Computer Software

A computer network is a collection of two or more computers with communication between them through a medium. The communication medium can be through radio waves, wires, infrared, optical fibers etc.

Computer network is an integral part of our daily lives, with the most important reason being that of communication. The use of computer networking is to share resources like fax machines, printers, modems, files etc., and its other uses are database server, computer server, email, chat, internet etc. The computer to which the resources are attached is called the server and the other computers that access the resource are called clients. In peer-to-peer computer networks there are no servers.

The sharing of fax machines, printers, and modems amongst many computers and users reduce the operational cost. A database on a computer network is a very important application as it stores and runs many important data and jobs. Emails and chats can be used for instantaneous communication and sending of files on a computer network.

The computer networks are classified, depending upon the size, as Local Area Networks (LAN), Wide Area Networks (WAN), Metropolitan Area Networks (MAN) and Personal Area Networks (PAN). The topology (topology is the way the computer networks and network resources are connected) of the networking can be classified as Bus Network, Ring Network and Star Network.

The networking hardware basically consists of wiring, network cards and a hub. Computer network cards are required so that one computer can understand what the other computer is “talking”. Network cards have a unique MAC address to identify computers on a computer network. Hubs connect all the computers in the network. Hubs can also be used to connect to other hubs to increase the size of the computer network. Two computers can be connected using Ethernet cards or phone lines or power lines for communication, with hardware kits available at roughly a cost of $100.

As the number of computers in an office or a home increases, so do the number of cables, so wireless networking is a viable solution. In wireless networking radio transreceivers or infrared signals are used to communicate between computers and devices. Examples of wireless networking include Wi-fi and Bluetooth technology, though there may be security issues involved in wireless networking. However there definitely is a stronger preference towards wireless networking nowadays among consumers.

Computer networks have added a new dimension to the 21st century. Today the cyber world is much faster and wider than the real world. This has all been made possible due to computer networks. Computer networks have revolutionized business, communication, travel, research, defense, society and almost all human endeavors. The evolution of computer networks has helped the technological revolution take a big leap forward.

It is a hierarchical representation of all the objects and their attributes available on the network. It enables administrators to manage the network resources, i.e., computers, users, printers, shared folders, etc., in an easy way. The logical structure represented by Active Directory consists of forests, trees, domains, organizational units, and individual objects. This structure is completely independent from the physical structure of the network, and allows administrators to manage domains according to the organizational needs without bothering about the physical network structure.

Following is the description of all logical components of the Active Directory structure:

Forest: A forest is the outermost boundary of an Active Directory structure. It is a group of multiple domain trees that share a common schema but do not form a contiguous namespace. It is created when the first Active Directory-based computer is installed on a network. There is at least one forest on a network. The first domain in a forest is called a root domain. It controls the schema and domain naming for the entire forest. It can be separately removed from the forest. Administrators can create multiple forests and then create trust relationships between specific domains in those forests, depending upon the organizational needs.

Trees: A hierarchical structure of multiple domains organized in the Active Directory forest is referred to as a tree. It consists of a root domain and several child domains. The first domain created in a tree becomes the root domain. Any domain added to the root domain becomes its child, and the root domain becomes its parent. The parent-child hierarchy continues until the terminal node is reached. All domains in a tree share a common schema, which is defined at the forest level. Depending upon the organizational needs, multiple domain trees can be included in a forest.

Domains: A domain is the basic organizational structure of a Windows Server 2003 networking model. It logically organizes the resources on a network and defines a security boundary in Active Directory. The directory may contain more than one domain, and each domain follows its own security policy and trust relationships with other domains. Almost all the organizations having a large network use domain type of networking model to enhance network security and enable administrators to efficiently manage the entire network.

Objects: Active Directory stores all network resources in the form of objects in a hierarchical structure of containers and subcontainers, thereby making them easily accessible and manageable. Each object class consists of several attributes. Whenever a new object is created for a particular class, it automatically inherits all attributes from its member class. Although the Windows Server 2003 Active Directory defines its default set of objects, administrators can modify it according to the organizational needs.

