Accepting LinkedIn Invitations

An interesting article in inc.com suggests that you should ask yourself “11Questions to Ask Before Accepting a LinkedIn Invitation”.

My rule of thumb is that if I don't know the person, the company or organization they are with, or if the organization is not one that I think fits my general group of companies I want to work with then I probably don't want or need to accept their invitation.

So the reasons not to just accept any old invitation that comes along is that you'll start receiving all sorts of information that is not necessarily relative to you or even more dangerous you are very, you could possibly open yourself up to somebody that is trying to scam you.

So you will want to think about the parameters that you want to use, that makes sense to you, but if you feel you need a little more help than take a quick gander at the article listed above. It is a great is a starting place but is by no means definitive.

Inc’s Criteria:

1. Do I know this person?	5. What is their industry and job description?	9. Do they have any recent activity?
2. Did they send a personal message?	6. Where are they from?	10. What does the profile tell me about the person?
3. Who else are they connected to?	7. Do they have any endorsements or recommendations?	11. How many connections do they have?
4. Does their profile have a photo? If so, what does it convey?	8. Have they published anything on LinkedIn?

(Cloud) Tip of the Day: FreeBSD now available in Azure Marketplace

FreeBSD is Now being supported in the Azure Marketplace.

HikVision’s new PanoVu DS 2DP1636Z D & DS 2DP0818Z D

Presentation of the Camera PanoVu 16 Megapixel 360 ° + PTZ Darkfighter of HIKVISION DS - 2DP1636Z - D, mounting and installation in the showroom of the company DIXYS

Naked Security Post: NIST’s new password rules – what you need to know

by Chester Wisniewski

It’s no secret. We’re really bad at passwords. Nevertheless, they aren’t going away any time soon.

With so many websites and online applications requiring us to create accounts and think up passwords in a hurry, it’s no wonder so many of us struggle to follow the advice of so-called password security experts.

At the same time, the computing power available for password cracking just gets bigger and bigger.

OK, so I started with the bad news, but this cloud does have a silver lining.

It doesn’t need to be as hard as we make it and the government is here to help.

That’s right, the United States National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) is formulating new guidelines for password policies to be used in the whole of the US government (the public sector).

Why is this important? Because the policies are sensible and a great template for all of us to use within our own organizations and application development programs.

Anyone interested in the draft specification for Special Publication 800-63-3: Digital Authentication Guidelines can review it as it evolves over on Github or in a more accessible form on NIST’s website.

For a more human approach, security researcher Jim Fenton did a presentation earlier this month at the PasswordsCon event in Las Vegas that sums up the changes nicely.

To see what is new click here

This pen blew my mind when I saw the video

The Cronzy pen puts over 16 million colors in your pocket

I pulled this one from the Verge and it was pretty cool if it really works. I included the video that was on the Verge site below showing the pan in operation. Currency claims that it can scan and draw 16 million colors, “collecting all the existing colors and shades of the world!” That's a pretty big claim but even if it works only half as well as they show in the video this is a pretty neat capability for those of you that have an artistic temperament. See the full article on Verge.