Thusday, August 18, 2011

Dear Sweetwater and Green River Cable TV High Speed Access Customers,

Webmail (webmail.sweetwaterhsa.com) is an online email program, that
allows our customers to access sweetwaterhsa.com emails that are on the
Incoming (POP3) email server. You can also access it from our website,
www.sweetwaterhsa.com This is where emails go, until they are either
downloaded to your computer from a program such as Outlook, Mozilla
Thunderbird or others email clients. From Webmail, you can view, send,
create new emails or manage certain aspects of email We do not
recommend that Webmail be used as your primary storage site, as
limitations in size capacity limit overall usage. It is handy while
traveling, or while at work, to look at emails that haven't yet be
downloaded to your computer.

Another tool within the Webmail program is SPAM Filtering. By defaults,
all emails that "look, smell, taste and feel" like SPAM, are treated as
SPAM, and kept from going to your INBOX. However, not everything that
looks like SPAM, is SPAM, so occasionally these need to be treated
differently.

Within the SPAM Filtering section, there is the option of both WHITE
LISTING and BLACKLISTING email addresses. When you WHITE LIST an email
address, unless it has a virus attached to it, it will automatically
pass through these emails, to your INBOX. If you choose to use this
option, set the Filtering level to (NORMAL WITH QUARANTINE) away from
the Default (NORMAL) This will ensure you view all SPAM filtered
messages, and can WHITE LIST those you want to pass through. OF NOTE:
If you do set this level up, log into WEBMAIL 1 or 2 times per week, as
the SPAM folder will fill quickly.

If you have questions you can either call the office, or the 24 Hour
Technical Support folks at: 1-800-352-8156.

 

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA) Policy.

In 2005, the United States Supreme Court affirmed that the uploading and downloading of copyrighted material, with out the copyright owner’s permission was an illegal activity.

It is not our role as an ISP to determine the legality of specific acts, nor is it our responsibility (or legal) for us to monitor individual usage of the protocols (such as Peer to Peer file sharing programs like Limewire or Bittorrent) that allow for the uploading or downloading of copyrighted material.

That being the case, we do believe it necessary for customers to know the consequences of such activity. We receive complaints daily about DCMA infractions. These letters are sent to us from companies hired by the owners of copyrighted material, to find infringers. The information we receive contains the IP Address from where the infringement took place, the date and the specific copyrighted material pertaining to the infraction. We try to pass along to our customers these notices, so they better understand the potential legality of this activity. We do not under any circumstance other than via subpoena or other legal request, release any customer information.

It is up to you to determine if potential litigation is worth the price of downloading and allowing other to upload from you, copyrighted material.

Feel free to contact us if you have questions pertaining to our policy, or your potential infraction of the statute.

Belkin Routers

Recent information showed us that certain Belkin Routers, with specific firmware (the code that runs the routers) causes significant issues for the customers Internet service.

A simple Firmware upgrade is all that is required in order to resolve the connectivity issues with these routers.

An audit of our system shows that you may have one of the affected Belkin routers. If you do in fact have a Belkin Router, we suggest the following: Download and install the latest version of the firmware for your router.

Belkin has on their website specific instructions on the upgrade, this is the actual URLhttp://www.belkin.com or you can do a Google search for belkin router upgrade.

WIRELESS SECURITY

The first thing you need to know is that there is no such thing as a truly secure wireless connection. Many free tools are available on the Internet giving individuals access to your wireless connection.

Please note: Per the ISP Agreement, Sweetwater Cable/Green River Cable TV are not responsible for any networking you utilize. You will have received a disk with your router with specific instructions on manually configuring you router, and additional resources will be available at your routers website. In general, there are 3 things that you want to do, to secure your wireless network.

• 1: Change the SSID Broadcast name (something recognizable but not descriptive).
• 2: Enable the WPA(personal) Settings, use a pass-phrase with at least 8 characters, including numbers
• 3: Change the Router Password (put information on bottom of router)

To Access the Security settings in the router, either use the disk that came with it, or manually configure it. We recommend you physically connect via Ethernet for the manual configuration of the router. If you connect wirelessly to router before securing it, each change will kick you off your network, and you will have to re-establish communications to continue.

First, you need the Default Gateway of the router. You get this information from “ALL PROGRAMS -> ACCESSORIES -> Command Prompt Screen. Type ipconfig in the Command Prompt screen then “enter” on the keyboard. You’ll see an IP Address, Subnet and Default Gateway. The Default Gateway is the access to the router's GUI interface. Leave this screen open, as you'll need it in a few moments.

Open a web page.  Type the Default Gateway, (ex: 192.168.0.1).  into the URL location box.   You should get a login screen. Your Wireless Router CD will have the default Login/PW for your device.  

Under the Wireless folder, you’ll want to change the SSID Broadcast Name, (to something recognizable, but not descriptive) enable the WPA personnal settings, and create your WPA Pass-phrase. (a good pass phrase is something like 1972 Jan 1975 Apr using your own dates)

Be sure to save the changes, and write them down on a note, that you put on the bottom of the router. Under Administration, you will then change the routers password from the default password, write this down as well.

Be sure to use at least 8 characters, using numbers and letters. Once configured, you can begin to use the secured wireless network you set up, by connecting to your routers SSID Broadcast name, using the wireless utility on the PC. Of Note: All routers have a RESET button on them, which will take the router to it’s default settings. Hold button for at least 30 seconds to do a complete reset.