Malware is more than a thorn in a business' side. It can lead to breaches and sharing of sensitive, financial, or legal information to individuals or syndicates who either sell it or use it for their own purposes. However, how do they infect systems? A new study by CSIS (a security group) over 3 months found that over 30% of infections were due to systems not updating their Windows systems and programs. By simply running Windows Updates and installing patches, this can eliminate the largest percentage of being compromised.

With people getting smarter about phishing scams, fake anti-virus scanners, not opening unknown attachments from unknown senders, and avoiding going to infected websites, malware creators are getting creative. The latest way for them to try and infect you is to send you an email that appears to be an attachment from your own printer or scanner. Of course, trusting a device in your own network is alright, isn't it? The way to know is the faked email has a subject: “Scan from a <printer name> <random 6 to 8 digit number string>” and has a ZIP file attached. Opening that file will open malicious forces on your machine and network.

With recent stumblings at Resarch in Motion, Blackberry's company, is it time for your office to switch to Android, iPhone, or a Windows Mobile device? The recent fall of Blackberry raises a cloud on its future and possible restructuring or acquisition. It was not that long ago that Palm was the end all of smart phones. It only took a few years before its assets were picked up by HP, who itself just dumped the remade Palm OS, named Web OS after a failed tablet line. Is this the same fate for Blackberry?

With the recent earthquakes and Irene bearing down on major cities on the East Coast, many forget about their company during these stressful times. However, it is during times like these that after a disaster stikes, that there is still company information to come back to. Whether or not you have fair warning of a disaster, are you prepared for its aftermath? Do you backup your data regularly? Do you have all the company logins, passwords, and vendor information at the ready for when you return? 

The days of using a laptop or desktop for your work and home are going
the way of the typewriter, according to IBM. Their CTO, Mark Dean, who
was one of the designers of the first IBM PC back in 1981 said
personal computers are “going the way of the vacuum tube, typewriter,
vinyl records, CRT and incandescent light bulbs.” With smart phones
and tablets becoming smaller, and more powerful, there are arguments
that all we will need is a small device that we can type on or plug
into a unit to use a keyboard and monitor when needed.”

Renascence IT Consulting knows about today’s technology being
tomorrow’s museum pieces. This is why we are constantly at the
forefront of advances made in smartphones, cloud computing, VoIP, and
other markets that would prove beneficial to a small business. If you
are interested in discussing whether your desktop should go the way of
the dinosaur or what solutions might help you in the bottom line, feel
free to contact us for a free evaluation.

More on the IBM statement:

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/081011-ibm-pc.html?page=1

With the economy having so many issues, is this a good time for your business to consider free software? Many are pointing that switching from Windows to a linux desktop may solve some business woes in the financial department. However, there is a learning curve involved when trying to have people switch from one operating system to another. One only needs to look at the changes just from Windows XP to Windows 7, or Office 2003 to Office 2010 to see the hills many people had to overcome. 

You may have seen posts in the past about malware, viruses and phishing, but this one is truly inventive. A security researcher was able to hack into an Apple laptop's battery and permanently disable, or "brick" it. No matter what is done afterwards, it cannot be used any longer. The way into doing this is through a chip found on all laptop batteries that tells a laptop how to operate with various operating systems and boot sequences. However, this person was able to get into the chip and put code on it to make it permanently dead. 

Many people think that since their iPhone or Droid is a phone, it can't get malware or viruses like a computer. That is completely wrong. It is estimated that by next year 5% of all smartphones will be hit with malicious code or install an infected app. With these kinds of statistics, small businesses need to consider training their employees that their business phone should be treated like a computer, because essentially, it is a computer. 

Do you have a part time IT person that comes in and checks on computers and your network? Do they shuffle around in the back and leave a while later declaring everything is alright? Do you know if they can be trusted? An article in ITworld.com (link below) discusses how easy an individual can sniff your company's network for logins for websites, grab emails in transit, and even plant malicious code or illegal items on your servers. 

With your small business starting, or growing to a point you need better email alternatives than Yahoo or Hotmail, where can you turn? There are plenty of avenues to go down; buy a server and host all your functionality at your office; go with a virtual server and run everything on it; move to the cloud and run services on there that you need. However, if the answer is to move to the "cloud" for your business, is Office 365 from Microsoft or Google Apps better for you? The review link below, I believe, gives both a fair shake, and ultimately it is dependent on your needs for cost, overhead, and ease of use for both IT and for end users.