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Total news: 25
Last news: April 12, 2010 11:39:12

Where Tech meets Church

Total news: 53
Last news: July 19, 2010 09:37:59

How seriously do you take your role as a tech volunteer (whether paid or not) within your Church?

Is it just something you do because you can?

Or is it because you feel called to the role or even because you were asked (probably by the pastor) to do it.

Or do you do it because you feel “called” to the role and this is your vision?

The reality is that it shouldn’t matter which caused you to be where you are – however I have found that with the few christian techs that I know in person it does make a difference.

The difference tends to come out in one of a few ways that I’ve spotted with the biggest being in our attitude towards security.

By it’s very nature the job we do day to day as techs tends to be one of secrecy with the security of the data we watch over either through backups; website maintenance; network maintenance; etc. Security should be the very watchword of our existence.

Because of this professional day to day nature I’ve seen the complete opposite attitude when out of our work role. We get careless or slipshod or believe that it doesn’t matter when dealing with our church role. Unfortunately I’ve even seen professionals be like this on a day to day basis. I work under tough security conditions daily – to just tell you what clearance I might have would be against the conditions of that security and so I do understand that a relaxation of our attitude can sometimes (inadvertently) go a step too fat the other way.

The point I’m coming too though, is that you are probably like me. When you leave work you want to forget about it, you want to kick back and chill and not worry about day to day restrictions. Does this chilling and kicking back then transfer into the work you do for the church?

I know I’ve certainly been guilty of this in the past and have let things slide either in myself or in what I let the users I serve get away with.

But quite a few years ago I made a decision that even if it costs me personally I am going to stand up and be counted.

What about you?

Are you being counted?

is a post from: Church Techy

How seriously do you take your role as a tech volunteer (whether paid or not) within your Church?

Is it just something you do because you can?

Or is it because you feel called to the role or even because you were asked (probably by the pastor) to do it.

Or do you do it because you feel “called” to the role and this is your vision?

The reality is that it shouldn’t matter which caused you to be where you are – however I have found that with the few christian techs that I know in person it does make a difference.

The difference tends to come out in one of a few ways that I’ve spotted with the biggest being in our attitude towards security.

By it’s very nature the job we do day to day as techs tends to be one of secrecy with the security of the data we watch over either through backups; website maintenance; network maintenance; etc. Security should be the very watchword of our existence.

Because of this professional day to day nature I’ve seen the complete opposite attitude when out of our work role. We get careless or slipshod or believe that it doesn’t matter when dealing with our church role. Unfortunately I’ve even seen professionals be like this on a day to day basis. I work under tough security conditions daily – to just tell you what clearance I might have would be against the conditions of that security and so I do understand that a relaxation of our attitude can sometimes (inadvertently) go a step too fat the other way.

The point I’m coming too though, is that you are probably like me. When you leave work you want to forget about it, you want to kick back and chill and not worry about day to day restrictions. Does this chilling and kicking back then transfer into the work you do for the church?

I know I’ve certainly been guilty of this in the past and have let things slide either in myself or in what I let the users I serve get away with.

But quite a few years ago I made a decision that even if it costs me personally I am going to stand up and be counted.

What about you?

Are you up for being counted?

Service or Security is a post from: Church Techy

I see many posts out there that are lists of the “top this” or “top that” and all of them purport to be the top list for that category.

The question I always ask myself is what makes this list the top and by what criteria has the list been achieved. For example, Kent’s list of the Top 100 Church Blogs is one such listing. At the bottom he does attempt to explain the criteria for the listings but phrases like “200 well-known blogs are selected” leave me wondering by who’s measurement or criteria.

This is not to bash Kent’s post, but of those top 130 (there’s a bonus 30 there) I read maybe 5 of them. Not that I think my opinion matters in this… but what I really dislike about the whole idea of lists is the very subjective nature of them.

So, with that firmly in mind here is my listing (no top anything) of Church Tech Blogs that I read and find have value to me.

