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MOUSE NOT FOUND! . . . Hello, and welcome to the third edition of Mouse Not Found, bringing you closer to the world of the Internet! Regular visitors to our club website will have noticed that its undergone a facelift over the past few months; gone are the numerous links that were scattered across and down the page, and instead we have a slick drop-down menu that allows visitors to easily navigate the site along with a striking picture of Foxy that shows newcomers what beautiful cats Turkish Vans are. If you haven't visited our site recently then do spare a few moments to take a look, I hope you'll be impressed. You can also join our low-volume email list which will keep you up to date on the latest news and events relating to our cats. The Internet continues to expand at a frightening rate, with well over 1 billion web pages worldwide. The potential is huge, and like it or not, it will become a familiar part of our lives. Already there are many online shopping sites ranging from groceries and pet products, to airline tickets and holidays, however many of you may be wondering just how secure is purchasing over the Internet? Well, read on! Internet security is a big issue, with even Microsoft having been invaded by hackers in recent months. Obviously the banks have taken great steps to ensure that access to their servers is fully restricted to authorised users only, and that means you and me if you've chosen to open an online banking account. Whether you're checking your bank balance or buying a scratching post the security situation is the same - you do not want anyone to snoop your transactions and learn things like your credit card number, or bank account details. Fortunately there is a mechanism built into our web browser software that prevents this from happening, effectively scrambling our details as they pass over the Internet to the remote site. As long as this encryption is activated then nobody will be able to see our personal details. So how do we know whether the encryption is activated, i.e. that we have a secure connection? Well, there are a few ways of checking this, depending on which browser you use, but in any case the first indication of a secure site is in the URL (i.e. the www… bit) where you will see it begin with https:// instead of the more usual http://. This indicates that a secure protocol is being used for data transfer. For users of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser a secure site is also indicated by the presence of a closed padlock symbol in the status bar at the bottom of the window. This is not displayed for normal insecure sites. You can also check the security settings by looking at the Connection field in the File -> Properties menu selection. This will indicate that the connection is either not encrypted, or that it uses something like SSL with 56-bit encryption. Netscape users will also see a closed padlock symbol in the status bar when a secure site is being accessed, and this will change to an open padlock symbol for unsecured sites. You can confirm this by opening the Communicator -> Tools -> Security Info menu, which will also allow you to view the security certificate for the site being viewed. If you want to try this out, point your browser to www.petplanet.co.uk/shop/about.asp (note the https:// prefix) where you'll also be able to read more about security for online shopping. I'll round up this article with a few URLs that you may find interesting and/or useful:- THE CINNAMON TRUST Visit www.cinnamontrust.co.uk/ to learn what The Cinnamon Trust can do for you, or more specifically for your pets should anything untoward happen to you. Perhaps you're thinking of making a Will and need to consider what happens to your pets? Well, The Cinnamon Trust can help you. GRAPHICS & MEDIA The CatStuff website at www.xmission.com/~emailbox/catstuff.htm is packed with games, clipart, poems, software, trivia, and humour, all loyalty free so you can use tem on your own website. STORIES & ARTICLES www.felidae.clara.net/ is the homepage of Cats-Paw Detective Agency, for stories and articles about our feline companions. PET HEALTH www.pethealthcare.co.uk/ A healthy pet is a happy pet. Which is why we've brought together leading experts to create the world's most comprehensive online source of pet care information. Get all the latest health news, advice. OUR CATS MAGAZINE Our Cats magazine now has a website at www.ourcats.co.uk/, although it was still under construction at the time of writing. TV PROGRAMS The BBC has a web page dedicated to pets, located at www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/pets/. Here you can also catch a link to their wildlife pages and follow their latest series. Similarly, The Discovery Channel's Animal Planet at animalplanet.discoveryeurope.com/ contains many interesting articles connected with current news and programs. Well that completes another edition of Mouse Not Found! So until next time, happy surfing!
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