To further improve account security, LuxSci has added an automated alert system to notify users of failed logins to their accounts.  These include:

• Failed logins to WeMail, POP, IMAP, SMTP, and FTP
• Failed message sending over SMTP due to limits exceeded or other issues.

The alerts are sent out within 5 minutes of the failure event.  Successive alert digests are sent out no more frequently than once/hour and are quickly rate limited to once/day for situations where the failures keep coming (we don’t want to flood people’s mail boxes with alerts, but we also want to be timely).

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LuxSci has for a long time allowed account administrators to restrict from which IP addresses their users are permitted to login to the web interface.  Administrators can specify a list of IP addresses and IP blocks (CIDR blocks) along with a list of users exempt from these restrictions.

This service has been expanded.  Now, account administrators can restrict logins based on a chosen combination of countries and/or regions.  When a user tries to login to the web interface, that user’s IP Address is converted into the location from which s/he appears to be and that is compared to the list of allowed locations.

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LuxSci has revised its user interface for accessing the audit trails of user logins, the “Activity Auditing Reports” area.  Additionally, LuxSci has added new reports for reviewing:

• Unsuccessful POP logins
• Unsuccessful IMAP logins
• Unsuccessful SMTP logins / rejected SMTP connections
• Successful FTP logins
• Unsuccessful FTP logins
• Successful SFTP / SCP /SSH logins
• Unsuccessful SFTP / SCP /SSH logins

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Repeatedly, it is a situation that we see over and over.  Monday morning hits and we get a frantic call from a manager or VP in one of our customer’s organization. They need access to their account, but the person who was set up as their account manager has left the company or been terminated.  Oops.

At LuxSci, like many other conscientious places, we take very seriously the determination of “who is authorized to do what” in an account.  If the account owner is gone and provisions are not made ahead of time for taking over his/her duties, it can be a time consuming and tedious process to validate and establish someone else in the organization as the rightful owner of the account (and not just someone trying to “trick the system” and get access to things that s/he should not have access to).

If you are planning on letting an employee go, you should make sure well ahead of time to check the following things:

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LuxSci supports OpenID as a mechanism for logging into its web-based user interface.  OpenID allows both a single signon for multiple web sites (so you do not have to remember as many usernames and passwords); it can also enhance the security of your account.

As with most web sites that support OpenID access, LuxSci also permits users to login with their usual username and password — even if OpenID use is enabled.  This is usually a good thing, as it allows users to login if, for some reason, their OpenID is not working.

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LuxSci has supported login to Web-based email and administration consoles since January, 2009. OpenID allows users with logins to other websites to use those logins to access their LuxSci accounts as well — thus needing to remember fewer passwords, or to have enhanced security.

Now, in addition to permitting any generic OpenID login, LuxSci has specific OpenID login support for logins from Google, Windows Live ID, myOpenID, Yahoo!, Facebook, AOL, flickr, VeriSign Personal Identity Portal, Livejournal, Blogger, and WordPress.

These specific options make it easier and faster to use OpenID logins from these providers.

To use an OpenID to login to your LuxSci account, you need to login normally first, go to “Account > My Profile > OpenIDs”, and then add your OpenID login to your account as an authorized means of logging in for you.

LuxSci has completed the major re-design of its WebAides collaboration tools; a final installment brings all WebAides up-to-date in terms of functionality and the user interface in both the Full and Xpress WebMail portals.  The project to modernize our collaboration suite began more than one year ago.  Of course, “final installment” is a misnomer as the job is never done — periodic feature updates are scheduled.

Significant updates include:

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LuxSci has re-written its web-based Password management interface from the ground up to provide users with a fast, modern, featureful experience.  The WebAides Passwords user interface now matches that of WebMail, Address Books, Calendars, and User Groups in AJAX-based Web 2.0 speed, data caching, and usability.

The Passwords WebAide provides:

• PGP-Encrypted online storage for all of the user names, passwords, and related information that most people have in abundance for logging in to countless web sites and devices.  Every entry is separately encrypted using PGP.  The PGP certificates are imported by you and/or generated by LuxSci.  There is no need for the passwords to these PGP keys to ever be stored on LuxSci’ servers.  This is a secure online solution.
• Shared access — you can have detailed control of who in your account, if anyone, can decrypt and access which passwords.
• Associated encrypted notes and attachments with each password so that you can store additional related information.

Consider LuxSci’s WebAide Passwords to be an “Online Lockbox” where you can securely store and share all of your passwords.  This Lockbox can be accessed from anywhere that you have Internet access.  The major changes that come along with these user interface enhancements include:

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LuxSci now allows users to login to its WebMail, Affiliate, and SecureSend portals using an OpenID. This feature can make logins faster, simpler, and even more secure by:

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