Hopefully one or more will for you too:

1. ChurchTechMatters.com – CTM has gone from being a one man show by Jim Walton to a place that has a group of christian tech bloggers aged from 15 upwards. CTM’s breadth and depth of content has taken the site to a new dimension and whilst articles aren’t regular, they are all of top quality (NB In the interests of full disclosure I am one of those writers).
2. 8Bit Network – like CTM, 8bit is a group of church tech bloggers but unlike CTM they update frequently and are targeted across 5 specific areas from Web to IT to Media. The inspiration behind 8Bit is John Saddington (aka human3rror) and if you can cope with high traffic, high volume sites then these are a must add.
3. Tech, No Babel – in their own words, “TNB is your weekly source for church video, graphics, and tech news, perspectives tips and tricks“. Paul has an interesting blog and like myself will post on any subject close to his heart at the time; be it personal or a tech tip. He used to do a weekly podcast but hasn’t done so for a number of years now – though the archives are still available.
4. ChurchIT Help is run by Barry Buchannan and was one of the first christian tech blogs I ever read. Since then Barry and I have struck up an online friendship. Like most personal blogs his topics are widespread but alas he hasn’t been active for some time on the tech blog. These days he puts his time into his daily tech toon but does occasionally post an article.
5. ChurchTechToday is written by Lauren Hunter and is a must read for myself. Lauren writes on her desire to “help churches do ministry better through internet-related technological advancements, whether it’s through using church management software, online newsletters, or cutting-edge social communities to spread the Gospel“.
6. Jason Powell – Jason’s site is written from the perspective of a full time Church IT Director. Being a self titled blog it can cover every aspect under the sun but mostly good tech stuff and other bits that relate to the CITRT.
7. The Beta Version – Greg is, like me, an IT professional and whilst this blog isn’t purely about tech, it is very much about the Church, his role within in it and how he works that out.

There you have it, just some of the many I read.

Enjoy.

Do you have any you care to recommend I add to my regular reading list?

7 Church Tech Blogs is a post from: Church Techy

I love free and I like ScriptLogics stuff – however most of their stuff is not free so I tend not to visit too often.

Today though I’ve taken some time to see what their latest products are and guess what, they’ve released it as free. The latest (?) tool in their armoury is “Privilege Authority” which is sub-headed as ‘Users Need Rights Too‘ and I agree.

Privilege Authority is designed let the Windows network admin establish what aspects of Windows “users can manage without making them local admins. By defining elevation rules within Privilege Authority, user privileges are automatically elevated for specific actions that currently require administrator access”.

Sounds good to me and I can think of at least two uses for it already.

Privilege Authority is a post from: Church Techy

I’m not usually a person who falls easily into scams or attempts by others to obtain more money for a product than it is realistically worth.

But this one got me.

If I asked you what NOH means, would you know?

What if I said it was on a website that sells products?

Still no idea?

Well that’s ok, because you won’t be alone. I asked my contacts and friends via facebook and twitter and whilst I had some excellent guesses and some fun ones, not one of them was right or even close to being right.

First, a bit of history. I was probably the first keeper (read maintainer) of text speak acronyms (as they’ve become known) on “teh internets”. It was an ascii document full of smilies in all varieties, TLA’s such as IANAL, and it even had some ascii art in it. You’ll see the linked doc has my old, now defunct, email address and is from Feb 8th 1994 but I’d been maintaining it for a couple of years by that stage.

I tell you this to let you know that I do acronyms. I get them. I understand them and I’ve seen most of them already. If I don’t know them, then google is but a click or two away. But NOH had me thoroughly foxed.

When I saw it in the context it was in it was laid out this way:

Product Name Model NOH Get FREE blah - where ‘Model’ was a combination of letters and numbers.

Later on the same page it repeats the black boldened text but this time it is non-bold and nothing else on the line.

So would you then expect, as I did, that the NOH was simply an extension of the model?

Maybe you wouldn’t, but I haven’t found anyone yet that understands what it meant out of context or even in.

But I do know now.

After I purchased said product.

It means “Newly OverHauled” as in refurbished or second hand.