Organizational Unit (OU): It is the least abstract component of the Windows Server 2003 Active Directory. It works as a container into which resources of a domain can be placed. Its logical structure is similar to an organization’s functional structure. It allows creating administrative boundaries in a domain by delegating separate administrative tasks to the administrators on the domain. Administrators can create multiple Organizational Units in the network. They can also create nesting of OUs, which means that other OUs can be created within an OU.
In a large complex network, the Active Directory service provides a single point of management for the administrators by placing all the network resources at a single place. It allows administrators to effectively delegate administrative tasks as well as facilitate fast searching of network resources. It is easily scalable, i.e., administrators can add a large number of resources to it without having additional administrative burden. It is accomplished by partitioning the directory database, distributing it across other domains, and establishing trust relationships, thereby providing users with benefits of decentralization, and at the same time, maintaining the centralized administration.

The physical network infrastructure of Active Directory is far too simple as compared to its logical structure. The physical components are domain controllers and sites.

Domain Controller: A Windows 2003 server on which Active Directory services are installed and run is called a domain controller. A domain controller locally resolves queries for information about objects in its domain. A domain can have multiple domain controllers. Each domain controller in a domain follows the multimaster model by having a complete replica of the domain’s directory partition. In this model, every domain controller holds a master copy of its directory partition. Administrators can use any of the domain controllers to modify the Active Directory database. The changes performed by the administrators are automatically replicated to other domain controllers in the domain.

However, there are some operations that do not follow the multimaster model. Active Directory handles these operations and assigns them to a single domain controller to be accomplished. Such a domain controller is referred to as operations master. The operations master performs several roles, which can be forest-wide as well as domain-wide.

Forest-wide roles: There are two types of forest-wide roles:

Schema Master and Domain Naming Master. The Schema Master is responsible for maintaining the schema and distributing it to the entire forest. The Domain Naming Master is responsible for maintaining the integrity of the forest by recording additions of domains to and deletions of domains from the forest. When new domains are to be added to a forest, the Domain Naming Master role is queried. In the absence of this role, new domains cannot be added.

Domain-wide roles: There are three types of domain-wide roles: RID Master, PDC Emulator, and Infrastructure Master.

RID Master: The RID Master is one of the operations master roles that exist in each domain in a forest. It controls the sequence number for the domain controllers within a domain. It provides a unique sequence of RIDs to each domain controller in a domain. When a domain controller creates a new object, the object is assigned a unique security ID consisting of a combination of a domain SID and a RID. The domain SID is a constant ID, whereas the RID is assigned to each object by the domain controller. The domain controller receives the RIDs from the RID Master. When the domain controller has used all the RIDs provided by the RID Master, it requests the RID Master to issue more RIDs for creating additional objects within the domain. When a domain controller exhausts its pool of RIDs, and the RID Master is unavailable, any new object in the domain cannot be created.

PDC Emulator: The PDC emulator is one of the five operations master roles in Active Directory. It is used in a domain containing non-Active Directory computers. It processes the password changes from both users and computers, replicates those updates to backup domain controllers, and runs the Domain Master browser. When a domain user requests a domain controller for authentication, and the domain controller is unable to authenticate the user due to bad password, the request is forwarded to the PDC emulator. The PDC emulator then verifies the password, and if it finds the updated entry for the requested password, it authenticates the request.

Infrastructure Master: The Infrastructure Master role is one of the Operations Master roles in Active Directory. It functions at the domain level and exists in each domain in the forest. It maintains all inter-domain object references by updating references from the objects in its domain to the objects in other domains. It performs a very important role in a multiple domain environment. It compares its data with that of a Global Catalog, which always has up-to-date information about the objects of all domains. When the Infrastructure Master finds data that is obsolete, it requests the global catalog for its updated version. If the updated data is available in the global catalog, the Infrastructure Master extracts and replicates the updated data to all the other domain controllers in the domain.

Domain controllers can also be assigned the role of a Global Catalog server. A Global Catalog is a special Active Directory database that stores a full replica of the directory for its host domain and the partial replica of the directories of other domains in a forest. It is created by default on the initial domain controller in the forest. It performs the following primary functions regarding logon capabilities and queries within Active Directory:

It enables network logon by providing universal group membership information to a domain controller when a logon request is initiated.

It enables finding directory information about all the domains in an Active Directory forest.

A Global Catalog is required to log on to a network within a multidomain environment. By providing universal group membership information, it greatly improves the response time for queries. In its absence, a user will be allowed to log on only to his local domain if his user account is external to the local domain.

