Hackers are employing increasingly sophisticated techniques to scam users into downloading malicious software. For instance, today’s hackers and malware authors have begun using so-called “doorway pages” – web pages optimized to rank highly in results for common search engine queries.
These pages often feature trending or hot topics to show up favorably in search results, and [...]
Entries from May 2010
Hackers Employing Sophisticated Techniques to Trick Users
May 31st, 2010 · No Comments
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services · Security
Personal IT in the Workplace: Bad for Your Business?
May 28th, 2010 · No Comments
Consider this: according to research by technology analyst group Gartner, beyond 2010 end users, not the IT department, will be responsible for 50 percent of business IT procurement decisions—ultimately bringing and running their own systems on company networks. Meanwhile, according to management consultants Accenture, around one-third of today’s new generation of workers (a group they call [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services
Why You Can’t Survive Without a Disaster Recovery Plan
May 26th, 2010 · No Comments
It’s simple: Businesses that suffer data losses usually fail as a result.
That’s according to a study by the Department for Trade and Industry, which found that 70 percent of small businesses suffering a major data loss are out of business within 18 months.
What this means is businesses have failed to protect themselves from a plethora [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Disaster Recovery · Managed Services · Security
Why Investing in Technology Can Actually Save You Money
May 24th, 2010 · No Comments
Money is tight and hard to come by, and a lot of companies are looking to cut costs and sacrifice the non-essentials. For many, taking off a chunk out of the IT budget is one of the ways to try to save money.
However, when it comes to IT services, chances are a bit more investment [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services · Virtualization
Thinking About Security in the Cloud?
May 21st, 2010 · No Comments
As we begin to store more and more of our data on the Internet and in the “Cloud,” the threat of that data being accessed and used by someone or something outside of our knowledge or control becomes very real. Data such as credit card information, banking transactions, work history, private addresses and numbers, email [...]
Tags: Cloud · Cloud Computing · Managed Hosting · Microsoft · Security
Beware New Facebook Scam
May 19th, 2010 · 1 Comment
McAfee posted on its blog recently news about e-mail purportedly coming from Facebook urging recipients to open an attachment to get their new password on the site. Unfortunately the email is a scam to get not only users’ password of the popular social networking website, but potentially any accounts they use while using their computer [...]
Tags: Managed Services · Security
Tornados and Floods…are you prepared?
May 18th, 2010 · 1 Comment
Ever wonder what it would look like if your business were destroyed by a flood? See firsthand what the Pep Boys location in Nashville caught on their security camera in early May.
What about a tornado? Watch this clip to see what impact a tornado can have on your business.
Both of these film clips should serve [...]
Tags: Backup · Business Continuity · Disaster Recovery · Managed Services
Beware of Ransomware!
May 17th, 2010 · 1 Comment
Users beware of ransomware: malicious software that extorts money from users in exchange for freeing the user’s computer or data. One particularly nasty version was recently discovered by researchers at CA which came bundled with a software download called uFast Download Manager. The malware blocks Internet access for users until they pay the publisher a [...]
Tags: Managed Services · Security
Common Craft: Complicated Made Easy
May 14th, 2010 · 1 Comment
For many people, learning begins by understanding the basic principles that drive a certain concept. Whether in technology or science or society, the world is filled with so many complex and complicated subjects that affect our lives, but remain largely misunderstood by the general public.
This is where commoncraft.com comes in. Owned and maintained by husband [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services
Assessing and Documenting Your IT Needs
May 12th, 2010 · 1 Comment
You expect your computer to work when you turn it on. The last thing you want is to waste valuable time trying to get your email running or wrestling with a web browser that won’t load.
These are frustrations you surely have experienced, and chances are you will again. But you don’t have to. Or, at [...]
Tags: Backup · Business Continuity · Disaster Recovery · Managed Services · Security
Brad Paisley Sings the Blues…
May 11th, 2010 · 1 Comment
Not even the rich and famous are immune from disasters so don’t think that it can’t happen to you. Just take a look at country singing sensations Brad Paisley and Keith Urban who are two of countless musicians that will most likely lose millions of dollars on performance gear due to the historic floods in [...]
Tags: Backup · Business Continuity · Disaster Recovery · Managed Hosting · Managed Services · Storage
Are You Regularly Defragmenting Your Disks?
May 10th, 2010 · 1 Comment
When most people want to purchase a new computer or upgrade their current one, they focus on finding a CPU with the quickest speed, the most computing cores, or the most RAM they can afford. However, they may be overlooking the most likely reason for computing slowdowns: fragmentation in the disks.
Disk drives claim the [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services · Virtualization
Free Online Solutions Make Your Life Easier
May 7th, 2010 · 1 Comment
Do you frequently struggle with creating PDF documents, sending large files through email, and converting various file types from one to another? If so, you may have found that some mainstream solutions are complicated and time consuming. But there are some online solutions that can help you with these common tasks without requiring you to [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services · Microsoft
Ports Ahoy!
May 5th, 2010 · 1 Comment
This past Saturday night Dallas Data Center implemented 5 new Cisco switches, which added a significant amount of new ports (216 to be exact) to our networking infrastructure. The 5 latest switches were joined into a HA mesh with 1 and 2 gigabit redundant port channels to the core. Along with this addition, we increased [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Dallas Data Center · Data Centers · Managed Hosting · Managed Services · Switches
Are You in Danger When Searching the Internet?
May 5th, 2010 · No Comments
Research released by antivirus vendors MacAfee and Panda suggest that searching for certain key words on Internet search engines can prove dangerous. Hackers and malware authors have become adept at Search Engine Optimization and are using frequently searched key words to create sites that will rank favorably in search engines, but are a host for [...]
Tags: Business Continuity · Managed Services · Security
How to Simplify IT and Unlock Resources
May 3rd, 2010 · No Comments
Businesses need to use the economic crisis as a time to reassess their IT needs and options. Server virtualization, consolidation, and energy costs are a good place to start.
Read more at Inc. Technology…
Tags: Business Continuity · Consolidation · Servers · Virtualization