Byte by Bite

Faster Internet service soon will be available

by Marv Dealy

Published February 6, 2004

Fast Internet connections have been impossible -- or at least impractical -- to obtain for many Tuolumne County residents. True, there have been options that include satellite, wireless, ISDN or even a T1 or better connection, but these all have problems.

For example, ISDN is old technology and the equipment costs about as much for the initial setup as a satellite hookup. Satellite has problems because you are limited in your upload speeds, which matters if you need to send someone large files such as Power Point files. T1 connections -- what we're using at my office -- are expensive to set up and costly to keep going each month. Wireless is limited by the terrain around here -- it doesn't like hills much less granite-filled mountains.

Fortunately, there's DSL (Digital Subscriber Line), technology that dramatically increases the capacity of normal telephone lines, allowing for fast Internet connections from home or office.

Until very recently, DSL service was only available in downtown Sonora, relatively speaking. Now, thanks to equipment upgrades by SBC, the service is soon to be available along the Highway 108 corridor from Jamestown to Twain Harte, and along the Highway 120 corridor to Groveland and Pine Mountain Lake.

According to Vanessa Smith, spokesperson for SBC, DSL is now available in Jamestown and Twain Harte, as well as Sonora. Areas in between may fall into a "service gap," depending on your location. You can check availability by calling SBC (1-877-722-2028) or by using the web site noted below. Groveland and Big Oak Flat service is scheduled for February, says Smith. She adds that the SBC engineers are certain that DSL will be available at both Pine Mountain Lake and at the Pine Mountain Lake airport. I'll be signing up and will let you know how it all works out.

Smith says that the DSL service will be available through SBC Yahoo! DSL. If you have a phone account through SBC, you can get this service, again depending on your location.

The DSL signal, by the way, uses your existing telephone line, and when set up allows both DSL and voice signals to go over the line at the same time, meaning you don't have to add a new phone line. You'll see a new monthly charge on your phone bill, but you can get rid of your old ISP and save that money each month.

Monthly charges advertised by SBC on their web site start at $26.95 a month (http://www.sbc.com/yahoo) and include free installation and a free modem. You can do the very easy installation yourself, and of course SBC provides telephone support. SBC provides a search feature on the web site listed above that lets you type in your telephone number to determine if DSL is available to your phone number. Which brings us back to the question of your location.

Like other kinds of Internet access using phone lines, DSL is limited by your distance from the telephone company's central office. For example, Asymmetric DSL, which can share an existing phone line with your regular phone, comes in 4 flavors (ADSL, RADSL, G Lite and VDSL), depending on your distance from the CO. Most commonly, ADSL should be available to about 18,000 feet from the CO with maximum upload speeds of 1 Mbps and maximum download speeds of 8 Mbps. If you're within 1,000 feet of the CO, and are willing to pay the money, you can get up to 6.4 Mbps upload and 52 Mbps download -- equipment willing and the creeks don't rise.

You can read lots more about DSL at the ComputerLanguage.com website (http://lookup.computerlanguage.com/host_app/search). They also provide excellent graphics that show how the signal travels, and provide more definitions than most of us want to know.

Phishing Alert -- I've received a number of official e-mails requesting that I provide certain financial or personal data due to reasons that vary from e-mail to e-mail. One recent example claimed to be coming from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and contained very official looking graphics and links to what appeared to be a real "official" web page.

The e-mail claimed I was under investigation by the Department of Homeland Security as well as various state and local law enforcement agencies, and warned that my bank account was in jeopardy if I didn't provide the requested information.

This fraudulent e-mail, and others like it, are actually part of a phishing (pronounced "fishing") scheme run by criminals who are after everything from your bank card PIN numbers to your social security number. These thugs are using some pretty good tricks to make it appear that the requests are official, but one thing remains constant -- if you get a request by e-mail for your personal information, it's most likely fraudulent.

Another recent phishing scam supposedly came from Citibank -- read more at http://antivirus.about.com/cs/allabout/a/citiphish.htm.

Whatever you do, don't fill out the on-line forms offered. If you are concerned, pick up the telephone and call the institution in question and ask them if they really need that information. The FDIC phishing scam, by the way, apparently comes from Pakistan. Read more at About.com in an excellent article by Mary Landesman (http://antivirus.about.com/cs/allabout/a/fdicphish.htm).

Not planning on falling for the phishing scam? How about the Xombe Trojan to get your year off to a great start.

Sent to huge numbers of e-mail recipients about a month ago, the e-mail spoofed its return address to make it look like it cane from windowsupdate@microsoft.com. The e-mail claimed that the reader needed to download and install a new version of Windows XP by running the attachment to the e-mail. Naturally, it wasn't true, and those who did so found their computers had been infected with a Trojan, which immediately set out to download and infect the system with other malware (malicious software).

Again, Microsoft doesn't send out e-mails with attachments to update its software. Rather, you have to visit the Microsoft update web site, accessible by clicking on the Windows Update icon, found under Start>All Programs on your XP-equipped PC.

Marv Dealy is a lifelong computer enthusiast and businessman in Tuolumne County. Reach him by e-mail at marv.dealy@throck.com