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e-Mail

We can offer a number of e-mail solutions from simply hosting your e-mail accounts on our server to installing and configuring Microsoft Exchange or Novell Groupwise servers. Giving you internal and external mail and scheduling sytems, together with remote mail boxes and web mail access.

Once you have a mail system it needs to be administered, there is a legal requirement for archiving mail and Servers need protection against external attack. There is also the ever present menace of Spam and viruses, together with possible inappropriate use by staff.

Our consultants can offer a solution to suit your business no matter how big or small, together with the services to keep your e-mail secure and spam free. We will even produce acceptable use policies and guide lines for your staff. Please contact us for further information.

Protection Services

Together with our Partners we can provide perhaps the most comprehensive protection against Viruses, Spam, Phishing and Spy-ware. Their track record is astonishing - they can guarantee your emails will be 100% free from viruses, and their spam filters are proven to remove 95% of spam emails, with only 1/250'000 false positives (A false positive is when a non-spam email is identified as spam).

Users pay a subscription to recieve these services, and after this all of your email/web traffic is then redirected to Message Labs, who run it through their extensive filtering systems before sending it on to you. The quality of the service is reflected in the cost, but this is one of the most comprehensive security solutions available.

How web scanning works

Spam

In a recent survey, junk or “Spam” email was voted the thing most people associated with the internet. Although not as dangerous as viruses, Spam can be a terrible drain on productivity, and nobody wants the trouble of sifting through 50 emails to get through to the relevant ones every morning. A lot of internet service providers have introduced their own Spam filtering systems, which have reduced the problem to an extent. There are also good products available that stamp out Spam altogether - if you’re having problems with persistent unsolicited emails, check our endorsed products section for software that we know can deal with it.

Phishing

Phishing is the act of fraudulently trying to obtain sensitive information (such as credit card details or passwords) while posing as a trustworthy person or institution. The word Phishing arises from the use of progressively sophisticated “lures” to fish for peoples information. A lot of phishing began with people using AOL instant messenger to get other users details, but now it more commonly takes the form of an email from a bank or similar, asking you to verify your account details. If you follow the link in the email, you’ll be taken to a webpage set up to look identical to the banks own, with perhaps only an imperceptibly small difference in the sites address to alert you to what’s going on.

Common sense and vigilance are the easiest response to Phishing. A good spam filter will drastically reduce the amount of Phishing mail that you get to see, and there are programs that you can install which monitor for the tell tale signs of false web pages.

Viruses

The dictionary defines a Virus as a computer program that is designed to replicate itself by copying itself into the other programs stored in a computer. Most viruses are created by enthusiasts and programming students, but while many aren’t intended to be malicious their presence alone can cause all manner of disruption to businesses and their systems.

The main problem with viruses is how quickly and easily they proliferate across the internet. If you use email, transfer data online or browse the web then you will inevitably encounter an infected file at some point. If a file on your computer becomes infected, and is subsequently loaded into the computers memory the possibilities are endless. Potentially any data you have can be accessed and distributed; the virus can replicate itself all over your computer and any connected to it on the network. Some viruses then use your computer to spread itself to the next machine over the internet. There are many anti virus programs available that can protect your files from infection, but it can be extremely difficult to remove them once infected – a virus can change its name, the name of files that windows needs to work properly and even corrupt anti-virus software while it’s being installed.

Since new viruses are being created all the time and existing ones are constantly evolving, software companies have to work hard to keep their anti-virus programs up to date. The most common practice is for companies to provide these updates (often daily or weekly) for download from their websites, and to charge a subscription fee for these services. Most anti-virus products come with a year’s subscription.

If you would like more information on anti-virus software, or our recommendations on which packages are best suited to which situations, please contact us via E-mail or telephone.