Site: A site is a group of domain controllers that exist on different IP subnets and are connected via a fast and reliable network connection. A network may contain multiple sites connected by a WAN link. Sites are used to control replication traffic, which may occur within a site or between sites. Replication within a site is referred to as intrasite replication, and that between sites is referred to as intersite replication. Since all domain controllers within a site are generally connected by a fast LAN connection, the intrasite replication is always in uncompressed form. Any changes made in the domain are quickly replicated to the other domain controllers. Since sites are connected to each other via a WAN connection, the intersite replication always occurs in compressed form. Therefore, it is slower than the intrasite replication.

Starting an IT consulting business requires patience and dedication. The hardest part is often getting new clients. In this article, learn some more of the steps you should take before beginning your IT consulting practice.

Step Sixteen: Get Your Networking Contacts into a Follow Up Plan

With every business card you collect, jot down the date that you met them and any relevant notes about them. If you have a follow up request like they said “hey give me a call about that,” or “hey call me on Tuesday about setting that up”, immediately jump on those.

Follow up on the request tomorrow if not sooner. If you can’t follow up with a personal call, send a handwritten note that says you look forward to seeing them again and if you need any help between now and when we meet again, give me a call. Include your card in the note, and put your contact’s card on a rolodex and put him on a 30, 60-day call back schedule.

Step Seventeen: Re-Evaluate Your Networking Organization Options

Take another look at the different networking groups you attended as a guest. Which ones did you like? Which ones have the most potential for the most business opportunities? Start joining and participating. The purpose is to get known and to raise your profile in the community.

Pick out at least 4 groups and join them. Drop off your check personally to the director or office manager. Be direct and tell him or her that you have this new IT consulting business and that you are looking for small business that you can help out with LANs, etc. Ask them what is the best way to get to know these small business owners that are most likely to need your IT consulting services.

At every 60-90 minute event, you should be talking to eight or ten people. Half of them may be a waste of time, half of them could be potential clients, half could be potential referrals. It’s a matter of staying organized and keeping your name in front of them.

After you go through the first ninety days and you’ve gone to one of these every week, move on to more sustainable networking.

Step Eighteen: Do Your First Direct Mail Campaign

Have your testimonials in place from your earlier clients, and get your networking organizations’ directory on disc. Send out a personal letter and your business card to every member who may fit into the IT consulting sweet spot. Offer them a free 30-minute needs assessment coupon with an expiration date. Tell them you look forward to seeing them at upcoming event and then you can always follow up with a phone call.

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If you sense resistance during the IT network sales cycle, listen very carefully to the prospect’s objections. Many times, they like what they hear, but small business owners need to hear three or four different opinions in order to bolster their confidence. Take time to understand exactly what’s driving the investment in this planned IT network.

In small business IT consulting many of your prospects and clients will have similar IT network needs.

Consider Faxing Needs

Most small business employees have similar experiences when it comes to sending faxes. When a document that needs to be faxed is complete, the employee prints the document and cover sheet, gets up from the desk, walks over to the fax machine, and stands there waiting on line until the fax machine is available. This creates an enormous productivity bottleneck.

Ask Questions about IT Network Needs

To understand the cost of not addressing the single Internet access account or fax machine dilemma, talk with the small business owner. Here’s a sample line of questioning you can use to shed some light on the real costs and limitations of sending faxes through a fax machine:

How many people in the office send faxes regularly?

What’s the average number of pages in each person’s fax?

Does each person typically create a cover page to go along with each fax?

How many faxes a day are sent out?

How often are people sending the same fax to multiple recipients?

How far away is the fax machine from most people’s desks?

How many hours are wasted on a daily basis with people waiting around to send outgoing faxes?

How many hours does this translate into annually?

What’s the average hourly wage of the people impacted by this productivity issue?

The Bottom Line about IT Networks

It is a good idea to have a blank contract with you when you ask these questions. Why? Because it’s very hard for any rational small business owner or manager to refute your

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It is very important to educate your small business prospects and clients on key small business networking terms and buzzwords. After all, in order to “win them over”, you need to be speaking the same language. In fact, you may even want to prepare a “cheat sheet”, based on the below definitions, to help you in your prospect and client pre-sales activities.