Last time that one gets me and I hope this goes some way to helping others.

Icon courtesy of icons.mysitemyway.com

The Mystery of NOH is a post from: Church Techy

I’ve just committed myself – friends say it should have been done years ago – but all jokes aside I’m in for the challenge.

Paul Steinbreuck over at OurChurch.com has challenged his readers, a lot of whom are also bloggers, to take up the 31 Days to a Better Blog process.

Well, I’m not sure I can guarantee to do all 31 days as and when required even though Paul is structuring it to not roll over weekends. But I will commit to completing all days sooner rather than later. I’m not worried about getting the added incentives that Paul is throwing in of a free silver hosting package to all that do all 31 days, but I am looking forward to the added benefits that hopefully this will bring both myself as a blogger and to yourselves as readers.

What about you?

There’s still time to join even though it started yesterday!

31 Days to Better Blogging is a post from: Church Techy

As part of the 31DBBB challenge we’ve been challenged to write a list post as list posts are succinct and hit the reader right where they are at.

So, keeping in mind that this is a tech blog, here’s my list post for today’s part of the challenge:

• Run a computer workshop.
• Run a “Parents Internet Safety” class.
• Run a “Youth Internet Safety” class.
• Find a local church that doesn’t have a tech volunteer and volunteer.
• Learn some new tech or software purely to help your church.
• Take one section of your church and find a way to make tech more useful to them.
• Offer to train non-christians on better, safer, more effective use of their tech.

I hope these prove of some use and certainly some of these I’ve undertaken and others I plan to.

What other tech ministry ideas do you have?

7 Ministry Ideas Using Tech is a post from: Church Techy

Today is day 4 of 31 Days to Build a Better Blog. Our task is simple (yeah right) … analyse other blog(s) in the same niche as mine and discuss!

Paul has set the challenge as a series of questions to trigger the thoughts:

1. What is your niche?

This one is easy and matches the elevator pitch I had to create for day one. My niche is “Tech ’stuff’ in Church”. By Tech, it could encompass anything from Computers to Sound to Media to Arts to Back Stage control and so on – in short, if it has tech of some form in it, then there is a possibility I’ll touch on it at some stage (no pun intended) but primarily I focus on computing.

2. What site(s) did you analyze?

As I’m not aware of  any other blogs like mine that cater for the same eclectic area as I do that would also be considered successful I am struggling with this one. The one I did know is now a multi-author site of which I am also one of said authors cf: ChurchTechMatters.com so it seems a little self-serving to promote that.

However, I have decided to pick on one I do frequent and participate in its community, appears successful and that includes one or more of the elements I cover.

ChurchIT - a part of the 8Bit community.

The site utilises Wordpress as it’s backend with the now almost ubiquitous Standard Theme. To me, the seeming overuse of StandardTheme makes the site very ’samey’ – however, being the same as it’s sister sites which are all a part of the 8Bit network is not a bad thing.

For those that don’t know, 8Bit is a creation of John Saddington (@human3rror) and is an outlet of his hugely successful ChurchCrunch blog. ChurchIT, like its sister sites has regular bursts of content which range from nothing to multi posts per day.

The site certainly appears successful and occasionally advertises its figures but its RSS feed + Twitter Followers combined is viewable to all when the site is visited. Currently it stands at an appealing figure of 1,375. The other obvious visibility of its success is the number of comments most posts receive – again, anything from none to many dozens.

Personally I don’t like the format / layout of the site but it is easy to navigate. It does have a good visual appeal and its authors always use pictures in their posts and typically almost always to start.

My other and prime dislike of the site is the post style. These tend to be short and sweet – which may appeal to some, but when you click through expecting to see a detailed breakdown or how-to, you actually end up feeling let down. Beyond this, the posts can be short on information, and purely there for churn effect and appear to be the output of a personal surfing session. Almost as if someone visiting a site feels their day isn’t complete without first commenting on it – but only on their own blog as a post.

