Search OutlookPower's 9,596 Outlook and all-things-email article archive 
Home
EasyPrint
News details Click here for the RSS feed's XML code. This is not a browser URL.
Articles-only Click here for the RSS feed's XML code. This is not a browser URL.
Twitter Feed Click here for the Twitter feed.
The White House email controversy: our formal recommendations (continued)

Since email, computer files in the form of attachments, key contact lists, and so much more are accessible from and stored within these tiny potential nightmares, we believe they need the same careful and integrated oversight that White House email should be getting.

Recommendation: manage political email via the Electronic Communication Protection Detail
Once a candidate wins an election and moves into the White House, all electronic communication, political or otherwise, needs to be managed by the proposed Electronic Communication Protection Detail.

We discussed the reasoning for this earlier, in our Hatch Act recommendation, but we feel it's necessary that the Electronic Communication Protection Detail be clearly tasked with the management of all White House email, not just email that's purely government related.

We have absolutely no problem with the Republican National Committee using a firm like SMARTech to manage non-White House email or email for presidential candidates. In fact, our limited research into SMARTech indicated a company that seems to know its stuff.

However, once a candidate becomes president, the game changes. No longer is the candidate transported in his campaign bus, now The President is transported in Marine One and Air Force One.

Likewise, as we've made abundantly clear in our investigation, White House email, political and otherwise, must be managed by a professional, career Electronic Communication Protection Detail.

Recommendation: archiving must be managed professionally
Without a doubt, enterprise-quality archiving servers need to be set up for the management of all White House email. This technology is offered by many companies, it's solid, tested, and used by the very largest of corporations to comply with their own government-mandated record-keeping regulations.

"The practice of archiving is a technical act, while the practice of disclosing is a political or policy act."

Once again, we recommend the Electronic Communication Protection Detail manage these systems. We also recommend that all email, policy, political, or otherwise, be archived. Remember that archiving doesn't mean disclosing and the practice of archiving is a technical act, while the practice of disclosing is a political or policy act.

It's up to the politicians to determine whether anything from the archives should be disclosed. But it's up to experienced IT professionals to make sure everything's available if disclosure becomes necessary.

Because technology, media, and file formats are changing at breakneck pace, another responsibility of the Electronic Communication Protection Detail with regard to archiving would be the regularly updating of archives to new formats. In fact, we recommend that the entire cumulative library of archives be checked and migrated every four years as technology and file formats change.

Recommendation: handhelds need management, tracking, and self-destruct
Given the rigors of the job, it's not surprising that White House staffers are human. People sometimes lose things. Given the long hours and high stress, we're not surprised that Karl Rove and likely other staffers have lost BlackBerry handhelds. In fact, we'd be surprised if they didn't.


« Previous  ·  1  ·  2  ·  3  ·  4  ·  5  ·  6  ·  Next »
Other articles you might like
Home > Special Reports > White House Email Controversy (24 articles)
   Obama's DOJ quietly sought dismissal of missing emails lawsuit
   Here come the judge, Barack's BlackBerry, David does CNN, and more
   Please treat the White House computers like crime scene evidence
Get Weekly Email Updates
Subscribe to our regular weekly email newsletter. It's packed with tips, reviews, deep analysis, and the latest news.
 
Recent OutlookPower Articles
The strange case of Outlook losing notes and requiring passwords
Why I'm choosing to stick with Outlook 2007
Three ways to avoid email distraction and take back control of your time
Twenty ways to use email to commit career suicide
The two most motivational words in the English language
Diagnosing corrupted email headers
Email offenders
OutlookPower News Center
New Filing Assistant from Allometa
Dropbox bridges gaps in Microsoft's mobile sync
SmartBear Software Releases AQtime 7.0 Pro
6 Super Wi-Fi Tools for Windows
Microsoft Revives Windows 7 Family Pack Discount
Microsoft releases FixIt for critical flaw in 100 apps
M-Files Cloud Vault Easy, Hosted Document Management
>> Read all the news
More from the ZATZ journals
Computing Unplugged: Smartphone smarts for a mobile world
David Gewirtz Online: CNN commentary and analysis
DominoPower: It's time for Lotus to double-down on Linux and open source
-- Advertisement --

Five Email Mistakes You Should Avoid
Have you ever made any of these mistakes?

  • Forgotten to send an attachment you promised in a message
  • Replied-to-all, annoying everyone
  • Forgotten to Reply-to-All, annoying everyone
  • Sent emails using the wrong email account
  • Said something you oh-so-knew-better than to say

Send Guard can keep you looking good by saving you from yourself.

Tap here to download a fully-functional 30-day trial.

ZATZ Home  ·  News  ·  Back Issues  ·  Credits/Trademarks ·  Link To Us
The Power Magazine for Microsoft Outlook and Exchange Users at OutlookPower.com
Copyright © 1998-2010, ZATZ Publishing. All rights reserved worldwide.
Outlook is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Editor's Login