If you’d like to order a license to reproduce these networking terms for client sales literature, please contact questions@ComputerConsulting101.com and put “Licensing Your LAN Buzzwords” in the subject line.

• NIC (Network Interface Card) – a printed circuit board, adapter card or the underlying supporting chipset that snaps into the motherboard of a desktop PC, notebook or server and transmits and receives packets on a network; used to connect to networks including a local area network (LAN), wide area network (WAN), or a broadband network for high-speed cable modem or DSL-based Internet access or other dedicated Internet access service; most common NIC used by small businesses is the 10/100Mbps Ethernet adapter.

• NOS (Network Operating System) – an OS designed for communications between networked computer systems; popular NOS’s include Apple Mac OS, Linux, Microsoft Windows NT/2000 and Novell NetWare.

• Peer-to-Peer Network – an inexpensive alternative to a client/server network in which a PC doubles as both a workstation (used by an end user) and a server (from which resources are shared); although virtually any OS can be configured for peer-to-peer networking, peer-to-peer networks are often assembled from Microsoft’s least expensive consumer OS’s, such as Microsoft Windows 98, Microsoft Windows Me and Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition.

• RAID (redundant array of independent disks) is technology generally used to increase a server’s reliability — by simultaneously writing data to multiple hard drives. While many people also use RAID to improve server performance, RAID eliminates a single point of hard drive failure. Years ago, you could only get the benefits of RAID through SCSI-based hard drives. Today, IDE hard drives can also enjoy entry-level RAID fault tolerance benefits.

• SCSI (small computer systems interface) is a high-end interface for connecting both internal and external computer peripheral devices. Years ago, only SCSI-based storage devices were used in most servers.

• Server – any computing device or peripheral on a network designed to provide shared services and resources to network users; primarily characterized by multi-user usage, as compared to a desktop or notebook PC; common servers include the file, printer, e-mail messaging and collaboration, Web, proxy and database server.

• Wireless Ethernet – set of standards and in-progress standards that allow Ethernet networks to run without physical cabling and utilize radio waves for transmission.

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By engaging small business decision makers in discussions about their IT networking needs, you can highlight how automating services like faxing will save your prospect’s or client’s company on manual labor, which indirectly translates into substantial salary savings over the course of the year.

At the very least, network-based faxing will free up staff to focus on higher-level activities, rather than “babysitting” an archaic fax machine.

Listen for Other IT Networking Opportunities

As you get to know more about the prospect’s or client’s business, keep your antenna up for additional solution opportunity areas, such as centrally-managed Internet access for each desktop.

Besides faxing and Internet access, a client/server network makes sharing, protecting and securing information much easier. Through permissions and auditing, small business owners can ensure that only those authorized have access to sensitive information.

By centralizing the storage of data, small businesses can also more easily protect data with a tape backup drive, antivirus software, firewall software and an uninterruptible power supply (UPS).

Who Are You Promoting IT Networking To?

Tailoring your message for different audiences and interests is also key. If you’re discussing IT networking with the president or owner of the company, the hot buttons might include costs, the value of proactive technology investments, industry trends, competitive factors and lower labor costs through more automation.

The Bottom Line about IT Networking

If you’re discussing IT networking with middle management or employees in the trenches, make sure to shift gears. Staff and the internal guru will likely want to talk about ease of use and administration, how the network will make their job easier and the amount of training required to become proficient.

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Imagine a future in which your every belonging is marked with a unique number identifiable with the swipe of a scanner, where the location of your car is always pinpoint-able and where signal-emitting microchips storing personal information are implanted beneath your skin or embedded in your inner organs.

This is the possible future of radio frequency identification (RFID), a technology whose application has so far been limited largely to supply-chain management (enabling companies, for example, to keep track of the quantity of a given product they have in stock) but is now being experimented with for passport tracking, among other things. RFID is set to be applied in a whole range of consumer settings. Already being tested in products as innocuous as shampoo, lip balm, razor blades, clothing and cream cheese, RFID-enabled items are promoted by retailers and marketers as the next revolution in customer convenience. Consumer advocates say this is paving the way for a nightmarish future where personal privacy is a quaint throwback.

