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Greetings from Polar's E-Connections Team
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E-Mail
Scam - Watch For
IRS E-Mail Scams During Tax Season
It's a familiar scenario.
As April 15th approaches, the amount of tax-related spam increases. The
Internal Revenue Service has identified at least 105 different e-mail scams
featuring the fraudulent use of the government agency's logo and Web address.
While there are variations of the IRS e-mail scam (some promise a tax refund
and others threaten an audit), your response should always be exactly the same
— DO NOTHING EXCEPT DELETE IT. Do not click links in the body of the e-mail and
do not provide any information. Remember, the IRS never sends e-mail messages
to taxpayers. If they need to contact you about a tax refund or audit, they
will do so by mail.
These e-mail messages are phishing scams aimed at
bilking you out of personal information such as your Social Security number and
bank account numbers. Scammers are capitalizing on the fact that more than half
of all tax returns are now filed electronically. For example, a recent e-mail
claiming to be from the IRS contained this message: "You filed your tax
return and you're expecting a refund. You have just one question and you want
the answer now. Where's My Refund? Access this secure Web site to find out . .
." When victims click on the link, they find an IRS site that looks
official but is actually a fake.
The good news is that you can help shut down these schemes and prevent others
from being victimized. If you receive a suspicious e-mail that claims to come from
the IRS, relay that e-mail to this IRS mailbox: phishing@irs.gov.
The IRS can use the information, URLs, and links in the suspicious e-mail
messages that you send to trace the hosting site and alert authorities.
Polar
Encourages - Email Password
Security
We all know how annoying
and troublesome it is to have to keep up with a changing list of passwords, but
passwords are our first, and perhaps only line of defense between our personal
information/privacy and the malicious hackers and evildoers in the world. This
makes passwords perhaps the most important security tool in our security
arsenal.
With the increased hacker activity lately keeping your passwords fresh and
secure is ever more important. It is a very good idea to change your email
password every month and to use a good strong password.
Changing your email password is easy. All you have to do is go to your PolarComm hosted webmail at https://webmail.polarcomm.com
and log in with your email address and current password. Then you can click on
Options, and Change Password.
It is a bad idea to use any common word or name for your password. Hackers have
methods to find out if your email address is a legitimate email account, then
they have programs that will try all the words in an unabridged dictionary and
all the names in the
The best password is a random collection of at least six or eight characters
that are a combination of upper and lowercase letters, numbers and punctuation.
There is a very good website for randomly generating passwords at http://www.pctools.com/guides/password/.
Another suggestion is to take two unrelated words and join them with some
random numbers and punctuation (like yaCht*54orAnge
yacht-54-orange) .
If you would like to know if your password is a strong one there is a nifty
password checker at http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/privacy/password_checker.mspx
I would recommend that the password for your public uses - like access to email
and web sites - never be the same as the password you use to log in to your
computer, and absolutely not what you use for banking or other important
accounts. If those passwords are the same then if an intruder gains access to
your email it will also be easy for them to break in to your computer.
People in places like military bases and secure government installations are
proscribed from writing passwords down, but for personal computer users writing
down a hard to remember password and keeping it in a safe place away from
prying eyes can save you a lot of work when you forget what your password is.
There are many password management programs like zsafe
(a free program you can get at http://z-soft.z-portal.info/zsafe/)
or MyPasswordManager (http://www.mypasswordmanager.com/)
that you can get to keep a safe encrypted list of your passwords on a disk, and
then you only need to absolutely remember the one password to open the program
and look up the others. Many people like to keep their password manager program
on an inexpensive memory stick they can carry with them to whatever computer
they might be using. Even though these programs are mentioned here, the PolarComm helpdesk cannot support them, and if you lose the
password to open the program you are just out of luck, so guard that one and memorize
it well.
Remember that if you use PolarComm dial-up internet
service (not DSL) when you change your email password you are also changing the
password you use to connect to dial-up internet.
At some time in the future there will be a solution where you can easily change
your DSL or broadband password. Watch for news of this feature in future
announcements. In the meantime if you want to change your DSL password please
call the
If you would like to read more about passwords and how to use and manage them
take a look at http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1537.
Ask The Help Desk - Where's
The Correct Place For E-Mail Replies?
Question: When I reply to an e-mail, I
put my reply at the top of the message pane (above the sender's original
message). Most of my friends and family do the same thing. However, I
correspond with a few people who reply to e-mail messages at the bottom of the
message pane. Which way is correct?
Answer: Congratulations! You come out on top in this debate. Typing
your e-mail reply message at the top of previously sent correspondence is
considered proper etiquette. This just makes sense from an efficiency
standpoint, especially when you have a series of messages going back and forth
between two people. When the most recent reply is at the top of the message
pane, it's right there in front of the receiver and ready to be read. By
contrast, when the reply is placed at the bottom, the receiver has to waste
time scrolling down the e-mail to find it.