They do however have lengthier posts, just not as many as I’d like to see and the majority of these are by the other writers. This overall style is likely driven by John – I don’t mean this as a criticism (though it could be perceived that way) but it is what I see and not what I want.

Does the popularity of this site come from John’s style? As an overflow from his successful personal blog? As a key player / employee in social media within the church he attends or simply because he’s hitting the right note? I honestly don’t know, but do join in the community as best I can in the interests of extending my network. If that brings benefits to my blog then that’s good, though so far I don’t see any evidence for that.

In terms of sidebar usage they make use of a multi-tabbed twitter update feed for each of their sister sites so it’s easy to click and see what’s occurring without jumping between sites. There are some adverts but most are self-serving to the 8Bit network or their sponsors and the only other aspect is ‘weekly top commenters’ box.

Re-reading the above makes it sound like I’m being overly harsh or critical – far from it. I love using the site though frequently find I have to decide to miss some stuff because of the volume and I love the fact that John is passionate about what he does and about sharing it with others.

3. What did you notice about them that you  may want to incorporate into your blog?

Certainly the passion that John brings is fantastic and if I could emulate that or be perceived to be emulating that then all is good.

The other aspect is to perhaps generate more churn or fluff content that simply is what it is – place fillers to keep folks coming back.

Another aspect that I haven’t really touched on, is that John and his team are good at spotting the potential in a product or service or … and in hinting at ways it could be used by the wider church.

In terms of layout and use of elements I could do with de-cluttering mine a bit. But I’ve just gotten used to it and until I can afford to pay for a personal design here it stays.

4. How is your blog unique?  How are you going to differentiate it from the rest of the pack?

I think it is pretty unique already.

One of my motivators behind CT is that I couldn’t find another single blog offering what I wanted. Sure I found plenty that had tech content, or that were using podcats or vlogging, but none that actually tried to take foward the idea of using tech in church. Beyond that, none that tried to stick to their intended initial aim. Most became personal diaries rather than tech blogs – and whilst that has helped me make some new iFriends it hasn’t taken forward the challenge of helping others, like myself, that is an unpaid tech volunteer in a church.

How can I make it different – continue to believe that what I am doing is worthwhile and is meeting a need even if that need isn’t always talking back at me.

I Get to Analyse a Blog is a post from: Church Techy

Shocking isn’t it.

But let me step back a second and explain.

According to the many terms and conditions (T&Cs) I’ve agreed to down the year I, and most likely you, are indulging in alleged criminal behaviour. Let me give you an example or two.

- Have you ever bought a CD and then copied t to tape or even your MP3 player? Yes. Then you’re a criminal.

- What about your iPhone / iTouch. Have you jailbroken it? Then yes, you’ve just broken the law again.

- Ever bought a DVD? Then ripped it to place on your media player? Guess what? … You’re a criminal.

But in reality, occasions like this are highly unlikely to get you arrested, let alone face a judge or fine. These are some of the many absurd ‘restrictions’ that companies place in their T&Cs.

But, I digress.

My main reason for this is to reveal that I ‘jailbroke’ my iPhone. There are any number of reasons I’ve done it but to obtain “pay for apps” for free is not one of them.

And here’s one of those reasons: WiCarrier.

Simply put, it displays the name of the WiFi network your iPhone / iTouch is connected too. Why is this so necessary when I can drop into settings and see the same name there? It isn’t but it does make life that one step easier and adds to my security at a glance that I am actually connected to the local coffee house’s network and not some hacker hotspot.

What about you?

Are you a criminal too?

I promise I won’t hold it against you.

I Am a Criminal is a post from: Church Techy

This post is a request for any assistance I can get.

It’s about a mistake or an oversight when setting up a Windows 2003 server running Active Directory (AD) and DNS. So if you know nothing about these things then please feel free to check out one of my other more regular posts – such as this one.

- o – o – o – o – o – o – o – o – o – o – o – o -

OK, on with the issue.

Please bear in mind that this used to work using a workaround despite the oversight. It stopped working when due to reasons beyond their control our hoster had to put us on another server and hence a different IP, but more on that in a moment.

