So here are a few final thoughts to keep in mind this week and beyond.

These are based on a booklet we commissioned by Linda Criddle of the Safe Internet Alliance and Nancy C. Muir from iLookBothWays to help seniors have a safe, fun and productive time online.

This week’s tip:

E-Mail Safety Basics

Adopt the following e-mail practices to keep you safer every time you send messages:

• Don’t share sensitive personal information.
  
• Never share passwords.
  
• Choose who you e-mail.
  
• Think twice before you open attachments or click links in e-mail.
  
• When sending e-mail to a group of people who don’t know each other, protect everybody’s identity.

Best wishes for a prosperous 2010!

So here are a few more Internet Safety tips to keep in mind over the holidays.

These are based on a booklet we commissioned by Linda Criddle of the Safe Internet Alliance and Nancy C. Muir from iLookBothWays to help seniors have a safe, fun and productive time online.

This week’s tip:

Recognize Fraud and Scams

Learn to spot e-mail scams. Most e-mail spam and scams are easy to spot. Common red-flags include:

• You don’t know the person sending the e-mail.
  
• The claims sound too good to be true.
  
• Someone is promising to send you money or a prize.
  
• A financial institution or store asks for your account information or password.
  
• You’re asked to click on a link in the e-mail or download a file.
  
• The message has misspellings or is unprofessional.
  

Check back again next week for my final installment and please feel free to share your thoughts with us. If you’d like a copy of the booklet, send us a comment and be sure to include your address.

Happy Holidays!

Participants on the December 3rd call included representatives from:

• The American Foundation for the Blind;
  
• Hearing Loss Association of America;
  
• American Association of People with Disabilities; and
  
• Telecommunications for the Deaf, Inc.

Verizon attendees were Tom Maguire from Issues Management and Barbara Kaplan from Verizon Wireless.

Because broadband deployment and adoption is such a critical issue for this constituency, Tom provided everyone with an excellent overview of the net neutrality issue. He outlined where things are today and what some of the perils to universal deployment of broadband may be down the road.

Barb Kaplan then discussed the TALKs handset product. This is a great example of accessible products and services that adapt broadband and mobile technologies to the needs of people with disabilities and physical challenges.

A good feedback session followed, during which the advocates expressed pleasure with much of the work we are doing in this space. The majority of their constructive comments were in the area of customer service. I encouraged the conferees to contact me if they have questions, concerns or ideas so that Verizon can do the best possible job to meet their needs. I know from experience that this group will make their feelings known so I am confident that I will be hearing from them. The goal of these calls is to help make us a better company and that translates into wins for Verizon and our customers. The next call will be held in February.

This week’s tip:

Secure Your Browser and Search the Internet Safely:
Browsers help you move around the Internet and search engines make it easy to find information on the Internet. A secure browser, combined with an antivirus/anti-spyware program, helps you identify safe and unsafe web sites.

• If you get a message from your antivirus program that a site is unsafe… believe it. Don’t go there.
  
• If a site tells you to change your browser settings for a “better experience” – ignore it and use a different web site.
  
• Only allow downloads and run programs when you absolutely trust and understand with the program will do.

Check back next week for more tips. Let us know if you have others and if you’d like a copy of the booklet, send us a comment and be sure to include your address.
Happy Holidays!

Here is an excerpt from a booklet we commissioned by Linda Criddle of the Safe Internet Alliance and Nancy C. Muir from iLookBothWays to help seniors have a safe, fun and productive time online.

Use Technology to Stay Safer

The Internet, just like your local shopping mall, may occasionally be used by miscreants to commit theft or fraud. Just as you would take precautions with your purse of wallet while at the mall, you should take similar precautions to protect your valuable information while online. For example:

• Protect your computer with good antivirus and anti-spyware services.
  
• Use a reputable browser.
  
• Keep your software and operating system up to date.
  
• Protect your computer network and home wireless networks as well.
  
