I had a backup. Really.

I'm an expert! I have proof!

Well, my webcast with Mike Nash of Microsoft went really well. It aired Tuesday morning at 8:30am PST, and it's archived here. It requires IE, dragging the slider over to 25:40 into the program is where my segment started. It was 17:30 long.

This webcast was was written about in SearchWindowsSecurity.com.

Now that Microsoft says I'm a security expert, I guess it must be true :-)

Tooting my own horn: Microsoft Security webcast

Next Tuesday at 8:30am, I'll be appearing on a Security360 webcast with Microsoft VP of Security Mike Nash on the topic of malicious software. Mike's doing the webcast live, and it will include a taped roundtable discussion with three security "experts": Stephen Toulouse ("stepto") of the Microsoft Security Response Center, Michael Cherry, an independent analyst at Directions on Microsoft, and (ahem) me. We taped this segement in Redmond yesterday.

The target audience is more executive than technical, and it won't include much that security-savvy people don't already know (malware is getting worse, keep your systems patched, run XP/SP2, educate your users, etc.). The discussion was lively, and I think our segment was about 20 minutes long. We got it in one take.

Microsoft has some beautiful broadcast-quality facilities.

The event is Tuesday morning, and it will be archived for later viewing.

Mike Nash's Security360 series

Tuesday's event: Managing Risk of Malicious Software «- use this link

Internet Explorer required.

Do you like Food and Open Source?

If so, then why not help out at the Chef Moz project!

This is an online dining guide (a part of the Open Directory Project, and all the data is available with a free license.

The project accepts submissions of new restaurants - there are now more than 2 million entries worldwide - and reviews of those restaurants, and all contributions are checked by volunteer editors: I'm one of them. A system of moderation is the only way to keep the data useful (a disgruntled employee's "review" is really easy to spot).

Please help: enter or review restaurants near you, and if contributing to an open directory project is to your liking, apply to become an editor for your town. I am editor for Tustin and Irvine California (I've applied for a few more).

I've been making it a point to eat at many of the small restaurants in town, always taking a to-go menu with me, and I've discovered some real gems.

It's a worthy project.

How to run a crappy ecommerce site: element5

Well my ongoing difficulties with Element 5 continue. These folks do credit-card processing for various online merchants, and they really don't seem to "get it" on customer service.

First, they are located in Europe, so any authorization they perform for US-based customers are flagged as "suspicious" by the credit card companies. This is not really their fault - they are where they are - but looking on their website does not provide one single clue on "how to deal with us if you're in the United States".

On a previous purchase - from the dimwits at Central Command, a US-based company that uses a European processor - I attempted five transactions on three different cards without success, but the only information one gets from the denial messages or from the website doesn't say say anything like "Hey, we're in Europe, this is how we recommend you talk to your credit card company". Instead they mainly suggest making sure I entered my card number correctly and calling my bank.

The dimwits at Central Command saw positively nothing wrong with using a European processor, and they lost a multi-hundred dollar sale because it was just too hard to do business with them. I can understand why somebody in Europe would use them, but I have not met anybody who knew anything about this business who could find a good reason for an American company to do this.

So today I tried to make a $70 purchase from a Russian company (Famatech, the makers of the outstanding RAdmin remote-access software), and of course it was denied this time. Rather than play games with my credit card company, I tried calling Element5's US-based support number.

I hung on hold for 90 minutes before being disconnected by their phone system, and when I called back I was told that their offices were closed, and had been for the last 30 minutes. These guys haven't figured out how to run their call center properly to at least cut off the calls when there was no chance of answering, or (better) play a message apologizing for this. I guess I'm not their customer, so they don't really care.

Element 5 is owned by Digital River, a large US-based processor, but this doesn't seem to make any difference to the banks. I find it very hard to believe that I'm the only one who has this problem or is exasperated that there doesn't seem to be a way to resolve this.