We have a W2k3 Server running an AD Schema and all works just fine. The server is a fairly basic accounts and policies type box with nothing fancy on it. For sake of argument, lets call the schema name we picked as being ourdomain.org and the oversight being that we didn’t add in the MS recommended .local flag.

Skip forward a year or so and we’ve also registered a website with the same name as the schema – can you see where this is going yet?

Skip forward until very recently and we start to develop the website and all is working well except that the folks internally can’t reach the website. No problems thinks I and talk through them setting up an hosts entry pointing to the hosted server – and this nicely resolves the issue.

You might wonder why I didn’t just add an A record to the DNS setup? It’s a valid question but at the time I was away from all tech but my phone and this was the easiest & quickest fix available.

Then we get to last November (I’m pretty sure this is when our issue it started though at the moment it’s supposition) and our hoster falls prey to a hacker. No data is lost but the hacker decided to hose a whole bunch of file systems. The upshot being that our server required a bare metal restore but still had issues afterwards so ultimately we got moved to a new box and consequently a new IP.

So I think, simply change the IP and all will be well.

Not so.

I started off by just editing the hosts file on the server with the new IP and flushing the DNS cache – all appeared good as I can tracert to the new IP and ping it. Additionally an nslookup reveals that the ourdomain.org is being seen as the correct internal IP and that www.ourdomain.org is being seen as the correct external IP.

However, firefox can’t connect. Its status update flickers between ‘waiting for’ and ‘connecting to’ the domain, while IE8 says it “cannot display the webpage”.

Changing the servers secondary DNS settings to use say, OpenDNS.com’s DNS server makes no difference either. However, if I set both primary and secondary to use OpenDNS then we get straight through.

So, either there’s an isse with our DNS that is shafted in some way I can’t see or the hosters new security measures are denying us getting through or ?

So, is there a way to configure AD to force everyting but internal lookups to go through OpenDNS? Because using no configured internal DNS on the server, then a simple ping of an internal client ends up resolving to an external IP – can we say oops!

Any suggestions gratefully taken because I’m stumped.

This just in: I asked the hoster to check their firewall logs and whilst I’m not 100% satisfied that they are logging this aspect they tell me they can’t see our IP arriving. Which strikes me as odd as they should have my pings and tracert’s at the very least – but if they only checked for web traffic then it would efinitely (in my tired mind) point at an internal name resolution issue / clash.

Big kudos to anyone that can help solve this.

DNS Problem is a post from: Church Techy

It’s day 7 of the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog process with OurChurch.com and what better way to tackle today’s challenge – which is to ‘create a link post‘ – than to provide some links to my new found friends to help them get started on Twitter.

Dave Fleet has written an easy to read reference post that covers all the basics of getting started on Twitter. The linked post is part of his 101 series.

Chris Brogan shares how he derives value from Twitter.

Getting Started This last link isn’t exactly a ‘how to’ or 101 but is a link to Twitter’s very own support page. This sub section specifically covers the ‘getting started’ aspect. I particularly recommend you read ‘The Twitter Glossary” and “Frequently Asked Questions“.

Do you have any other good introductions or suggestions for newbies to Twitter?

3 Links to Help Get Started on Twitter is a post from: Church Techy

Today’s challenge in the ProBlogger 31 Days to Build a Better Blog is very little to do with blogging, but much more about the bloggee (is there such a word?) getting out and about and participating themselves.

However, unlike previous days where the emphasis is on going to other blogs, sharing links,commenting, etc – today is all about utilising forums.

The opening line of the task states “Join a form that relates to the topic of your blog and spend 10-15 minutes participating in it“.

Well for my part I grew up in forums. I’m an ex BBS SysOp. I’m an ex Usenet junkie. I was a member of CompuServe. I was a member of CiX. I’ve participated in forums that now no longer exist. And I still do – so rather than join anymore, let me link to a few of the ones I do participate in.

