December 2011 IT Security and Help Desk Newsletter

Holiday Security Topic - Social Engineering - Hacking Your Mind

We will be providing a PDF of this article and future articles.  These articles are provided the University of Colorado Office of Information Security. Social Engineering - Hacking Your Mind

Reminder about Holiday Shopping and Email Scams

As you are purchasing gifts online this season, make sure your checkout page is protected.  The easiest way to tell is there will be a little lock or "https://" in the browser bar.  There is also a rise in the amount of phishing attempts this time of year.  Emails claiming to be a purchase or delivery confirmation are not always what they seem.  If you are not expecting specific emails from UPS, FedEx, Amazon, etc., make sure you verify the link that you are going to in an email is legitimate by hovering your mouse over the link.  This will display the actual page you will go to if you click on the link.  Watch out for email attachments as well.  If you don't know who sent the file to you or it is a "zip" file from the UPS, FedEx, etc, it's best not to click on it.

Update or Fix Your Computer Over Break

The semester is quickly winding down, if your computer has been having problems over the semester or just limping along to get through finals the break is a great time to have IT work on your computer.  Just give us a call and we can arrange to pick up your computer and deliver it to your office once the work is completed.

Accessing the Campus From Home -

If you need to access the campus from home or while you are traveling some of these links may come in handy.

Outlook Web App for Exchange -  https://exchange.uccs.edu

Webmail (fi you haven't been migratged - https://webmail.uccs.edu

VPN's for the Library and Resources - http://www.uccs.edu/helpdesk/top5/vpn.html

Mobile Device Configuration - http://www.uccs.edu/helpdesk/Mobile-Devices.html

Keeping Campus Safe - The Numbers

Incoming spam and malicious emails kept out of your inbox in the past 30 days: 4,259,667 which accounts for about 76% of all incoming email

Software Update Notes

Microsoft December Updates - Please make sure you save your work before you head home tonight (12/13).  The updates may cause your computer to reboot.

Mac December Updates - Be sure to update your Mac, click on the Apple icon in the top left corner and click on Software Update... be sure to install all updates.

Adobe Reader Update - Please update your Adobe Reader.  This update affects both OSX and Windows. More Info

Latest Firefox version: 8.00 and 3.6.24

Latest Google Chrome Version: 16.0.912.63