Last week I attended a lecture on the investment implications of the rise of political populism. The lecture was delivered by the Head of Research and Investment Strategy at a large global asset management firm. The content of his presentation was excellent, and he was an expert and insightful presenter. And, he was speaking to me from London, England, arguably the financial capital of the world for the past several centuries. The reason that I mention this here, however, is not to discuss his information, but to invite you, dear reader, to consider the profound significance of the free, immediate, and global communication capabilities that are now available to most of Earth’s citizens. Historically speaking, this is something brand new, and it creates amazing possibilities for sharing knowledge and gaining new knowledge. Furthermore, there are now available, at no cost, apps that translate between languages in real time. What benefits to humankind might we experience when more and more people from different cultures are able to share their expertise?
In a prior blog post, I told you that we would be making a new service available to our clients, a secure, web-based connection point, kind of like Mint.com, but better. Well, that service is here. We are in the process of testing it now and will set it up for our financial planning clients in the coming weeks. It will be yet another case of better living through technology.
Our clients trust us with their private information, and we make every reasonable effort to maintain its confidentiality. But in the early 21st century, electronic communication can be intercepted by parties with malicious intent. Therefore, to minimize the likelihood of interception, we use only email servers maintained and encrypted by Microsoft. As a result, our inter-office emails are safe because they are encrypted at both ends, since the only email servers involved are the Microsoft servers. The problem – thanks to Lalit T. for pointing this out to us – is that not all servers used by our clients are encrypted, and therefore, there could be a vulnerability at one end of the communication. So, whenever we send privileged (email) information to our clients, we use an additional Microsoft security measure that provides greater protection. If you receive an email from us that includes the text “Encrypted message from Financial Planning Associates, Inc. Secure Messaging System,” you will know it is secure. You should then follow the instructions included to open and view the document. Also, note that we do not “doubly secure” all of our email communications with our clients because some of the information is not considered sensitive. For example, if we are just confirming an appointment, we would not typically take the extra step to ensure the email is encrypted at both ends. If you would like us to always use double encryption when sending emails to you, please let us know.
Note: Some commonly used email servers are also encrypted. Gmail, for example, uses encrypted servers. Therefore, if you communicate with us, or we with you, using your Gmail account, our connections are secure.
I took four tires to a friend’s garage sale and was asking $30 apiece. I needed to leave for a few minutes, so I asked him to watch them for me.
“Sure,” he said, “but if someone offers less, how low are you willing to go?”
“Try for more, but I will accept $15,” I said, and left.
When I returned, my tires were gone. “How much did you get for them?” I asked excitedly.
“Fifteen dollars each.”
“Who bought them?”
“I did!”