Hi Lynn here's a few things I can think of
securing your wireless
this depends on the make of modem but if you login to the router and look for the wireless/security options
setup a password on your wireless, use WPA or WPA2 security (don't use WEP it's mince). When enabling this it might ask for a "pre-share key" which just means a password. If you make the password a mix of number and letters it's better and more difficult to guess, it can be handy to take a normal one like Frostie and substitute a couple of letters for numbers i.e. Fr0st1e. Password are usually case sensitive too, so mixing those in can make the password even trickier to work out.
Another thing, a bit more tricky to find on some routers, is to setup an access list so that only your computer is allowed to access the router, regardless if the right password is given. To do this you need to find the MAC address of the wireless card in your computer. To do this in windows I think (i'm a bit rusty) pick Run from the start menu, type CMD and hit return, this should bring up a very old fashioned looking black window with a command prompt. type ipconfig /all and hit return. This should bring up the list of network connections on your computer, one of which should be your wireless card. If your wireless card is connected it should have a complete list of stuff like IP address, gateway etc. Your MAC address, or physical adapter address I think it calls it, should be listed as a mix of 12 numbers and letters in groups of two i.e. 00-5f-3e-98-a3-e1. Make a note of it and look in the router for an option to set up an access list. Make sure it's allow only, and add the MAC address you just got.
The last thing I could suggest is to hide your wireless connection. The option to look for is show/hide SSID. This will stop your router shouting HELLO I"M HERE, to all and sundry.
As for Outlook I thnk you need to change the connection it'll use to network rather than dial-up. I can't remember off the top of my head but I'll check in work tomorrow when I'm near a copy of Outlook
HTH
Paul
Bookmarks