CloudLock Helps Admins Secure Google Docs

The service gives admins and users greater control over document management.

CloudLock,which lets users view and control all documents in the domain, has added some  compelling  new features for admins and users. It now adds a level of security to its Dashboard, letting you view and manage who has access to what Google Docs content.

The new security feature allows admins granular control over multiple actions. For example, you can transfer ownership of documents, terminate access, and search across the domain, which is great for eDiscovery purposes, says ReadWriteWeb’s David Strom. Additionally, you can schedule and run a variety of reports, including historical summaries of documents (and how they are classified), and generate an audit log to show changes to those documents.

There is one catch: users can’t make changes to online documents, but they can download them to their desktops.

CloudLock costs $8-19 per user per year and is free for domains with fewer than 10 users; you can also sign up for  a one-week free trial. Users can activate CloudLock from the Google Apps Marketplace.

Read more at ReadWriteWeb.

Who Owns Your Social Identity?

Think that username you use all over the Internet is yours? Maybe not.

Imagine if you woke up one day to find your blog had been renamed without warning by your hosting service and your user name given to someone else.  Or what if Twitter decided to give your username away?

According to IEEE Spectrum‘s Steven Cherry these things can happen. To find out how much ownership we really have over our online identities, Cherry interviewed technologist and journalist Tristan Louis on his weekly podcast who talked about what he learned after studying the Terms of Service agreements for sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Ironically, Louis told Cherry that if Twitter wanted to collect all of Cherry’s podcasts and sell them to the highest bidder, or take all of his tweets and put them into a book, it could legally do so. While Louis said Twitter’s TOS are actually very readable compared with other sites filled with legalese, its terms put Twitter, and not users, in control of content on the site.

Louis said Facebook, which is commonly blasted for its privacy policies, says it will at least alert users before moving them to another account name, as well as give them a right to challenge the decision.

To hear Cherry’s podcast with Louis, go to IEEE Spectrum.

Three Internet Security Programs

We tested three programs to see how they performed against malware and viruses.

For many companies, off-the-shelf security software is the main defense against online threats. We set up a dummy laptop and visited sites known for doling out malware and viruses to see how the following programs performed.

Trend Micro Worry-Free Business Security
Trend Micro's software allows administrators to manage local desktop security online. The software blocked all but two (mostly harmless) sites, but it did not remove some malicious apps.
COST: $31 a year per user for two to 25 computers

Symantec Endpoint Protection Small Business Edition
This program warns administrators of new attacks via e-mail or text. It did not block as many sites and programs as the other software we tested did. (Symantec says its software is designed to avoid false positives.) It also used the most computer memory.
COST: $35 per user for five to 24 computers, plus update fees

McAfee SAAS Endpoint Protection
Our top pick, this program also has an online management tool. It did not flag harmful websites like the other software we tested. But it blocked threats the others missed, including a program that tricks people into giving out credit card details.
COST: $35 a year per user for up to 25 computers