Abstract: An information providing device capable of providing information through Web pages so that a user (a browsing party of the Web page) can acquire a desired piece of information without performing intricate operations. The information providing devices has such architecture that if a certain link anchor is manipulated (clicked) on the computer of the user who desires to acquire the information, the user can be provided with the information by displaying the standard content page that is to be redisplayed when there is met the predetermined condition about the elapse time since a point of time when the anchor manipulation has been done.

Abstract: An authentication apparatus decides whether a sender of an e-mail received is an authentic user. The authentication apparatus includes a confirmation mail transmission unit that transmits a confirmation e-mail to the sender demanding the sender to reply to the confirmation e-mail; and an authentication deciding unit that decides whether the sender is an authentic user depending on whether the sender replies to the confirmation mail.