Have your say at computerweekly.com
On the government's e-crime
strategy
In response to Bill Goodwin's article on the national e-crime
plan
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How much confidence do I have in the government's e-crime
strategy? Not much - about the same level of confidence I have with
the government's anti-spam laws.
The question that needs to be addressed is why do the major ISPs
allow all that spam to be moved around (almost all phishing is spam
to begin with). There are products available that will block false,
forged or unverifiable e-mail addresses. The ISPs need to look to
that type of product now.
Liz Power
On enterprise storage
In response to the special report on storage
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Many datacentres have embraced the concept of enterprise
storage with gusto, but companies are now having to carefully
justify policies and purchases, which for the past five years have
been based upon the premise of "disc storage is cheap, let's get
some more".
This approach has resulted in inefficiencies of operation and has
stifled and injured business performance. The promotion by storage
hardware suppliers of pre-prescribed hardware products has led to a
product centricity and a shift in the debate from business,
information and knowledge to simply filling rooms with as many
discs as possible.
This has created a dangerous situation where it is all too easy for
in-house IT staff to diagnose their own data management needs and
incorrectly prescribe their own "off-the-shelf" storage hardware
product.
Companies may believe they need a storage area network, network
attached storage or direct attached storage product but these are
categories on which products can be conveniently hung and they fail
to address the key information issues affecting businesses today -
namely the interrelationship between data security, access,
transfer volumes, file systems, databases, applications and the
systems on which they run.
Organisations do not necessarily need another rack of discs, or a
San, Nas or Das system. What they need is a system that best
supports their business and makes use of all relevant technologies.
What that means is expert analysis, design and implementation; not
a litany of spec sheets and product price lists.
Mark Simmonds, managing director, Anix Group
On addressing energy inefficiency
In response to the feature on the potential drain on IT budgets
caused by poor management of electrical equipment in the office
Read article >>
Of equal importance to the issues raised in the article is the
problem of increasing landfill created by "end-of-life"
products.
The Waste Electrical & Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE),
which comes into force in August, aims to deal with this problem by
regulating how we re-use, reclaim, recycle and dispose of IT
hardware.
In a response to the directive, the Department of Trade &
Industry confirmed that "individual producers", ie manufacturers,
will be responsible for the cost of collection and recycling of
their own products.
So IT managers may assume this has nothing to do with them. This
may be true, however the cost of the directive will make itself
felt along the entire supply chain. The Royal Mail recently claimed
that the implementation of the WEEE Directive was likely to add to
the cost of its IT hardware by 10%.
The DTI also proposed that WEEE is returned on a "like-for-like"
basis, although it is unclear what is really meant by this. Can you
return an old printer when purchasing a multifunction device, for
example? So it may be necessary to introduce a policy for the
management of WEEE before it becomes law.
Mike Dinsdale, marketing director, Brother UK