How RFID works
There are two types of RFID tags: active and passive. When most people talk about RFID, they talk about passive tags, in which a radio frequency is sent from a transmitter to a chip or card which has no power cell per se, but uses the transmitted signal to power itself long enough to respond with a coded identifier. This numeric identifier really carries no information other than a unique number, but keyed against a database that associates that number with other data, the RFID tag’s identifier can evoke all information in the database keyed to that number.

An active tag has its own internal power source and can store as well as send even more detailed information.

The RFID value chain involves three parts: the tags, the readers and the application software that powers these systems. From there, the data generated by the application software can interface with other systems used in an enterprise, or, if they obtain the information or collect it themselves, concievably by governments or more nefarious organizations.

Where it’s used today
Global companies such as Gillette, Phillips, Procter & Gamble, Wal-Mart and others see huge savings to be made from the use of RFID, and there are numerous pilot projects underway which are indicating savings in supply chains as well as the ability to add value to both product owner, product reseller and customer.

But they’re just pilots, mostly. RFID is a long way from being everywhere, so far. Pharmaceutical tracking has long been held out as one of the flagship applications of RFID in the short term, yet just some 10 medications are expected be tagged using RFID technology on a large scale in the U.S. during 2006, analysts predict. Slow roll-outs are contrasting sharply with the optimism of a year ago, when evidence suggested tripling or even quadrupling of RFID for consumer goods tracking. Why? Uncertainty over pending legislation. There are a complex mixture of federal and new state laws (in particular Florida and California) intended to combat drug theft and counterfeiting that have implications for RFID. The details are still being worked out.

Where it’s likely to be used tomorrow
Depending which analysts you believe, the market for RFID technology will represent between 1.5 and 30 Billion USD by the year 2010. Analyst firm IDTechEx, which tracks the RFID industry, believes more than 585 billion tags will be delivered by 2016. Among the largest growth sectors, IDTechEx forsees the tagging of food, books, drugs, tires, tickets, secure documents (passports and visas), livestock, baggage and more.

Buses and subways in some parts of the world are being equipped with RFID readers, ready for multi-application e-tickets. These are expected to make things easier for the commuter, and help stem the fraud from the current paper-ticket system. However the biggest problem facing rollouts of RFID for commercial micropayment tracking is apparently not technical, but involves agreeing on the fees charged by the clearing house and how credit from lost and discarded tickets will be divided.

Passport tracking
One of the highest profile uses of RFID will be passport tracking. Since the terrorist attacks of 2001, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has wanted the world to agree on a standard for machine-readable passports. Countries whose citizens currently do not have visa requirements to enter the United States will have to issue passports that conform to the standard or risk losing their non-visa status.

American and other passports are being developed that include RFID-based chips which allow the storage of considerable amounts of data such as fingerprints and digitized photographs. In the U.S., these passports are due to start being issued in October of 2006. Early in the development of these passports there were gaping security holes, such as the capability of being read by any reader, not just the ones at passport control (the upshot of this was that travelers carrying around RFID passports would have been openly broadcasting their identity, making it easy for wrongdoers to easily – and surreptitiously – pick Americans or nationals of other participating countries out of a crowd.)

Those security blunders were initially corrected by adding metal shielding to the passport cover to minimize its readability when closed, dialing back the range of the electronics and adding a special electronic protocol called Basic Access Control (or BAC). This scheme required the passport to be opened and scanned before its data could have been properly interpreted by an RFID receiver. Unfortunately, in early February 2006, Dutch security experts managed to “listen in” on the communications between a prototype BAC-protected passport and a receiver and cracked the protocol. Which means the international authority developing this new global passport standard may need to go back to the drawing board as of this writing, because ‘bad guys’ could clearly stand in line at passport control and capture passport information. Details of the Dutch hack here.

Implications for privacy seekers
RFID has clear implications for those who are worried about their privacy and safety. Some of them are obvious, and some of them are not.

