forum with dedicated groups of other successful IT executives whose only agenda is to help each other outperform.

I am certain you will find the experience both enjoyable and useful in your efforts. Here is our site as background, www.CIO-Summit.net, if you could take a look and please let me know of your decision. Thanks, Andrew.

Sincerely,

Chris Jameson
The CIO Summit
1200 Abernathy Road
17th Floor
Atlanta, GA 30328
404-592-9904 Ext. 81
Mail back to decline further.
Chris@CIO-Summit.net
www.CIO-Summit.net


For my records in case any follow-up is needed, I show your contact information as: Andrew Badera, Davis Vision, ###########@davisvision.com, 159 Express St, Latham, MA, 11803 518-###-####

Thursday, January 10

Book Review: Now is Gone

Now is Gone, by Geoff Livingston, with Brian Solis



This book is precisely what it claims to be: a practical primer for new media. Moving right to the heart of every topic it covers, Now is Gone is straightforward and on the mark, with a succinct recap of salient points at the end of every chapter.

This is not a tome of theory -- nor should it be. This book is more of a field guide: how to get involved with new media, social media, social networking, how to do it right, how to hopefully avoid certain pitfalls along the way, and to be ready, willing and able to admit culpability in the case of a misstep. Every executive, entrepreneur AND student ought to read this work, because moving forward, the activities and philosophies covered are going to be heart and core of nearly every company out there. New media, especially as covered by this work, is as much, or more, about customer relationship management than it is about PR or marketing; perhaps I should rephrase. PR and marketing, maturing to meet social media as described in this book, are the future of CRM.

Now is Gone returns again and again to the concepts of community, conversation and transparency. Without a doubt these values and practices are becoming, must become, predominant in the culture of any company hoping to succeed and thrive in the evolving, globalizing, always-on business world and consumer community. The people formerly known as the audience are smart, in touch and growing more and more used to getting the "inside story" on the products and services they consume, to having their voices heard, to having their opinions matter. It makes nothing but the best of sense to work with these powerful forces, rather than against them, and Now is Gone offers valuable insights and real world examples relevant to these critical matters without wasting the reader's time with ivory tower nonsense.

Learn more at NowIsGone.com