| Saturday,
March 8, 2003 There was a temporary problem at the web site
host that prevented access to this page, but clearly it's fixed now.
I have fixed the following. Thanks to all who responded.
Does anyone remember offhand how to change the default name of a
computer's owner and organization? I know it's relatively simple but I
forgot what it is. Also, is there any easy way to find out what that name
is?
That is: I have a machine that doesn't know it belongs to me, and so
when I install new software I have to type in my name and organization
each time. I'd as soon change that, but I forgot how.
One reader said "Go to Control Panel/Performance and
Maintenance/system and click on the "Computer Name" Tab,"
but that takes you to the computer's name on the network. I am trying to
change the machine's owner and organization, so that when I install new
stuff the machine already knows who it belongs to. It's a registry key,
and I expect I can find it if I look hard enough, but someone will know...
Well, I found it. Open RegEdit and search for RegOwner. The default
setting is "Your Name" and "Your Company Name". I
should have known this but I didn't.
I just got this from a Navy lifeline group
associated with Phil's former ship:
Message: 1 Date: Wed, 05 Mar 2003 06:06:39
-0000
From: (A KNOWN SOURCE)
Subject: Please avoid this website
SUBJECT: NACEC.org Website.
This was sent by the support group for a US Navy ship.
According to Snopes
http://www.snopes.com/rumors/nacec.asp
it is in error. I am still looking for something official from Navy
sources; the support groups for a ship are run by the families of sailors,
and aren't entirely official.
All I really know is that the warning has been sent to us by families
of US Navy sailors on active duty. Whether they have better or worse
sources than Snopes I don't know. I have found Snopes not 100% reliable
when it comes to judgment calls involving political viewpoints different
from theirs.
As I said in the previous mailing, I have no data beyond the email from
the ship's Lifeline group. It's certainly possible they are overly
cautious., and NAEC.org on its web site has an impressive list of
credentials, as well as a rather snippy tone.
http://www.nacec.org/DODMemoMain.html
I suppose that tone is understandable, but I also note that they now
say that their flashmail "no longer" requires social security
numbers, which implies that at one time it did; doubtless one of the
reasons for suspicion.
In any event, I don't have any misgivings about be safe rather than
sorry in instances like this.
On that score:
Snopes says, rather imperiously, that "overzealousness can be just
as harmful as laxity." In my judgment that depends on the overzeal
and what measures are taken.
Overzealousness that results in someone going to jail or being shot ore
even missing an airplane is quite different from overzealousness that
warns people to be suspicious about those asking for social security
numbers and other personal data. The NACEC site says that checking them
out would "would have been a very simple
task. One that a high school student could have accomplished in about 5-10
minutes by checking us out through the Minnesota State Attorney Generals
web site or perhaps through their school or public library." For
reasons not entirely clear to me, Snopes quotes them as saying as
the NACEC noted, "a high school student could have accomplished in
about 5-10 minutes by checking us out through the Minnesota Secretary of
State's web site or perhaps through their school or public
library").
Since I haven't tried checking with either the Attorney General or the
Secretary of State, and I am not sure that a military officer's wife is
going to have a lot of time going to a school or public library to look up
credentials (or that she could do it in 5-10 minutes for that matter), I
can't say which is the best way to verify NACEC's bona fides. But then
later NACEC says the warning wasn't a good faith error at all, but rather
"For this reason, I believe the memo was
not really intended to be an Alert to a potential threat, but rather a
direct attack by one or more individuals within ACERT using ACERT's
official and respected DOD channels in an attempt to discredit and damage
the integrity of this organization, myself as founder, and our many hard
working volunteers, many of whom are military family members."
which makes me wonder if the Navy support group hasn't wandered into
some kind of bureaucratic rivalry buzz saw. I have no idea of what NACEC
is, or what salaries (if any at all) are paid to its executives; I do know
that non-profits can be quite profitable for those who work for them
(Elizabeth Dole was probably paid more to head the Red Cross than she now
gets as a US Senator). Note I don't say that the salaries and perks are
undeserved, or even that NACEC pays any; but as a general proposition,
working for a non-profit is not always itself an act of charity, and the
rivalry for fund raising can get pretty stiff.
Nor am I aware of what ACERT is, which is apparently a government
agency responsible for generating the warning in the first place.
Me, as I said earlier, I'd rather be safe than sorry. Just for the
moment my son is no longer out in the Gulf, but the crews he trained are.
I don't at all mind being safe rather than sorry; if that's
overzealousness, ok, I am overzealous.
In any event this has generated two mailings to subscribers,
and this stuff here, and it's quite enough. And see
mail for a comment by a senior retired Navy officer.
For another subject and something interesting see SCO
vs IBM...
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