- Can be read without your knowledge – Since the tags can be read without being swiped or obviously scanned (as is the case with magnetic strips or barcodes), anyone with an RFID tag reader can read the tags embedded in your clothes and other consumer products without your knowledge. For example, you could be scanned before you enter the store, just to see what you are carrying. You might then be approached by a clerk who knows what you have in your backpack or purse, and can suggest accessories or other items.
- Can be read a greater distances with a high-gain antenna – For various technical reasons, RFID reader/tag systems are designed so that distance between the tag and the reader is kept to a minimum. However, a high-gain antenna can actually read tags from much further away, leading to privacy problems. Governments or others could punch through privacy screens and keep tabs on people.
- Difficult to remove – RFID tags are hard for consumers to remove; some are very small (less than a half-millimeter square, and as thin as a sheet of paper) – others may be hidden or embedded inside a product where consumers cannot see them. New technologies allow RFID tags to be printed right on a product and may not be removable at all
- Disruptions if maliciously jammed – RF signals can be jammed, which could complicate everyday life if RFID tags became essential. Imagine a central bus or train station, maybe an airport, where suddenly everyone could neither be ID’d or access their cash accounts. A single hour of jamming during morning rush over a large area could cost a large city untold millions of dollars in delayed commerce and transport. It would be worse than a mass-transit strike, and easier to repeat.
- Could be linked to a credit card number – The Universal Product Code (UPC) implemented with barcodes allows each product sold in a store to have a unique number that identifies that product. Work is proceeding on a global system of product identification that would allow each individual item to have its own number. When the item is scanned for purchase and is paid for, the RFID tag number for a particular item can be associated with the credit card number it was purchased with.
- Potential for counterfeit – If an RFID tag is being used to authenticate someone, anyone with access to an RFID reader can easily capture and fake someone else’s unique numeric identifier, and therefore, in essence, their electronic ‘signature’. If an RFID-tagged smartcard is used for shopping, for instance, anyone who intercepted and reverse-engineered your number, and programmed another card with it, could make charges on your account.
- Marking for crime – Even after you leave a store, any RFID devices in things you buy are still active. A thief could walk past you in the mall and know exactly what you have in your bags, marking you as a potential victim. Someone could even circle your house with an RFID scanner and pull up data on what you have in your house before robbing it. As a result, there are now discussions of “zombie” RFID tags that expire upon leaving the store and reanimate if the product is ever returned to the store and returned to the supply chain.
- Marking for violence – Military hardware and even clothing are beginning to make use of RFID tags to help track these items through supply chains. RFID is being used today by the U.S. military to track materials in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some analysts are concerned about particular items being associated with high-level officers that could trigger roadside bombs via an RFID scan of cars going by. (Thankfully, RFID tags retained close to the body can rarely be scanned. For instance, UHF tags, the kind being most widely deployed, are virtually unreadable near the body because of its high water content.)
Some have suggested that mobile phones are already as great a threat to privacy as RFID. In the case of mobile phones, information about your whereabouts and calling patterns is regularly available to your service provider, a centralized and highly regulated source of information gathering. An adversary with special-purpose equipment would also have the capability of tracking your mobile phone, but this would require significant expertise and investment. See our separate article “Cell phone hazards”.

What makes RFID a more significant privacy threat than mobile phones is the fact that readers will be readily available and ubiquitously deployed. In other words, RFID readers will soon be an accepted element of everyday life, while eavesdropping equipment for mobile phones is unlikely to be.

How to thwart RFID technology
There are a few approaches you can take to thwart RFID tags … but before you take proactive steps, note that sometimes the very absence of a tag or its signal in places it’s expected could arouse suspicion. For instance, if you’re carrying what is expected to be an RFID-tagged passport and your tag isn’t working, say, you may invite unwanted scrutiny. Be careful which tags you choose to disrupt.

The simplest, most permanent approach to disable RFID tags is to destroy them. If you can detect them and wish to permanently render them useless, remove them and smash the small chip component with a hammer. If you’re not sure whether a product you own contains a tag, consider putting it in a microwave to destroy the tag if the object is otherwise safe to be microwaved. Be careful with some plastics. Note there have been reports of RFID materials catching fire in microwaves.