• Turn on your firewall – It is part of your computer system and blocks unauthorized access.

Check back regularly over the next few weeks. I plan to share more about how to keep everyone’s time on the Internet safe.

If you’d like a copy of the booklet, send us a comment and be sure to include your address.

Happy Holidays!

This year Verizon is a recipient of the Torch award in the category of marketplace excellence.

Needless to say, we’re pleased with the BBB’s recognition not only because it acknowledges great business performance, but also because it recognizes Verizon is a good corporate citizen. We’ve always believed that engaging the community builds business as well as social value. So we’ve continued to make those investments because our future growth depends on it.

I want to extend my congratulations to the other recipients of this year’s awards. Springfield Health and Rehabilitation Center located in Springfield, Ohio also receives an award for marketplace excellence for its health care facility; and James A. Guest, president and chief executive officer of Consumers Union, wins the award for Consumer Leadership.

By these awards, the BBB has issued a call to action to all companies. We understand this and will work hard to make continued progress in building trust, respect and confidence in our business.

This week he returned to work and received a hero’s welcome as “World Champion Clark Rachfal.” (Rachfal is on the left in both photos.)

Rachfal participated in a Disability Mentoring Day in 2006 in our downtown Washington, D.C. office, and so impressed senior managers there that he was hired as an intern in the Strategic Alliances organization. A year later, our lobbying office extended the internship and put him to work on Capitol Hill. He’s been working in that group ever since, and he’s made quite an impression.

In fact, two Verizon colleagues flew to Manchester from Washington to cheer him on. Joanna McIntosh and Ed Senn, both executive directors in the D.C. office, brought cowbells to ring and an American flag to cheer him on.

McIntosh said she made the trip partially because Rachfal’s parents couldn’t, but mostly because she wanted to support Rachfal during the race.

“Clark’s incredibly brave,” said McIntosh, a cyclist herself who has ridden with Rachfal in the annual ride across Iowa sponsored by the Des Moines Register. “It’s just been amazing to see him define and dream and then work for it. I think it’s fantastic when people match up with their passion. Some never do; some don’t have the discipline to do it. But Clark does, and he went there and proved it.”

For Rachfal and his teammate Swanson, it was another step on the way to the 2012 Paralympics in London. Between now and then, they’re planning on a lot more training and a few more races.

Rachfal, though, is still savoring the moments filled with tears and smiles when he stood on the winner’s podium proudly wearing the gold medal around his neck. He said the one thing that calmed him down was reciting the words to “The Star Spangled Banner” as it accompanied the raising of the Stars and Stripes.

“It’s a pretty spectacular feeling,” Rachfal said. “To know you went out and represented your country, and then they’re playing your song. That’s a powerful moment.”

This isn’t exactly news, but it is the reason that Verizon is reaching out to children, parents and grandparents so that they experience the value of the digital world in a safe, non-threatening way. We have worked hard to help people use the power of technology to connect and create new communities on-line.

As one example of this work, the Verizon Foundation has sponsored a terrific PBS Frontline program called Digital Nation and I encourage everyone to take a look at it.

The idea is that Frontline is going out and interviewing a wide range of the population – across the country – and exploring how people from all walks of life are using a vast array of digital tools.

Well, I visited the site and you’ll never believe what, or rather who, I found.

I found Bubbe.

Bubbe is an 83 year old grandmother who has an Internet cooking show that her grandson produces. Bubbe cooks and tells stories from her family’s past. She has a large following and has found that she is now Grandmother, or Bubbe, to thousands of people on-line. She started with her simple “Jelly Jammies” recipe and now has 26 episodes with recipes ranging from stuffed cabbage to chicken schnitzel.

I don’t believe I could have found a better illustration of what digital literacy is all about. You just have to watch this clip from Digital Nation to see what this digital tool has meant to Bubbe, her family and now by extension to her numerous fans. Check her out. You won’t be disappointed. As for me, I’m trying the vegetarian stew recipe this weekend. It looks great.