• ChurchTechMatters – this first is a little self serving as I am one of the moderators and writers on the associated blog. It’s a fairly small setup at the moment but has the potential to be much bigger and what’s more has the ability to answer most technical questions from IT to MultiMedia to Policies to .. well, take a look and feel free to ask a question.
• Karls Forums – this forum had a strong technical aspect to it and was built on the back of its owner amassing a large collection of drivers and providing timely help in the original Tiscali forums. I was a very active member assiting Karl and the few other technical minds there but tragically Karl died a few years back and the ethos of the forum changed – even though it has been continued by his wife – and I am no longer as active as once I was.
• WindowsSecrets – this forum was originally Woody Leonhard’s forum but after years in the bit wastelands it has been rebranded and now sees new life under the WindowsSecret banner.
• Petri – started by Daniel Petri an IT ‘expert’ from Israel. The forums are an overflow of his original IT Knowledgebase which can still be found at his parent site.

Like most forums, the support knowledge is only ever as good as the folks offering their time for free. And like most forums they all have their share of problems with trolls, time wasters and flame wars – but if you can get past these then you’ll find great resources at these places. And who knows, it may even be myself that answers your question.

However, one thing I have never done in any of these forums is use a ’sig’ to point back at my blog or even reference a blog post. Also my local avatar at each of these sites does not link back here – so perhaps I should start editing these to include a link and also start pointing folks at some of my articles.

Let me finish with a few questions about this:

• What technical forums do you use / hang around?
• Do you link your avatar?
• Do you link to posts?
• Any other forum statergy?

Technical Forum Use is a post from: Church Techy

Today I’m starting a new series on “Internet Safety”. And I’m going to call it Internet Safety Sunday or ISS for short so that it can be utilised as search keyword on Twitter.

The idea being that every Sunday I publish a tip, software review, advertise links, give my opinion, etc… on the subject matter of internet safety. Although not directly related to the most recent lessons in the ProBlogger 31DBBB course, not indeed any of its lessons, I feel a series is something this blog is lacking.

So to start the series off here’s my opening tip:

Establish Guidelines

Be you a parent at home, a business or a Church then you need to have clear and established guidelines.

• Establish a policy for acceptable computer use.
• List what may or may not be allowed including clear rules about time limits.
• Be upfront with your children / employees / volunteers that this policy will be enforced and monitored.
• Try to set a policy that respects their privacy whilst maintaining your rights over the equipment.

Specifically I’d add the following when children are involved:

• Don’t allow internet enabled computers in a child’s bedroom. Keep it in a public area.
• Set time limits.
• Consider their age, maturity level and inclination towards risky behavior when setting any guidelines.
• Discuss beforehand what to do if any issues arise.

What about your guidelines?

Do you have any at all?

Why / why not?

Internet Safety Sunday is a post from: Church Techy

I want this to happen but at the same time I’m not sure I want to hear what you folks really think about this blog!

Do I honestly want to know what you think or am I happy to live on in blissful ignorance? Being the person I am I’ve opted for the latter and am grateful to Paul at OurChurch.com for giving me the opportunity to be reviewed by my fellow bloggers on the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog challenge.

So onwards then.

To give some idea, I’d really appreciate feedback on the following items (one, many or all), but do feel free to throw any brickbats my way no matter how trivial they may seem to you.

So, layout and design first:

• General layout, font size, width of the text (I want it wider – do you agree?) or blog, readability, etc …
• Colour / graphic elements. Is it too blue? What about the header – I know I need a graphic / specific ChurchTechy logo but I’m grappling with lack of ideas – can you suggest something or better yet design me one?
• Sidebar elements. Is there too much, too little? If so, what should change?
• Would you prefer the “alternative layout” (see bottom of the post for an image and the bigfoot bit would become a CT image)?
• Advertising – I’ve been an avowed anti-adverts person partially because I don’t want to get into the battle of trying to understand them and integrating them but mostly because I’ve not taken the blog that seriously. But if I included adverts would you care? Would you click through if relevant?
• The “more tag” – until recently I’ve been a regular user of the more tag so as to keep the homepage down to size, but of recent have stopped that as most folks land directly on the post page anyway. But I really want to know if you click through when you see the “read more here” tags or not?
• Does the blog display well in your browser of choice? If not, what’s wrong / missing / broken?
• Is it easy enough to find other content?
• Have you noticed the Skribit tab on the right hand side? Would you ever use it? Or should I dump it?