If removing the tag is not practical, there are four general ways to disrupt RFID tag detection.
- Blocking – Construct a conductive foil box (even tin foil is good) around the tag. If you are concerned about RFID emissions from work badges, school IDs, new generation drivers licenses, credit cards, and even cash in the future containing RFID tags, buy or make an RFID-proof wallet. RFID wallet project details are easy to find on the Internet.
- Jamming – Since RFID systems make use of the electromagnetic spectrum like wireless networks or cellphones, they are relatively easy to jam using a strong radio signal at the same frequency the tag operates. Although this would only be an inconvenience for consumers in stores (longer waits at the checkout), it could be disastrous in other environments where RFID is increasingly being used, like hospitals, or in military combat situations. Such jamming devices, however, would in most cases violate government regulations on radio emissions. A group of researchers in Amsterdam have theorized that a personal RFID jammer is possible (their paper is linked to from the version of this article that lives at our web site, www.powerprivacy.com) but the device seems only theoretical at this time.
- Repeated interrogation – Active RFID tags that use a battery to increase the range of the system can be repeatedly interrogated to wear the battery down, disrupting the system.
- Popping – Generating a very strong pulse of radiation at the right frequency can cause RFID tags to resonate and break.

What strategy you should pursue depends on what RFID privacy threats you are trying to thwart and your technical expertise.

Most people are aware that there are continuous security issues with Microsoft’s Windows operating system and other programs. However, what most people do not realize is how easy it is to significantly improve your computer’s security and reduce the likelihood of becoming a victim to ever increasingly sophisticated threats that lurk on the internet. These steps should take less than a couple of hours to complete and should not clean out your wallet.

1) Windows Update – the first crucial step you need to take to make sure that all your Microsoft applications have all the latest product updates installed. These updates or “patches” address security vulnerabilities and other issues. Microsoft usually issues these updates on a monthly cycle. Visit the Microsoft website or switch on automatic updates from the Windows Control panel. Even if your “new” computer is second hand this is still a critical first step. If you buy a used computer with Windows XP make sure Service Pack 2 or SP2 is installed.

2) Strong Passwords – people often overlook this but having well thought through passwords is an important element of your computer security. A strong password should include at least 8 characters with a mixture of text, symbols and numbers. As a minimum you need to make sure the services most at risk have a strong log-in password. These services include your bank, credit card, other financial services like PayPal, your email address and any other services like Ebay which hackers can use to generate profit.

3) Anti Virus Protection – while it is fair to say the threat of the computer virus has receded during the last couple of years they can still inflict serious damage on your computer. Part of the reason why the threat has reduced is because PC manufactures are now more frequently bundling anti virus packages with their new computers. For example last year my new Dell shipped with a 90-day trial of McAfee’s Internet Security Suite. The best bet here is to purchase a security package which includes firewall and anti virus software as a minimum. Top brands include McAfee and Symantec Norton products. However, Microsoft has recently entered the market with their “OneCare” offering which is very aggressively priced.

4) Firewall – if you are using a broadband connection then a firewall is definite requirement to manage the traffic flowing between your computer and the internet. A firewall monitors the inbound internet traffic passing through the ports of your computer. Better products also monitor outbound traffic from your computer to the internet. As per above the best bet here is buy a firewall application as part of a security package which most vendors offer as standard. If a hardware firewall is included as part of your router package then you do not need anything else. A company called Zone Labs offer a great free firewall product called Zone Alarm which should be used as a minimum. Windows XP does now ship with a free firewall but the product does not monitor outbound communication and therefore I believe does not offer adequate protection.

5) Anti Spyware Tool – this software is the last piece in your basic internet security set up. This tool helps combat spyware and adware. There is a good mixture of free and paid versions on offer. Good free software include Microsoft’s Windows Defender, Spybot S&D or Ewido Anti-Malware. Ewido Anti-Malware is frequently recommended in computer help forums. Be careful if you decide to purchase a solution. There are a number of rogue vendors out there which aggressively push products which offer you little value. Stick to trusted names like Webroot’s Spy Sweeper or PC Tool’s Spyware Doctor. These products always come out well on independent tests.

Navino launched its search engine gateway service recently. For most of the Internet surfers, search engine gateway is a pretty new concept compared with meta search engine or multi search engine. Put it in simple, it is a web service, which can let you search the best information from the best content providers in one website.

When we try to find information everyday, most of us might go to Google.com. Yes, it’s true. Most of the time, Google works well. But does Google return the best information? I guess you would agree that the search engine’s ranking algorithm could only give a good answer, but not the best. Well, you may ask, where can I get the BEST? The best weather information? The best book information? The best price for your favorite mp3 player? The short answer is from the brain, from the hand picked information. Therefore, Navino’s editors and their users give out that the best weather website is weather.com, the best book website is amazon.com and the best price information is froogle.

