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How much is that tech pro in the window?

Valerie Helmbreck — Fri, 20 Jul 2012 11:56:52 +0000

Your IT budget may need some revisions if you’re planning on hiring tech pros in the coming months. But a lot could depend on where you’re located when it comes time to make techs an offer or negotiate a salary to hang onto te talent you already have.

The market for IT jobs is stronger than other areas, but IT pros in certain cities and with certain skills will be better off than others.

While there are still plenty of tech professionals looking for work, the IT unemployment rate has been well below the average for all U.S. industries, according to a recent report from IT job board Dice.com.

The rate is now hovering around 3.5%, according to calculations based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Over the past five quarters, the IT unemployment rate has stayed below 4.5%, while the national unemployment rate has been above 8% over the same period.

What are the most competitive regions for tech employment right now? The answers might be surprising, as some new markets have experienced a lot of recent growth. These are the top cities for IT pros, based on the number of the available jobs compared to the number of job seekers, according to job search engine Simply Hired:

Baltimore, MD
Detroit, MI
Charlotte, NC
Portland, OR
Seattle, WA
Pittsburgh, PA
Milwaukee, WI
Richmond, VA
Raleigh, NC
New York, NY

These are the worst cities, where there is a lot of competition for few IT jobs:

Newark, NJ
Birmingham, AL
Riverside, CA
Little Rock, AR
Honolulu, HI
Boulder, CO
Huntsville, AL
Sacramento, CA
Indianapolis, IN
Orlando, FL

Overall, health care is the top hiring industry right now, but technology is a close second, according to Simply Hired.

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Your data’s at risk with these lousy passwords

Valerie Helmbreck — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:56:23 +0000

Securing your finance data depends in large part on how careful your staff is with the crucial servers and networks it uses to keep your organization running. And nothing threatens the security of your data like a lousy, weak or easily compromised password, of which there are plenty. The worst of them? There are a number of sources, but check out these two that are pretty authoritative.

First, from SplashData:

1. password
2. 123456
3. 12345678
4. qwerty
5. abc123
6. monkey
7. 1234567
8. letmein
9. trustno1
10. dragon
11. baseball
12. 111111
13. iloveyou
14. master
15. sunshine
16. ashley
17. bailey
18. passw0rd
19. shadow
20. 123123
21. 654321
22. superman
23. qazwsx
24. michael
25. football

Recognize any of these? How about this list of 10 from Imperva:

1. 123456
2. 12345
3. 123456789
4. Password
5. iloveyou
6. princess
7. rockyou
8. 1234567
9. 12345678
10. abc123

Check with your finance staff to make sure they don’t use any of these (Full disclosure note: I noted in the list that the I’d actually been given one of those listed by an IT pro for a secure account at a former employer. While I changed the password soon after I got it, in retrospect it was a really good lesson in not assuming that IT pros are any more security savvy sometimes than the users they support.)

So what makes a good password? Here are the official tips:

A strong password has no fewer than eight characters
It should be a mix of four different types of characters – upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers, and special characters like !@#$%^&*,;” For added security, if there is only one letter or special character, it should not be either the first or last character in the password, and
Don’t ever use a name, a slang word, or any word in the dictionary. Don’t use any part of your own name or your e-mail address.

For especially sensitive databases of info, it’s wise to use two-factor authentication and keep to a schedule of changing the password on these accounts. If accessing these databases from remote or a public computer, only ever use a VPN (virtual private network) and consider signing up for a password manager that will keep your passwords safe and secure.

The post Your data’s at risk with these lousy passwords appeared first on Finance Tech News.

And the award for worst company in America goes to …

Valerie Helmbreck — Mon, 10 May 2010 12:30:59 +0000

You had to believe it was a technology company, right? Well, it was. The much-reviled cable Internet provider Comcast took top honors in this year’s contest at Consumerist.com.

The voting’s been going on for months now and there’s been plenty of shame to spread around for the Consumerist folks — who run a site that’s a subsidiary of the Consumer’s Union (which publishes Consumer Reports) and takes no advertising.

For a time, it seemed there would be a death match between Bank of America, Cash4Gold and Ticketmaster, but Comcast blew away the competition in the final rounds and emerged victorious.

According to the site, “the little cable company that could showed just how badly their horrendous service, exorbitant costs, throttled Internet and plans to acquire NBC Universal have ticked the Consumerist readers.”

The prize, which has yet to be delivered to the Philadelphia-based cable company, is the “Golden Poo.” Just let your imagination run wild, if you will.

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