Great
Sites To Check Out This Month
Astounding Stats
http://nationmaster.com/index.php - Any idea what the least populated country in the
world is? It's
March is Women's History Month
http://history.com/minisites/womenhist - According to the U.S. Census Bureau, women now
outnumber men in this country (152 million compared with 148 million). If women
of the past are any indication, today's women will continue to make valuable
contributions in every field. This site celebrates Women's History Month with a
look at groundbreaking American women throughout the years. For example, did
you know that Victoria Chaflin Woodhull was the first
female presidential candidate in 1872? Check out the list of Firsts in Women’s
Achievement, the History of Women's Suffrage, and the National Women's Hall of
Fame. It's an inspiring tour through the lives of amazing women.
Laughter on Ice
http://bladesofglorymovie.com - For the first time in the history of the sport, two
men (Will Ferrell and Jon Heder, star of Napoleon
Dynamite) compete as a figure skating pair. That's the premise behind this
lighthearted comedy from DreamWorks, which promises to spin, lift, and jump its
way through laugh after laugh. (The skating costumes alone are worth a
chuckle.) See the trailer at this site and register for updates on special
events and promotions.
Wealth of Money Tools
http://smartmoney.com/worksheets - Different stages of life generate different types of
financial decisions. Should I buy or lease a car? How much house can we afford?
How much should I save for college? How long will my money last once I retire?
This site contains a broad range of step-by-step financial worksheets to help
you find the answers you need. It's easy to use and a smart resource for making
informed choices about buying, saving, investing, and borrowing.
Join the Fun of Fantasy Baseball
http://www.mlb.com/mlb/fantasy/wsfb/info/index.jsp - The free fantasy baseball game, MLB.com Open, starts
a new season on April 2nd. So now's the time to join the fun
and compete for the $10,000 prize. The easy-to-play game is designed for
fantasy participants of all skill levels so anyone can take a swing at it. Play
with your friends in your own private league or test your skills as an
individual against a random group of eleven other participants. Get complete
contest rules and register online, then check out the site's stats on team
records, players, draft action, and more.
Short
Tutorial - Manually
Adjusting Time Settings To Match Earlier DST Start
As a result of the U.S.
Energy Policy Act of 2005, Daylight Saving Time (DST) is set to begin three
weeks earlier this year on March 11th. (Congress decided that more early
evening daylight would translate into energy savings.) Most
To help you "spring ahead" this year without stumbling, just follow these steps:
Windows Users
- Go to this webpage: http://support.microsoft.com/gp/cp_dst
and read the introduction to see whether you need to update your PC for
the new daylight savings time law.
- Select the option that best applies to you from the
list and then click "Next."
- Select your operating system and click
"Next."
- To download the update for the system you selected,
click the "Download" button.
- You will be asked if you want to download the update
to your disk or run it immediately. Either way is fine, but for the
purpose of this tutorial, we will choose to run the update. Click the
"Run" button.
- The "Internet Explorer - Security Warning"
dialog box will appear. Click the "Run" button again.
- The first screen of the "Software Update
Installation Wizard" will appear. Click the "Next" button.
- The "License Agreement" screen will appear
next. Click on "I Agree" to agree to the terms and then click
the "Next" button.
- The final screen of the installation wizard will
appear. Click the "Finish" button.
- When the installation wizard quits, you will return to
the "Update your operating system" window in Internet Explorer.
Click the "Next" button.
- Some other programs will require additional updates.
Select the program you would like to update and then continue. This
applies mostly to Outlook users, not Outlook Express users. If you are an
Outlook Express user or if you use Thunderbird or some other e-mail client,
select "I do not use Outlook" and click the "Next"
button. If you do use any of those programs, mark them and follow the
directions.
- The "I do not use Outlook" window will
appear. Click the "Next" button.
- You are now finished. As the final screen says, there
is no reason to restart.
Resetting
System's Clock On PC
If the time on your computer is incorrect, it may still be necessary to reset
the clock on your system. To do this, follow these steps.
- Click on the "Start" menu and select
"Control Panel."
- With the Control Panel open, click on the link for
"Date, Time, Language, and Regional Options."
- With the "Date, Time, Language, and Regional
Options" window open, click on the "Date and Time" link.
- Click on the "Date & Time" tab and
adjust the clock.
- Once you've adjusted the time, click the
"Apply" button and the "OK" button.
Mac OS
X Users
For information on updates for your systems, go to this web page: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305056
Macintosh users running Mac OS X 10.4.5 or later are good to go. No update is
needed. For some previous systems, there is an update linked to that page.
Download and follow its instructions.
We hope you found this
newsletter to be informative. It's our way of keeping you posted on the happenings
here. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins on a monthly
basis, click HERE.
Thanks for your business!
Best regards,
The E-Connections
Team
Polar E-Connections
Polar Communications
110 4th St E
Park River, ND 58270
800-284-7222 
(We have used our best efforts in collecting and preparing the information
published herein. However, we do not assume, and hereby disclaim, any and all
liability for any loss or damage caused by errors or omissions, whether such
errors or omissions resulted from negligence, accident, or other causes.)
©2007
Cornerstone Publishing Group Inc.
Trademarks: All brand names and product names used in this eNewsletter
are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their
respective owners.