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As I hopped from site to site, I encountered a lot of problems with timeouts and broken routes to various webservers.

Maybe it was coincidence, maybe it was because a critical flaw has been reported with one of the world's most popular brands of router. For those who don't know what a router is -- it's one of the many boxes that networks and ISPs use to direct the flow of internet packets from one place to another.

CISCO announced yesterday that they'd discovered a bug that made it possible for routers to be disabled by malicious sods who might send carefully crafted data packets to them.

When you consider just how many of these routers there are out there and just how reliant the Net is on such boxes, the potential magnitude of the problem is frightening.

But that's not the only worry for Net users right now.

Just a couple of days ago Microsoft announced that virtually all of its Windows operating systems suffered from a critical security flaw that could allow hackers to seize control of these machines.

Now let's get this clear: a good percentage of the routers that comprise critical elements of the Net are open to attack, and probably more than 95% of all Windows-based computers are similarly vulnerable to a different attack.

What does that tell us about the sensibility of actually relying on the Net for important stuff?

I wonder how many companies or individuals actually have properly designed and tested contingency plans that can be activated should they lose Internet connectivity for any length of time?

Don't look at me - I'm probably one of the worst offenders. I'm sorry to say that I don't have alternative contact details or phone numbers for many of the people I regularly exchange emails with.

Maybe now would be a good time to haul out the FiloFax or PDA and start adding a little information about colleagues and friends -- just in case.

Lighten Up
Come on guys, the stock of good links is bare again! Send me your favourites and funniest websites.

Here's one if you're *really* lost for something to do. Why not spank the monkey?

This picture adds a whole new meaning to the term "hit the gas" doesn't it?

And here's an example of how not to move a bomb.

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