If you’re anything like me then you look at an uptime figure of 99% and automatically assume “that’s good” – but have you ever sat down and worked out exactly what that equates to in time?

I know I haven’t, but Pingdom have come to my/our rescue with their handy Uptime / Downtime Conversion cheat sheet.

One can see at a  glance the difference between 99% and 99.9% uptime per month and per year. If you’re running a service that needs to remain up 24*7 then per month then it’s a difference of 6hrs 29m which increases to 3d 6hr 50m per year – suddenly 99% doesn’t look that good.

I like to attend InfoSec occasionally.

In fact so occasional that I won’t say when the last time was. Anyway, this year it falls on a date when I can make it and due to a recent renewing of an acquaintance via twitter has made me want to do it. So I start looking into the cost of train tickets and planning it when it dawns on me that my workplace would probably pay for the jolly.

So I ask the boss expecting a simple yes or no. Instead I get, and this is the daft bit, requested to “explain what benefit this will be to me and the business” in a paragraph!

Well strike me down if I’m being silly, but surely it’s obvious? I work in network support and most of my day is spent digging in the bowels of firewalls, IDS’s, load balancers, routers and switches.I think I can safely say that over 70% of my day is spent on Information Security (emphasis mine).

Then again it might just be me.

How seriously do you take your role as a tech volunteer (whether paid or not) within your Church?

Is it just something you do because you can? Or is it because you feel called to the role or even because you were asked (probably by the pastor) to do it, or do you do it because you feel called to the role and this is your vision? The reality is that it shouldn’t matter which of these caused you to be where you are but I have found that with the few christian techs that I know in person it does make a difference.

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I first published this article over at ChurchTechMatters.com where I’m a guest writer in a fledgling enterprise to get a bunch of Christian Tech Heads sharing their ‘stuff’ – but I wanted to be able to reference it more directly so here it is in unedited form – enjoy.

I’ve been working in computing for 25yrs now and to be honest, not much surprises me anymore. Oh sure, human culpability and stupidity are ones that never cease to amaze me – but in terms of computer security I’m 99.9% confident of keeping my personal machine clean and free from harm. In 25yrs I have only once been infected by a virus, rootkit, malware or other unwanted nasty and that was my deliberate fault. I can’t say the same for the machines I’ve used in my professional life though – most of the times I’ve had to put up with restrictions that are meant to be there for the common good, but ultimately cause us techies grief.

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One of the reasons I got into public blogging was to try and make contact with others like me.

Preferably in the UK so that I could build relationships with them and call on their talents and them mine as and when necessary. I wanted to be a part of a larger setup that I could get encouragement from or direction or any number of other things that a persons soul requires from time to time.

However, that process is slow so in the meantime I’ve become friendly with some Americans and look forward to deepening relationships with these folks. One day I would dearly love to meet them face to face. Today, I spot an advert for Ministry Tech and confess, the green eyed monster hit me. How I would love for the UK to have this sort of conference or failing that for me to have the funds to attend – unfortunately I don’t see either being realistic for years to come …

So yes, I’m jealous. But jealous in a good way guys so don’t fret too much for my soul.

Passwords – They aren’t rocket science … but perhaps they should be.

Graham Cluley of Sophos blog post reminds me that I’ve been meaning to do my little bit about passwords. Certainly Graham’s method is one I’ve used and one I have suggested to more folks than I can recall, but I remain unconvinced that this sticks or even that it ends up being used for every password. However, go read and watch his vid for yourself.
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I like this, I like it a lot.

EFF have created a sub site Surveillance Self-Defense.

Although this is an American project I’m certain the information will be just as useful on my side of the pond as well. We in the UK have been recognised as living in one of the most restricted, spied upon Western nation in the world. Our civil liberties are being eroded daily by our Government all in the name of protecting us – trouble is, most ordinary folks don’t see it that way.

Anyway, this new EFF site has a simple mandate that can best be summed up in two questions:

What can the government legally do to spy on your computer data and
communications? And what can you legally do to protect yourself against
such spying?

I receive a semi-regular newsletter from Internet Evangelism Day – an extract of which is below:

“I recently discovered that over 500,000
of the population of my home town use the networking website Facebook,” writes
a surprised computer user. Remarkably, 1.5 billion people now access the Web for
a wide range of activities. A new internet service called ‘Twitter’ recently
enabled eyewitnesses to pass on to thousands of other people their firsthand
accounts (with pictures) of the jet that ditched in the Hudson River, well
before TV and radio could tell the story. The digital world seems to change
every time we blink!

Go read the rest here – but be aware that this opens an MS Word document. IED is a an initiative of the Internet Evangelism Coalition.