security

Data Ethics And Security

I had the pleasure of participating on a panel with this topic for the Data Analysts for Social Good/Good Tech Fest, put together by my friend Andrew Means. The panel included Joshua Pesky, of Roundtable Technology; Kelly Misata of Sightline Security; Andy Abrams of the United Way; and moderator Laura Quinn, currently of Laura S. Quinn Consulting, formerly of Idealware (now Techimpact), and a long-time friend and collaborator of mine. Our goal was to present a grounded conversation for nonprofits, dealing less with some of the more philosophical questions about AI and facial recognition and more with the concerns that nonprofits have about working with… Read More »Data Ethics And Security

Experienced Technologist For Hire (Specialty – Nonprofits)

Once again, I’ve left a steady paycheck and I’m open for consulting and fractional CIO work. I am officially available to help out organizations with technology management and strategy. As always, my preference is to work with organizations that help people and/or the planet. Here are some of the ways that I can do that: Act as a CIO: serve as your Chief Technologist  on a part-time and/or interim basis. This can be helpful for an org that is either just setting out to implement technology strategy and/or infrastructure, or needs to reassess what they have in place, but doesn’t want to commit to hiring… Read More »Experienced Technologist For Hire (Specialty – Nonprofits)

Hillary Clinton’s Shadow IT Problem

As you likely know, when Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, she set up a private email server at home and used it for her email communication, passing up a secure government account. This was a bad idea, for a number of reasons, primary among them the fact that sensitive information could be leaked on this less secure system, and that Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests could be bypassed. But the burning question, at a time when Clinton looks likely to be nominated as the Democratic candidate for President, is what her motivation was for setting up the server in the first place. Was… Read More »Hillary Clinton’s Shadow IT Problem

Highlights Of The 2015 Nonprofit Technology Conference

I’m back and moderately recovered from the 2015 NTC in Austin, Texas, where, along with plenty of good Texas food and beer, I shared some wisdom and learned a lot.  Here’s a summary, with my favorite pics: #NTCBeer is a proven formula. Take a decent bar, Nonprofit techies, and a room without blaring music, and everyone has a great time, whether they’re NTEN mavens like me, or first time attendees. We estimate that about 275 people came by this year. Here’s a great shot of the room by Jason Shim:   On Wednesday morning I led my session on contract negotiation.  I’d been hoping for… Read More »Highlights Of The 2015 Nonprofit Technology Conference

Where I’ll Be At 15NTC

The 2015 Nonprofit Technology Conference starts on March 3rd and marks my tenth year attending (out of the last eleven). Based on my prior experience, I’m looking forward to highly enriching and rewarding social event, hanging out with about 2500 of the nicest people I could ever hope to know, this year at the Austin (Texas) Convention center. Huh! So we’re Convention Center-sized now. The challenge — which NTEN pulled off with over 2000 attendees last year — is to host that many people and still maintain an atmosphere of community. Last year, during the Ignite plenary, Susan Reed told a story that was breathtakingly… Read More »Where I’ll Be At 15NTC

How I Spent My 2015 Technology Initiative Grants Conference

I’m back from our (Legal Services Corporation) 15th annual technology conference, which ran from January 14th through the 16th  in San Antonio, Texas.  It was a good one this year, with a great location, good food, great people – nearly 300 of them, which is quite a record for us. There were plenty of amazing sessions, kicked off by a fascinating keynote on international access to justice web app partnerships. Slides and videos will be up soon on LSC’s website. But I did want to share the slides from my sessions, which all seemed to go very well.  I did three: Are You Agile I… Read More »How I Spent My 2015 Technology Initiative Grants Conference

Should You Outsource Your IT Department?

This post was originally published on the MAP Techworks Blog in November of 2014.  For a nonprofit that’s reached a size of 25 or more staff, a key question revolves around how to support technology that has grown from a few laptops and PCs to a full-blown network, with all of the maintenance and troubleshooting that such a beast requires. Should you hire internal IT staff or outsource to a more affordable vendor for that support? I’d say that the key question isn’t should you — that’s more a matter of finances and personal preferences. But what you outsource and how you go about it… Read More »Should You Outsource Your IT Department?

A Tale Of Two (Or Three) Facebook Challengers

For a website that hosts so many cute pet videos, Facebook is not a place that reeks of happiness and sincerity. It’s populated by a good chunk of the world, and it’s filled with a lot of meaningful moments captured in text, camera and video by people who know that, more and more every day, this is where you can share these moments with a broad segment of your friends and family. And that’s the entire hook of Facebook — it’s where everybody is.  The feature set is not the hook, because Google Plus and a variety of other platforms offer similar feature sets. And many… Read More »A Tale Of Two (Or Three) Facebook Challengers

Why You Should Delete All Facebook Mobile Apps Right Now

It’s nice that Facebook is so generous and they give us their service and apps for free. One should never look a gift horse in the mouth, right? Well, if the gift horse is stomping through my bedroom and texting all of my friends while I’m not looking, I think it bears my attention.  And yours. So tell me why Facebook needs these permissions on my Android phone: read calendar events plus confidential information add or modify calendar events and send email to guests without owners’ knowledge read your text messages (SMS or MMS) directly call phone numbers create accounts and set passwords change network… Read More »Why You Should Delete All Facebook Mobile Apps Right Now

Is It Time To Worry About Cybercrime?

This article was originally posted on the Idealware Blog in September of 2011. For the past decade, the bulk of unlawful web-based activities have been profit-motivated: phishing, spam, “Nigerian” money scams, and hacking to get credit cards. This year has seen a rise in politically motivated crimes, most widely exemplified by the loosely-knit group of hackers known as “Anonymous“.  Anonymous hackers attack the websites of organizations, be they government, corporate or otherwise that they deem to be repressive or unethical.  In addition to defacing the sites, they’ve also routinely exposed confidential user information, such as login names, passwords and addresses.  If we are now entering the age… Read More »Is It Time To Worry About Cybercrime?