In conjunction with our suppot policy, we want to let you know that Microsoft is ending support for Windows Vista on April 11, 2017. As a result, we will no longer provide free support for systems running Windows Vista either, beyond providing basic email settings.

All customers should consider migrating to newer Windows 7 or Windows 10 systems to continue to get security updates. We can help with suggestions on how to get an up to date system, or help you move your personal data to a new system for a reasonable fee.

Windows Vista Desktop

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WordPress 4.2 “Powell” has been released. The team has done it again, adding new features and improving the WordPress experience. Have a look at this video for the highlights.

This release adds a number of new improvements including:

• Easier content sharing with an improved “Press This” feature
• Switch themes from the Customizer
• Plugin updates have been streamlined
• New automatic embeds for Tumblr and Kickstarter
• Extended character support for Asian languages, music and mathematical symbols, hieroglyphs, even emoji
• They’ve also added a number of ‘under the hood’ improvements

We’ll be upgrading VIP client sites up to the latest version this week.

Do It Yourself Upgrade

The built in upgrade tool from the WordPress dashboard can be used to upgrade your site at any time. Just log in to your Dashboard, then go to Updates. From there, just click on the “Update Now”.

Upgrading WordPress is Easy!

Professional Upgrade Service

If you would like assistance with your site from one of our professionals, fill in our online form. We charge $25 for a basic upgrade, which will include upgrades to the WordPress core, as well as any themes or plugins that need an upgrade. A full site and database backup is performed before we do the upgrade.

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Secure by Design is pleased to announce the availability of fibre-optic broadband internet service in the downtown core of Trail, BC.  New internet speeds of up to 100mbps (upload and download), as well as email, web hosting, data backup services, all backed by our award winning support team are now available to Trail businesses.

Secure by Design was founded in 2008 by Kirk Ismay. With nearly 20 years in the industry, Kirk and his team continue to build a solid reputation for providing quality internet solutions for the Kootenays and beyond.

Don Freschi, Chair of the Trail Broadband Committee states: “This is the first step towards building intelligent communities that allow our businesses to adapt and prosper in the growing digital economy.”  Trail is well situated to host technology firms as it has good connectivity, a technology business incubator, and a new state of the art data centre.  The open access model will allow ISPs to compete for customers and offer a wide range of network services over fibre.

To request more information for broadband services on the Trail fibre network, fill in our service inquiry form, email sales@sbd.im, or call (877) 373-6121.  To learn more about Secure by Design, visit http://www.secure-by-design.com/

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WordPress 4.0 “Benny” has been released, with a number of improvements to make editing your web site in WordPress a smoother, more visual experience. The editor, media embedding,  media manager, and plugins page have all been given a make over in this release.

Secure by Design has been using WordPress as our go to Content Management System for all of our new web sites since 2008. We’ve helped deploy or host more than 100 WordPress powered web sites.  In addition to the solid WordPress core, we also have access to premium themes & plugins including Video Tutorials, StudioPress themes, and GravityForms.

Do It Yourself Upgrade

The built in upgrade tool from the WordPress dashboard can be used to upgrade your site at any time.

Upgrading WordPress is Easy!

Full Service Assisted Upgrade

If you would like assistance with your site from one of our professionals, fill in our online form. We charge $25 for a basic upgrade, which will include upgrades to the WordPress core, as well as any themes or plugins that need an upgrade. A full site and database backup is performed before we do the upgrade.

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WordPress 3.9 “Smith” was released on April 16th, with a minor maintenance update to 3.9.1 on May 8th. This new release has a number of exciting new features. Watch this video for a great overview:

New features include:

• A smoother media editing experience
• Improved visual editing
• Easy image editing
• Drag and drop image support
• Gallery previews in the editor
• Audio and video playlists
• Live widget and header previews
• Find new themes with the theme browser

Secure by Design provides WordPress powered web hosting solutions, currently we’re hosting more than 100 sites on the WordPress platform. Customers can update to the latest version themselves, or take advantage of our expertise. We offer WordPress updates for $25 + tax per site.

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It’s that time of year and consumer electronics remain one of the more popular gifts. So we decided to provide you with these 5 tips to help make for a frustration free Christmas morning. If you’ve bought a new computer, smart phone, tablet, or game console for a Christmas gift before you wrap it:

Step 1 – Check it out

• Open it carefully and make sure it works.
• Make sure its charged up or has fresh batteries.
• Wireless game controllers may have a rechargeable battery or require standard AA or AAA batteries.

Step 2 – Get it Working

• Read over the Quick Start guide or other instructions, or find a YouTube video on how to run it.
• Set it up on your WiFi or home network.
• Ensure it can get on the internet.

Step 3 – Lock it Down

• Install any system updates (the new Wii and other game consoles need this too!).
• For Windows PC’s, install an anti-virus product.