As the father of three children, I often feel like that cartoon character who follows his children around the house, turning off all the lights and devices behind them as they move from one activity to the next. As soon as you shut down one room, two more are lit up. I suppose motion sensing lights represent one way to manage energy usage, but I now feel empowered by the notion that my cell phone will enable me to complete my tasks from anywhere in the world.

Opto 22 makes hardware and software that uses open communications standards like IP and Ethernet on broadband networks to connect all kinds of machines, devices, and sensors to computer networks. The premise is by providing energy monitoring capabilities, customers can manage energy use. Opto 22 started off in the commercial market, creating a system that allowed building owners to better monitor and remotely manage how energy is used in their buildings. Opto 22’s system helps utilities and commercial power users implement load curtailment programs to better manage electrical grids during periods of peak demand. The system also lets building owners practice demand-side energy management strategies, because they have access to detailed information regarding energy consumption and future pricing.

It was exciting to learn that Opto 22 has turned its attention to the residential market. It has developed a prototype system that connects directly to the home’s electrical box and does not require a smart meter to help customers monitor their energy consumption. Energy usage data on appliances, air conditioners and even water heaters can be transmitted over a broadband connection back to Opto 22’s server and is available to the home owner via the Internet over a smart phone. So, any time the kids leave the television on, you can turn it off, even if you are in Europe. Better yet, you can program your dishwasher to only run after midnight, when you know electricity rates are lowest.

The second practical innovation is by a joint venture called Text On. Text On is a joint venture between New York-based Riverphonic LLC, a mobile phone applications specialist, and GreenOrder Ventures, a clean technology accelerator group. The company has developed a technology that can be applied to public lighting facilities to turn them on and off via text messaging.

Text On is working with the NYC City Parks and Recreation to develop a pilot scheme to manage lighting at athletics fields. City ballfield floodlights are energy-intensive and often stay on needlessly despite no-shows, rain-delays and system malfunctions. There is public resentment about wasting energy and about the perceived unfairness to non-players who pay the bill for ballfield lights.

With Text On, the lights stay off by default. Authorized users can turn them on by sending a text message to a designated ‘Short Code’, and be charged (or not) by the hour for their usage. The technology is operated via a central online platform that can be activated by the general public using simple keywords, and via municipal parks officers using individual pass codes.

Both of these applications are great examples of how information communications technology delivered over wireline and wireless broadband networks facilitate more energy efficient behaviors. Since the younger generation adapts to technology so quickly, I am hoping to install the Opto 22 solution in my home so that the kids think it’s cool to use their cell phones to turn the lights off in their rooms.

In today’s ever evolving, wired world it’s easy for parents to feel a step behind their children when it comes to technology.

Luckily, many companies, parental advocates and law enforcement officials offer practical resources and continue to look for new ways to help parents learn simple steps to make their child’s online experience a positive one.

This week leaders in those fields will gather in Washington, D.C. for the Family Online Safety Institute’s (FOSI) two-day conference entitled “Building a Culture of Responsibility from Online Safety to Digital Citizenship.”

I will moderate a panel at FOSI on law enforcement trends and prevention initiatives. Panelists include the attorneys general of Washington and Rhode Island, Robert McKenna and Patrick Lynch; Sgt. Jim Smith, of CT Internet Crimes Against Children; Ann Harkins, of the National Crime Prevention Council; and Parry Aftab, of WiredSafety.

My colleague, Jack McArtney, who oversees advertising and content standards for Verizon, will serve on a panel entitled “Kids on the Go – Challenges Confronting Mobility.” He’ll highlight some common-sense steps parents can take to manage their child’s online experience.

Need a few tips? A great place to start is the Verizon Parental Control Center. The center has a host of free materials and videos on topics ranging from social networking, to safe surfing for kids, to cyberbullying.

Finding parental peace of mind in the digital world can be easier than you think.