The Importance Of Having Up To Date Anti-Virus Software On Your Computer - We Were Nearly Cut-Off!

As a result of a spam alert on the network on Febuary 8 we had to alter our outgoing mail (smtp) port at short notice. We apologise for any inconvenience caused. The urgency of the matter meant we were not able to provide any notice of the change.


Changing to a more secure mailport

We have managed to prevent the service being cut off by asking those of you who use the service to change the outgoing mail server (sometimes called SMTP) on your computer to a more secure mailport, that spammers cannot easily use.

All of our users should now change the mailport settings for outgoing e-mail in your email programme from port 25 to port 587. You will also need to ensure the smtp server option “requiring authentication” is chosen or adopted – incoming (pop3) mail should be set to “pop3.strato.com” and outgoing (smtp) mail set to “smtp.strato.com”.

N.B. If you collect your email through your browser you should be unaffected.

Updating your antivirus software

It is also essential that you all update the anti-virus software on your computer and that you carry out a full scan to ensure that your computer is not infected. Your co-operation is really important to make sure that our ISP does not again threaten to cut off our service.

It is also essential that you all update the anti-virus software on your computer and that you carry out a regular full scans to ensure that your computer is not infected. However this is not guaranteed to all threats and we also highly recommend that you download and regularly run a software programme called Malwarebytes to carry out an extra check to see if your computer is being threatened. You should download and run Malwarebytes from a reliable site such as
http://download.cnet.com/Malwarebytes-Anti-Malware/3000-8022_4-10804572.html

Your co-operation is really important to make sure that our ISP does not again threaten to cut off our service.
Please help us to continue to provide our voluntary service to you by securing your mailport and keeping your anti-virus software up to date. We could all lose the broadband service, which for many is our only option, if you don’t.

If you need assistance please e-mail support@swaledale.org or leave a message on 886903 and we will get back to you as soon as we can.

Important Policy Information

File sharing - web announcement

The use by RRRN subscribers of file sharing software (such as, Kazaa, Limewire, Gnutella, BitTorrent, eDonkey, uTorrent) is compromising the quality of our service to all subscribers, causing network slowdowns and outages.

File sharing in itself is not illegal, but it does put a strain on the network. Any file downloaded is then uploaded from your PC to anyone else on the internet that requests it. This can happen many hundreds of times. It is this outbound traffic that causes the high usage. The ISP through which we connect to the Internet beyond Swaledale and Arkengarthdale warned us last month about the illegal sharing of a copyright film over our network. We cannot afford to jeopardise our relationship with the ISP or risk legal action.

Accordingly, the directors of RRRN have decided to block file sharing, otherwise known as peer to peer (P2P), through all our internet gateways. We will, however, still allow VoIP (e.g. Skype, SIP), Gaming and VPN access. The first Internet gateway will be the King's Arms, Reeth.

We trust subscribers will understand and support our action. If you have any queries regarding this announcement please email support@swaledale.org

Collecting your email through your browser. You can collect and send email online when you are away from home. There are two methods available to collect webmail.

Open www.mail2web.com and select the Advanced login.
Enter pop3.strato.com as the server name.
Enter your swaledale.org email address and password.
Highlight the POP3 mail protocol radio button.

OR

Open www.strato-communicator.net
Enter your swaledale.org email address and password.

Subscriptions and tickets

The monthly subscription is £11.75, payable by bank standing order.

A week's subscription costs £11.75 and a single month's £23.50.

Access tickets for casual users cost £2 for two half-hour sessions.

Tickets are available at Fat Sheep, The Green, Reeth, or contact support@swaledale.org for further information.

Thank you for supporting our community not for profit venture. In the coming year we hope to add additional functionality to the network and take the first steps to creating an online community in our dales.

Dangerous spam warning: please note that there is a lot of dangerous unsolicited email ("spam") in circulation at present. Some have attachments they suggest you open which are viruses ("malware"), some purport to be from high street banks, some appear to be rejected/ bounced messages, some are clever enough to use "swaledale.org technical support team" as their signature! (By the way, these are not unique to our network - they are being received by thousands of people all around the country - but we would like our customers to be educated and safe.)

• (Here is a "malware" example in plain text format - the attached file it refers to was a virus.)
• (Here is an example of a banking scam (a "phishing" attack) in HTML format - please see our inline note for details of how the phishing attack works).
• Here is another banking scam - note only some of the links go to dodgy locations, some go to the banks real web site. Note: any dangerous links have been removed

Please never click on links from unsolicited emails which request login details or other personnal information and never open attachments from such emails. Delete the message and also remove it from any recycle bin you may have in your email client. Also please ensure you have a up-to-date virus checker installed.

We will only ever contact you via email with very specific information to do with our services, such as service outages and newsletters, and we will always have "Reeth Rural Radio Net" somewhere in the mail. We will not send you unsolicited mail with attachments or requests to click links to login or provide other personnal information.

You can report phishing attacks to the Anti Phishing Working Group.

Reeth Rural Radio Net has now been successfully operating in Reeth since November 2004, offering a fast, "always on", internet service. We have expanded both up Swaledale and Arkengarthdale - if you live in the dales we will be very happy to provide a free survey. Please contact support@swaledale.org or phone 01748 886903 (answerphone)and we will organise a visit.

Why bother supporting a local wireless network anyway? It's cheap! And as more people get involved we will make it faster and therefore even better value. We will always try to provide the best value service available in the area. It is a locally run, not for profit, company and therefore provides a local investment which will endeavour to be highly responsive to local needs (such as helping local schools, businesses and community organisations get online). We look on this as the equivalent of building a locally owned, virtual motorway into the two dales. Why pay BT to run a toll road that doesn't offer long term cost savings and benefits to the local community!? You'll be helping the whole dale get online. We endeavour to get to the far-flung reaches of the two dales as soon as possible, which will mean a radical change in the communications services available to them. You'll get a very personal email address. You can choose between a 'swaledale.org' or 'arkengarthdale.org' email address. No phone line required! which means once it's up and running it should be more reliable than the phone line services Secure and private. The local network provides greater protection from external problems such as viruses and hackers (it is much more secure than a standard dial-up). No users of the network can "see" each other's computers or traffic. We will also be able to provide additional security (Virtual Private Networks) for businesses in the near future. Local skills. The practical knowledge learned and shared at many levels locally will enable the local community and hopefully other local communities for the future Tourism services. Business (e.g. cafés/ pubs/ caravan parks/ hotels/ post office) will be able to offer temporary wireless internet passes to visitors. The future - free local phone calls! Once the basic internet service is in place there are additional possibilities such as free telephony services and wireless phones, providing free calls to anyone else on the network (useful when you're out on the farm!). Who knows, even local video phones!