Pass the word on Phishing Please pass the word on phishing to your friends, neighbors, relatives, and even strangers. I told you so...sort of Bad research dooms CRM and IT projects. That's what Gartner Group says in an Infoweek article. According to the story, IT people don't know what data to collect or what to do with the collected data. Resolve...To Ask the Right Questions I recently consulted for a company that wanted project management services for a new website. When I came to my first meeting of the cross-functional website team I thought I was in a David Lynch movie.

Clients are constantly asking us what to do about spam. It is truly out of control! Unfortunately, as sage as Concept is about technology, we have no simple solution. Until a legislative solution occurs, I suspect spam will continue. Consider the following information provided by PA E-commerces association: Recently, the FTC held a three-day workshop on spam featuring consumer advocates, spammers, Internet service providers and lawmakers. About 33% of the spam sampled contained false return addresses and nearly half of those incorrectly suggested the sender had a personal relationship with the recipient. Twenty-two percent of the messages analyzed had misleading subject lines, including more than a third of the sexually oriented offers. Again, 42% of those e-mails falsely suggested a personal relationship with the receiver. And 40% of the spam had at least one false claim in the text of the message -- 90% of the come-ons for investment and business opportunities. Nearly half the health and vacation offers had misleading information. We have provided research on the best strategy for some clients. Call us if you need help. ~Joel