And now some thoughts about the content:

• Are my posts too technical or too dumbed down?
• Do I come over as patronising?
• Am I covering the topics that interest you?
• If not, what’s missing?
• Do you like my use of graphics? I decided about 6 to 8 months ago to start using them in every post – should I do more, less?
• I know this is a technically aimed blog but of the posts you’ve read are they aimed right for you? Would you care if I included off-topic posts? Please also tell me if you are a technical or non-technical person?
• Are my posts too long? Or should I offset those by including shorter ones?

And a final area of thoughts comes under other:

• Does the site load quickly?
• Do you like the use of the IntenseDebate plugin?
• Would you like more options to register for commenting?
• What about my ‘About‘ and ‘Vision‘ pages – are they useful? Do you ever read these things? Are they missing anything or do they have too much/ little in them?
• If I didn’t have a tag line (mine’s “Where Tech meets Church”) would it matter?
• Anything, and I mean anything else?

Click for larger version

Thanks for taking the time to read this request for a review and I do hope you take the time to consider and answer as many of my queries as possible.

If you only have the time or patience to answer just one point then that too would be as useful as answering all the points. Finally, if you want to address any of the points in greater length then do feel free to use my contact me form.

Blog Review Time is a post from: Church Techy

First off, what is phishing?

phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. [quote]

According to the Anti-Phishing Group this type of attack is very much on the rise – it is, as I’ve maintained before (e.g. 1, 2), that we should learn about the hardware and software we use and understand what we need to do to ensure the security of said items.

Let me state upfront – you can’t prevent phishing attacks, but you can prepare yourself by taking certain precautions.

• Ensure you keep your computer OS, software, drivers, etc., up to date.
• Ensure you frequently scan your system (either schedule it or manually run) with a top class security tool such as Malwarebytes or similar.
• Ensure (especially Windows OS users) that you keep your anti-virus up to date; that it is running and that it is still working as well as you hope. Check out what independent reviewers / testers such as AV Comparatives think of your AV.
• Always check the full URL of a financial site to ensure you are where you think you are – better still, type it yourself rather than use links in an eMail.
• Don’t trust any eMail that asks for any personal information, especially financial.
• Always check that the email from your financial institution is actually from them.
• Never give out your personal logon details to anyone – this includes your bank as they should never need that information.
• Take the approach of never trusting any eMail or web link unless you are 100% satisfied that it is genuine or has come from a trustworthy source.
• Equally, never open any attachments (especially from friends) unless you know they are sending it. It never hurts to double check.
• Finally, when logged in, ensure your browser is in secure mode.

In short, apply some common sense and avoid providing anything of a financial nature to a faceless website or eMail.

As I said above, you can’t prevent phishing attacks but by applying the above steps you will go a long way towards avoiding falling for their traps.

Also remember that only a few ever fall prey to these attacks and I’m hoping the above advice will reduce those numbers even further.

Have I missed any advice in my bullet points?

Do you take active steps to avoid scams?

Or are you a blind truster?

Avoid Phishing Scams is a post from: Church Techy

So the church hosting account got hacked.

I don’t really know when but the first I was aware was a very terse email from our hoster:

Hello,

We regret to inform you that your account has been suspended for the following reason:

compromised account, spamming

Please contact us as soon as possible to discuss your options for reinstatement.

Sincerely,

Well ok that’s fair but surely they could have given us a clue as to what caused them to be aware of this so we are better able to fix it, prevent it happening again and discuss it.

Turns out the rather simple password that was used for the cpanel account was just that – too simple and consequently the hacker placed a few ‘iffy’ PHP files that were (so I’m told) sending out spam.

I’ve passed the file onto my eldest – he does PHP – and asked him to look it over.

The lesson today … use strong passwords.