Step 4 – Make it Yours

• Install any “must have” software or games, for example, you might need to reinstall games or software from your old computer using the original CD or DVD.
• Use the “Windows Easy Transfer” or Macintosh “Migration Assitant” tool to copy over data from your old computer.
• Set up custom desktop wallpaper (window, maybe you have a photo with Santa that could work?

Step 5 – Wrap It Up

Carefully repackage it and wrap it up!

Bonus

Here’s a play list of helpful YouTube videos for each of the above tips. There are videos for both Windows and Mac users, if a video doesn’t apply to you, just skip it.

Have a Merry Christmas!

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At some point September 11, 2011 our antivirus program for our mail servers suffered a severe failure.  As a protection measure, all inbound email was not processed until antivirus functions were restored.  Antivirus function was restored on September 11, not long after, however, due to the shear volume of mail that had accumulated, our servers have become overloaded as they work to process all the incoming mail.  As load average becomes high, we detect it, and then shunt the data away from the overloaded system to return the load back to normal.  When load average becomes high, services such as sending mail, and webmail become inactive.

If it is not essential for you to check your email, please hold off until noon, September 12.  Otherwise, we are working hard to ensure all mail services can operate as best as possible.  We apologize for the inconvenience.  This should resolve after  our systems fully catch up, and we expect full function to be restored at noon, September 12.

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For those of you affected by poor DSL performance since Thursday morning, we have discovered a workaround until the underlying network problem is resolved.  The solution is to set your network MTU to 1250.

If you have a router, change the MTU on the Internet interface, which should fix the problem for all computers on your network at once.  Consult your router’s documentation for details.

Note, the following instructions are of advanced nature. We provide these instructions on an ‘as provided’ basis. If you do not follow the instructions properly, or use them on a different type of computer than described, it may make the problem worse.

Windows 7 or Windows Vista computers do the following:

1. Click on Start. Choose Accessories.
2. Right click on “Command Prompt”. Choose Run as Administrator.
3. You should get a screen reading “Administrator: Command Prompt”.
4. Type the following:
   netsh interface ipv4 set subinterface “Local Area Connection” mtu=1250 store=persistent
   Or if you use a Wireless connection type:
   netsh interface ipv4 set subinterface “Wireless Network Connection” mtu=1250 store=persistent
5. The command should return “Ok.”.  If it doesn’t, you may not be running the command prompt as Administrator.
6. Reboot your computer.  Or disable, then enable your Local Area Connection.

The above instructions are a summarized version of this article by Richard Slater (thanks!).

Macintosh users can easily set their MTU in their System Preferences:

1. Open System Preferences. Choose Network.
2. Select “Built-In Ethernet” or “Air-Port” (if you use wireless) from the “Show” menu.
3. Go to “Advanced Settings” (Leopard or newer), or “Etherenet” (Tiger and earlier).
4. Change MTU to Custom, and enter 1250.
5. Click on “Apply Changes”, and close System Preferences.
   If the settings are greyed out, click the padlock icon on the bottom left to unlock the settings.

Linux systems:

1. Type the following in a terminal window:
   sudo ifconfig eth0 mtu 1250

Verifying your MTU:

1. Open a web browser. Go to:
   http://speedguide.net/analyzer.php
2. The second line of the report will show your MTU = 1250.  It will also display the following:
   MTU = 1250
   MTU is not fully optimized for broadband. Consider increasing your MTU to 1500 for better throughput. If you are using a router, it could be limiting your MTU regardless of Registry settings.

To return your system to normal, repeat the instructions above with the value of 1500.

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One of our servers, mail.secure-by-design.com was blacklisted by spamhaus.org.  As soon as we became aware of the problem, we worked with our suppliers and spamhaus to get removed from the blacklist. They removed us from the list at approximately 2:30 PM (PST).  Due to the automtaic nature of such lists, we were not notified by spamhaus when this occurred.

As far as I can tell, it was not because of any email from our server or from our customers. In this case, it seems to be “Collateral Damage”, as spamhaus listed a block of 62 IP addresses, including 3 that are assigned to us.

I apologize for any inconvenience, and I am researching options of detecting this class of problem in the future.

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The Norton Safeweb service is presently identifying our site as having a “Malformed container violation“. Clicking on their link to read about this threat does not contain any useful information.  I am presently exchanging some emails with the staff  at Symantec to determine what the problem is.  It seems to have a problem with our RSS feed, at: http://www.secure-by-design.com/feed/

I uploaded the feed file to VirusTotal, an online service that will scan a file using multiple antivirus products.  It did not detect any problems. Neither did AVG’s Linkscanner.  Here are the VirusTotal Reports:

• Report from 5 link analysis tools
• Report from the file scanne

One possibility is that our feeds include some examples of phishing and virus infected emails, which might be the trigger. Or there is an invalid html tag or code in the feed itself.

Unless Norton can produce some concrete evidence of an infection that I can verify with another tool, I am treating this a false alarm.

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