While writing the ComputerWorld series “CW Investigates” in 2000, I worked with victim advocates and vigilantes helping the Mom and Pops who were getting raked by frauds committed over eBay, e-mail and other online outlets, including early phishing scams.
That’s when I realized computer crimes against the common man would soon be epidemic and began contemplating how I could help.http://www.nwfusion.com/columnists/schwartau.html
After leaving the magazine in 2002, I began searching for a way to reach the Mom and Pops on broadband home networks. I wanted the Anne Landers vacancy near the funny pages, so I tried syndication, only to be told they’d only syndicate me if I were syndicated!
After a year, I’d managed to get only three online safety stories published in non-technical magazines, two in Better Homes and Gardens and one in a magazine for travel agencies.
Enter Winn Schwartau, a security information icon. As president of Interpact and the Security Awareness Company in Seminole Island, Fla., he’s educated military experts worldwide in heated cyber-emergency enactments. He’s published several books on security awareness and he writes the Network World column, On Security.
http://www.thesecurityawarenesscompany.com/products/online.php
In May, I took a number of hurried, cryptic calls from Schwartau asking if I could understand the need to reach thousands of users at a time with security awareness education?
Well, duh. It’s the audience I’ve been trying to reach for 12 months, I said.
What if I told you I had the technology to do this all online: No browser interface required? he asked.
Those who know Schwartau know he’s a fast-talker. So with him, you always wonder. But he’s made a big name for himself, despite missed predictions about HERF guns and drive-by computer frying.
Finally he convinced me to write courses for his new online Security Awareness University
Just now going live, the virtual university will educate employees and college students on e-mail safety, viruses/worms, spyware, phishing, etc. In the future, the university will expand its reach to individual users, like your friends and family.
