VsiFax and filePro -- frustration! --- RE: Filepro-list Digest, Vol 79, Issue 39

[Bill Campbell]

On Mon, Aug 30, 2010, Fairlight wrote:
>Simon--er, no...it was Bill Campbell--said:
>> 
>> The first fax software I used was Unifax by Stuart Lynne, then of
>> Vancouver BC.  Another Vancouver product is Faximum.
>
>I think the only fax software I bothered with was efax for linux.
>Somewhere along the line I've touched VSI, but it was abysmally designed,
>for my money.
>
>> Size might be a factor.  E-mailing a 25+ page PDF file might run
>> into maximum file size limits in many MTAs.
>
>Fair point, although it'd be really easy to change those limits.

But not if there's an intervening MX server that doesn't take
large files.

>> Another factor might be privacy.  Anything sent unencrypted via
>> normal e-mail is visible at one or more points along the way,
>> in particular to NSA that has splitters at most/all of the major
>> Internet hubs (see James Bamford's boot ``The Shadow Factor'' for
>> more on this).
>
>Lovely to know that Big Brother is alive and well.  NOT.  :/

More so than you might think.

>General SSL/TLS is readily usable with SMTP nowadays.  Most sites allow it,
>GMail even requires it.
>
>I wonder if the NSA can crack 256-bit SSL in any sane amount of time.
>That's like a 32-byte password.  They're just now recommending a move to
>12-character strong passwords in IT for the masses, in general, and the
>computational time I saw on that was pretty hefty (years), even tossing
>dozens of CUDA GPUs at it.  Every character exponentially increases the
>time, so I'm kind of doubting the NSA could really crack it.
>
>Then again, some people claim the NSA has the resources to do anything they
>want.
>
>I won't even recommend PDF encryption...wasn't that broken fairly readily?

Use gpg or similar encryption on the entire e-mail, and let the
other end deal with it.

>> My wife frequently has to fax information on her patients to
>> so-called ``Insurance'' providers, where the telco connection
>> might be considered more private (but not really if Big Brother
>> really wants to watch/listen).
>
>I'm waiting for encrypted VOIP.

You got it already with Skype.  I read something recently that
NSA was looking for people that could break Skype's encryption.

>> If I were to provide better security for document transfers, I
>> would put the document on a secure web or ftp site, requiring
>> https, or ssl connections, then send a link to the file in an
>> e-mail.  Not only is it more secure, but it's about 1/3 smaller
>> than sending the encoded file in e-mail.
>
>I agree that it's usually the safer way to go, and I prefer it for file
>transfers.  But in the name of convenience, I still don't see why you
>couldn't just send using SSL with the MTA.  Sendmail has supported it for
>years, and I'd be shocked if Postfix didn't support something sendmail and
>exim both do.  Exchange's capabilities might be another thing entirely, but
>anyone willingly using Exchange deserves their headaches.

The Horde/IMP webmail client has a setting that will
automatically upload your attachment(s) to the web server, then
put a link in the outgoing e-mail to retrieve them.  We always
configure webmail to work only with https so retrieval should be
reasonably secure.  I don't like using webmail particularly, but
do use our horde server when I want to send large attachments,
particularly when sending to a mailing list or other large number
of recipients.

Bill
-- 
INTERNET:   bill at celestial.com  Bill Campbell; Celestial Software LLC
URL: http://www.celestial.com/  PO Box 820; 6641 E. Mercer Way
Voice:          (206) 236-1676  Mercer Island, WA 98040-0820
Fax:            (206) 232-9186  Skype: jwccsllc (206) 855-5792

The essence of all slavery consists in taking the produce of another's
labor by force. It is immaterial whether this force be founded on ownership
of the slave or ownership of the money that he must get to live on.
    Leo Tolstoy 1891