A technology roadmap is a key asset to use when planning your business for the near future. IT is volatile and demands that you always think ahead, so if you want to make sure technology doesn’t become a major pain point for your organization, it’s best to start thinking ahead. We’re here to help you get started thinking about how your business technology should change and adapt over the course of 2019.
Many organizations that don’t have the same breadth of funding and services might wind up spending more capital in attempts to compete with these larger organizations, but the way forward isn’t always clear. For small businesses that have trouble managing the many moving parts of their business, communication is key--especially in an age where so many businesses have remote employees who are not always in the office to speak to directly. We’ll discuss what the modern face of communications looks like with a particular focus on conferencing services.
Your business seems to be humming along nicely and, BOOM, a disaster hits. Whether this disaster is caused by an act of God, a cybercriminal, or one of your own employees, you have to be ready. Today, we will look at several statistics that show you just how important having a well strategized data backup and disaster recovery plan is.
Ransomware has now been a major threat to businesses and other organizations for a couple of years, and 2018 is no different. For those who don’t know, ransomware is a form of malicious software (malware) that threatens the elimination of hijacked and encrypted data if a user doesn’t pay a ransom. It is known to be one of the most prolific and pervasive threats seen on the Internet today. We will take a look at how ransomware has evolved over the past several years, what the future of ransomware looks like, and what you can do to protect yourself against it.
Phishing scams have one of the most descriptive names in all of computing, mostly because of how similar phishing is with fishing. Just as one does when one goes fishing, bait is dangled in the hopes of getting a bite - but to take the comparison one step further, different types of bait can be used, depending on the catch one is trying to make.
If your computer is running Windows 7 as its operating system, it’s time to start thinking about the future. Microsoft has officially unveiled the End-of-Life date for Windows 7, meaning that they will eventually stop supporting computers running the much-loved operating system. What does this mean for your business? Let’s find out.
The modern worker (or really, the modern person) spends a lot of their time looking at a computer screen. Considering this, it only makes sense that their screens and the items displayed on them are arranged in a way that they like. Our tip covers a few shortcuts to help you arrange and view the items on your workstation a little quicker.
Managing business technology is not easy, especially if your budget doesn’t accommodate an internal IT department. You want professionals who know what they are doing to be the first ones handling your organization’s technology solutions, but sometimes this simply isn’t possible. While the concept of outsourcing technology management and maintenance to a third party sounds strange at first glance, it sure beats just about any other alternative out there--and for good reason.
Businesses need to protect themselves in the modern threat climate. This fact can’t be negotiated, but many organizations have found themselves attempting to get by without protecting their assets or network infrastructure. We’re here to tell you why failing to implement security standards for your business could put its future on the line, as well as what you can do to make sure this doesn’t happen.
Email security has suffered in the past several years due to the commoditization of basic email security services. If every spam solution is the same, then they can be changed out to just about any other solution out there, removing quality and replacing it with quantity. We have seen this trend take antivirus--the fact that free antivirus exists and many people prefer it over some paid solutions is a testament to this--but will spam protection move in the same direction?
The Internet of things can be described simply as devices that have connectivity to the Internet, and thus to a computing network. Many times these connected devices aren’t manufactured with security solutions onboard (or any security-minded foresight at all) so they can be fickle instruments when trying to onerously secure a network that includes numerous IoT devices. Today, we'll go over some of the threats IoT devices pose to your network, and how to reliably secure it from these threats.
It’s not out of the ordinary for a business to sideline communications in favor of getting operations off the ground, but the issue is that communications are supposed to be used for augmenting operations. Therefore, businesses that don’t utilize a unified communications system are doing themselves a disservice in more ways than one.
For a technology that’s so commonplace, Wi-Fi rarely receives an update unless a catastrophic new threat becomes a major issue. Most recently, the KRACK vulnerability exposed serious shortcomings regarding WPA2 connections--a technology that has been in place since 2004. A new version of this technology called WPA3 has been introduced to combat the most recent threats and vulnerabilities, improving security considerably.
In the wake of the countless threats out there that can threaten your business, it’s more important than ever before to think about what your organization is doing to protect its data--and, by extension, its future. Depending on the current data backup solution your organization uses, it might be time to consider a change for the better.
The search for the right technology for your business sometimes becomes problematic because you either don’t have the necessary capital or operational leeway to integrate the latest and greatest solutions. For the company that needs an upgrade, and doesn’t exactly know what the next move is, consulting with an IT professional is a great option, and can turn your entire business around.
It’s important to think about how your organization manages its technology, especially in a world where businesses depend heavily on critical software and hardware solutions to stay functioning. Granted, getting the technology assistance you need can be difficult with a limited budget and workforce. Managed services can be a great alternative to your organization hiring and managing its own IT department, and they can even be used to augment your current IT administrators.
The Internet of Things might be a considerable step up in terms of connectivity for a lot of users and organizations, but this comes at a cost. With more devices accessing connected networks than ever before, security becomes a main focal point of discussion for the Internet of Things. How can you make sure that your network is secure while these devices run rampant all around you?
Every business executive wants an office assistant that can help with the everyday “grunt work.” These office assistants handle a lot of work that the busy business owner simply doesn’t have time for. Unfortunately, small businesses are working with a limited budget, making the odds of affording extra help slim to none. Can Amazon’s Alexa offer an alternative to this dilemma?
Starting a business is certainly no easy feat. It was likely a hassle just to get things up and running at a basic level. While most organizations that provide a product likely had to focus on getting that product to market, technology has begun to help aid this endeavor considerably. Unfortunately, it’s easy to fall into the trap that your organization uses too much technology--so much that it negatively affects your bottom line.
It’s not unusual for people to try and predict what the future will look like, but too many times when people try and predict what will happen in the future, the reality of what is happening today isn’t taken into account. Imagining the workplace (and workforce) of the future requires we look at where we are today, the pace of change, and what changes are expected. It may not go the way you envision, but the more empirical data you use to model what the future looks like, the less disappointed you’ll be when your imaginary benchmarks aren’t met.
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