“We’ve been hacked.” There is a must read article for all small businesses. It’s about electronic hackers and a small business in Chicago that was successfully hacked. The authors are Geoffrey A. Fowler and Ben Worthen. The title of the article is: Hackers Shift Attacks to Small Firms. The article appeared in the Wall Street Journal on July 21, 2011. The authors quote Dean Kinsman, a special agent in the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Cyber Division. Kinsman says that hacking at small businesses “is a prolific problem,” and that “It’s going to get much worse before it gets better.” Imagine this: It’s just another day at your small business. You take a credit card from a customer standing in front of you. You run the card just like you always do and begin a standard transaction. The credit card is sent from the reader over the Internet to the processor. But unbeknownst to you, or your customer, before the transaction arrives at the processor for approval, a software program intercepts your customer’s data (known as a data breach) and a … Continue reading →

“How are your Data Backups?” if your answer is . . . “Uh . . . I . . . think they’re ok?” That’s the wrong answer.

Saying “We’ve never had a virus problem on our network” is like saying… “I don’t carry car insurance, because I’ve never had an accident!” Corporate Antivirus Programs, like car insurance, will always cost you less in the long run.

Break-Fix is waiting for a problem to arise and then resolve it… preventative maintenance,
like car maintenance, will always cost you less in the long run Continue reading →

For as little as $1/day, per computer, your systems can be fully backed up, patched, cleaned and optimized. So what does $1/day get me? LiveWatchIT “Essentials” Office Managed Services Automatic Cleanup of Temporary Internet Files and “Temp” Folder to get rid of accumulation Automatic Disk Defragmentation Patch Management, keeping your system up to date and closing security holes Monitored backups and easy recovery Nightly disk-imaging backup allows for quick whole-hard-drive disaster recovery Individual file and folder restoration available All backups monitored for successful completion Backup and restoration phone technical assistance at no additional charge Already have an employee that “does IT” in addition to his job … ? How much are you REALLY saving?

A note from dts|infotech to our valued clients and friends . . . You may have heard about a current news story regarding the “LizaMoon” web attack. To see what this attack actually looks like, follow this link and watch the 4 minute video. It’s very informative. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKI5dg1cs74 For more technical information follow this link: http://community.websense.com/blogs/securitylabs/archive/2011/03/31/update-on-lizamoon-mass-injection.aspx The LizaMoon attack is all the rage among online security watchdogs for its speed and scope, but built-in safeguards and common sense mean few users will suffer. Security firm WebSense (www.websense.com) discovered the attack last week where malware writers used website flaws to inject malicious scripts into hundreds of thousands of websites. It’s virtually impossible to know the exact number of infections, but reports in the hundreds of thousands, and up to millions of websites, have been hit in this attack. The attack comes in the form of an infected domain called Liza Moon, which is part of a larger attack that redirects users to a website that dupes them into downloading a rogue anti-virus software (for a monetary price) called Windows Stability Center. … Continue reading →

On January 11, 2011, Thomas J. Donohue, President and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said in his The State of American Business 2011 speech that, “We also need stronger global rules as well as more effective enforcement efforts to address the rampant theft of intellectual property in both the digital and physical worlds . . . and we cannot stand by as 19 million jobs in our most innovative and creative industries are threatened.” Effective enforcement begins in house with employee monitoring. You may feel like Big Brother, but it’s the most effective way to protect your company against employees you suspect of goofing off while they’re on your payroll, or downloading and removing sensitive files to sell to your competitors. The reality is that it happens all too often. There are numerous reasons to investigate employees. Here are just a few . . . Increased Productivity It’s estimated that US employers lose $759 billion dollars each year. Most of us accept a little downtime during the day for fun and relaxation, but according to surveys by Salary.com … Continue reading →

Regarding employee monitoring, one of the published goals of the non-profit, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse is to “Raise consumers’ awareness of how technology affects personal privacy.” And according to their Fact Sheet 7: Workplace Privacy and Employee Monitoring, “Employers want to be sure their employees are doing a good job, but employees don’t want their every sneeze or trip to the water cooler logged. That’s the essential conflict of workplace monitoring.” As a former network administrator, employee monitoring was the last thing I wanted to spend time doing. The very thought of watching someone is repugnant to me, let alone monitoring them.  However, I was paid by a company to administer their network. And it is well documented that small businesses and large corporations are being ripped off every day by poor productivity, improper ethics, stolen documents and potential law suits stemming from employees who engage in this type of behavior. But time out.  Can’t we frame this conversation in a way that has the potential to resolve conflict, and is non-combative yet beneficial to the company and their employees so … Continue reading →

Whenever I see advertising that claims Data Recovery for $199.00! I always think about what we went through to recover our data. And I wonder if other companies who find themselves in a similar situation really want to trust their data recovery for $199.00. Continue reading →