October 2014

Over the last few years I’ve lost count of the number of times I have emailed staff and customers to make them aware of opening attachments from an unknown source.

One customer even suffered at the hands of the CryptoLocker which started to encrypt a network share. Once I had recovered the data I locked down the TMP folders to ensure that ZIP files and EXE files could not run from these locations. This does have a knock on affect of stopping legitimate applications installing if the try to run from these locations, however that is easily overcome.

Last week I had a frantic call from a lady who had received an email purporting to contain an invoice, but the email was from an unknown source. So she proceeded to open the attachment which was in the form of a word document and then was prompted to enable macros’. Instead of contacting me first to find out if this was a safe thing to to, she continued, her PC started to behave erratically then blue screened on her. My advice was to turn off the computer and leave it until I could take a look.

I’m not sure if it is more to do with curiosity than anything else when it comes to attachments. There seems to be this external force telling you you must open this attachment whether you know it is legitimate or not. Still I suppose if IT was plain and simple and these problems did not exist then I might well be out of a job.

I need to order 2 FTTC services for a customer as part of a new network installation and VOIP telephone service in preparation for an office move.

The customer is moving into a large industrial estate, so I used the customers existing ADSL service provider to do a service check on FTTC based on the postcode and actual address to narrow it down and yes according to their systems we can get FTTC at between 25Mbps and 35Mbps down and 6.1Mpbs and 7.7Mbps up. Fantastic and a vast improvement on their current bonded ADSL solution which as best provides about 5.5Mbps down a 1Mbps up. Even BT’s wholesale checker says it is available and even gives the cabinet number associated with the service and the potential speeds we will get.

Now here is the rub, BT cannot and will not confirm that FTTC is available until they have a telephone number on which to run a test, WHAT!!!, This is BT, they own everything telecom but they cannot tell you what services are available in a particular area. Even BT say they are not sure the service is available and won’t until the lines are installed. So I now have to order 2 x analog lines which may be wasted if FTTC is not available. I have no choice but to order these on a 12 months minimum contract at a cost of £210 to find out if I can purchase the rest of the services I require. I will also be expected to start paying line rental as soon as the lines are live. Non of the service providers will give us a cast iron certainty that we can get the services. In this day and age this sucks. If BT cannot deliver I will then have to order another 2 analog lines with bonded ADSL to get a half decent service that may or may not be good enough to support both data and VOIP. The lead time is critical for us moving but if, after installing the lines, the FTTC service is not available, then my lead times go out of the window.

We have spent weeks speccing a telephone system, costing it and deciding on a provider and it could all go out of the window because BT don’t know their arse from their elbow. Its beggars belief that we as a country have to put up this this crap from the only supplier in the country that can supposedly deliver the goods. ARRRRRGGHHHHHH!.