Besides best hand picked information resources, Navino also provide the search engine gateway technology. Using this technology, you can search all the best website at Navino. All you need to do is to add a unique search name before your searching keywords.

For example, if you want to search New York’s weather, you can search with ‘weather New York’ and you will be forwarded to weather.com with the keyword ‘New York’. If you want to search finance books, you can search with ‘book finance’ and you will be forwarded to amazon.com with the keyword ‘finance’. If you want to search the best price for your favorite mp3 player, you can search with ‘price mp3 player’ and you will be forwarded to froogle with the keyword ‘mp3 player’.

Navino search engine gateway is very convenient for your everyday web surfing. Besides that, Navino also provides its users to customize their own search engine gateway and allows its users to recommend search names for public use.

ased on my research, this seems to be the basic principle that website owners have been following to get passive income online:

* Get many people to come to your website
* Get them to click on your Adsense links

Sounds simple enough. Get people into your website from Google search, then link out to an Adsense Ad. Search In – Adsense Out.

Practically applying it to get sufficient commendable income, however, can be quite a challenge.

The first problem is how to get many visitors to your website.

That’s where Search Engine Optimization comes in. However, this is really easier said that done. It’s a bit of an artwork. You basically have to read the mind of an Internet user. What keywords would he use? Why would he visit your website? Do you have the content go get people interested enough to get to your website?

Basically, your goal is visibility. You have to be seen. You can do this using SEO or using traditional brand-building methods. Tell your friends, family and colleagues. If they have websites, politely ask if you could link with each other.

For those lucky few that are already on top of the search engines, this is not a problem. Others (including myself) would have to work hard at it. Look at FilipinoLinks.com. It’s been around for a very long time and has made quite a foundation. It would not be too difficult for its owners to tweak the website for SEO.

Experts have varied opinions on what to put in a website. Some say, put relevant important content – with around 500-1000 words on each of your website. Some say provide simple 300 word news posts.

Another option to get clicks would be to advertise online for keywords. Adwords is an example of a tool that can allow you to do this. There will be marketing expenses in this scenario. The goal here is to get more Adsense income than Adwords Expenses – which is really basic business sense. This is easier said than done, I tried it and got dismal results.

The next problem would be how to get visitors to click on Adsense links.

Well, the first thing that needs to be done is to get an Adsense account. It’s pretty easy to setup. After that, you need to put the Adsense links on your website. There are people who say make it blend it when the rest of your pages. Here, on my website, you can see my Adsense Ads that seem to be part of the overall theme.

Other experts say the more noticeable the advertisements, the more they will be clicked. In this case, the Ads stand out prominently – with a different, and sometimes contrasting color scheme. One tip given was actually position the Google Ad right next to an image/picture. Viewers tend to click on picture links, so more income potential income there.
What does this all mean for a Filipino Entrepreneur?

In my point of view, it means opportunities. Although I have just started experimenting on all of this myself, there seems to be a real possibility of gaining a little revenue. For example, I started this website (last January) and have,in my first month I gained US$7 from Adsense. It’s not much but consider this:

* My expenses so far have been the webhosting (US$4 monthly), and domain name (US$3 for one year – got it at a discount).
* If I continue getting US$7 a month, that would be, US$84 a year.
* My year’s hosting would be US$48
* My theoretical income for one year would be US$33.

There are other costs, of course, from writing the content for this website – electricity, less time to do other things, etc… I didn’t include it yet. If you had pre-existing content, this wouldn’t matter to you. Just upload it and you should be ready.

For example, if you had a song lyrics database, you could find a pretty reliable web developer, have him upload your database, and include AdSense. Optimize it for search and you should soon get some revenue. It will probably not be big, but enough to get you interested.

I remember on my last test with the wordtracker application, “Pinoy Ako Lyrics” were some of the top keywords I found. People were actually looking for lyrics of Filipino songs. Since new songs come out every month, whoever gets the lyrics out soonest would be found earlier.

If you had a database of all Philippine Lotto Results ever since it began, you could probably have a statistics analyzer custom-made from your website. It could give suggested lotto numbers based on historical info. That would be something a lot of people would go to.

There are probably other more interesting opportunities for the web-savvy Pinoy entrepreneur. As long as you get people to your website, and get them to click on an advertisement, there will be revenue.