Don’t know how or worried about remembering them? Then read this about various password utilities. Need to create a strong password and don’t have one of the listed tools in my link then try this online password generator. My advice, at the very minimum use the defaults but preferably up the character count to 16 or more.

Want to know what makes a strong / secure password? Then have a read of this article.

• Do you use strong / secure passwords?
• Do you have a different one for each site you access?
• Do you use any tools to help you?

Password Lessons is a post from: Church Techy

A goodly number of years back…2002 to be precise, the EFF published a whitepaper on protecting your online privacy.

Despite this being 8yrs ago now the advice is still apposite and really it mostly boils down to common sense. I’ve linked to the original as they go into greater detail but here for your edification are the main points:

• Do not reveal personal information inadvertently.
• Turn on cookie notices in your Web browser, and/or use cookie management software or infomediaries.
• Keep a “clean” e-mail address.
• Don’t reveal personal details to strangers or just-met “friends”.
• Realise you may be monitored at work, avoid sending highly personal e-mail to mailing lists, and keep sensitive files on your home computer.
• Beware sites that offer some sort of reward or prize in exchange for your contact information or other personal details.
• Do not reply to spammers, for any reason.
• Be conscious of Web security.
• Be conscious of home computer security.
• Examine privacy policies and seals.

That’s it – ten succinct and common sense pointers.

Have you any old advice that still applies equally today?

Do you bother to protect your privacy?

Protecting Online Privacy is a post from: Church Techy

I’m still wandering through the #31DBBB project that OurChurch.com has running and today’s task is to effectively introduce you to one of my readers.

I can think of nobody better than a fellow blogger – Greg Simmons.

Greg has been a loyal reader and commenter at my site almost since it’s inception.

It may be that he’s also a fellow geek (though he’s a self-confessed one and I’ve been labelled one by friends & family) or that he works in the same industry as myself or any number of reasons. Whatever the reasons, Greg has made valid and valuable comments to many of my posts that not only enhance the subject but take it in a direction I hadn’t previously considered.

Also, in a similar vein to me he has served his local church for over 20yrs and most of that in some technical capacity.

It may be that my affinity to Greg is to do with the fact that he’s a fan of coffee and getting away to unique locations rather than re-visiting the same old same old.

Greg is also one of my fellow writers at ChurchTechMatters.com.

However, right now I feel it is very appropriate to bring Greg to your attention as he is very shortly going to be heading off on a foreign mission. I’ve been on some of these (and hope to again) so I get some of what he’s feeling and going through.

Right now Greg and the rest of the team are in the less than 10 days to go zone and he even has a countdown on his site showing how long is left. They are off to Romania on June 10th and whilst most of their physical and practical needs are already taken care of they would still value your prayers and any donations you can make.

Here’s a little list:

• That their ‘individual testimonies’ are powerful tools
• That flights and journeys go smoothly and without problems.
• Funding – for individuals and the end aim of the mission trip.
• That all paperwork is in order.
• That God gets the glory.

And I’m sure if you ask Greg he’ll happily add any specific requests.

Greg’s personal website is an eclectic mix of everything from technical thoughts to spiritual challenges to ministry opportunities.

Please allow me to thoroughly recommend Greg and TheBetaVersion.org.

Please Allow Me to Introduce is a post from: Church Techy

Have you ever considered hiding your IP address?

It’s a bit like trying to hide your post or zip code – it’s not easy but it can be done. But today’s post is focusing on why we should consider this and not a one of them is for illegal reasons.

Here’s some reasons why you might hide your IP:

• to protect your privacy from search engines ‘profiling’ your surfing habits.
• or from marketing companies sharing information or profiling.
• to stop your ISP from keeping logs of your activities.
• to overcome geographic blocks.
• to stop competitors knowing about your research of them.
• fear of being persecuted.
• or simply as a matter of principle – after all how many of us are ex-directory with our phone numbers?

Have I missed any obvious reasons?

Do you hide your IP?

Why or why not?

Hide Your IP Address. is a post from: Church Techy