A scathing report emerged today, accusing Staples of reselling old customer machines that still had sensitive customer information on it. Over 1/3rd of systems independently checked still had data that included social security numbers, tax records, and banking information. 17 out of 20 laptops that were wiped still had information on them that would be labelled sensitive on them. 

Three days after patching 3 known vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer, a vulnerability in Internet Explorer 8 has already been exploited. Microsoft and security professionals agree that if you have not run the latest round of updates for your systems running Internet Explorer 6, 7, or 8, do so now or upgrade to Internet Explorer 9 immediately. The exploit in question abuses a hole found in IE that simply by browsing to a compromised site, automatically downloads malicious software to a user's local machine. This software then connects to a remote server to await instructions on how to exploit the user's system.

A way to get users to install crimeware on their computers, hackers are using spear phishing tactics to commit illegal acts on the internet. Spear phishing is targeting individuals inside companies as opposed to regular phishing that sends thousands of emails out in a scatter shot method. People respond better to an email from a "friend" that emails them by name to download an 'important' piece of software that, when done, allows the phisher to control that machine. Malware, once installed, can be used to gather passwords, steal company information, and even be used to commit attacks against other targeted systems on the same network or on the internet. 

Have you got used to Windows 7 yet? Are you still running Vista or even XP? Well get ready as Windows 8 is set to debut in 2012. While specifics have not been revealed, it is suggested that the Operating System will get a user interface refresh. This whole new version comes only 3 years after Windows 7 was released. 

A new statistic from Microsoft states that one out of every 14 downloads by Windows user is of malicious software. There was a time that browsers could be exploited to gain access to a computer, but hackers have found a new way to attack users; by social engineering. An example is someone on Facebook receives an email from a friend to look at a video. That person goes to view the video, but is told they have to download a video player. The video player is actually malicious software that now installs on the computer. If this is an employee at your business, the hacker could now have access to proprietary, financial, or other sensitive data.

Trust us when we say that we know firsthand how difficult it can be to find “talented” graphic designers at a reasonable price! Being the full-service consultancy that we are, we decided to offer clients the use of our own in-house design team to augment their internal marketing efforts. Whether it’s business cards, websites, advertising or updating your identity and brand …we can help! 

Visit our site for a list of services and to view our portfolio.

As a small business owner, I deal with a lot of documents that need to be signed. Contracts, legal papers, documents all require me to sign. I have to print the document, sign it, and then either scan and email, fax, or meet the person face to face. I just found out about a cool (and our favorite four letter word, free) website that eliminates this process. It is called signnow.com. You upload a document to their server. You then sign your side using the on screen pen or text. You then put in the email address of the other person, and optional password. They will now receive an email and can sign their side. When done, you download the document from the SignNow server and it is erased from them. No more wasted paper or time, and all legally binding!

Patching computers has become a necessity in today's world. Computers without the latest updates leave vulnerabilities that hackers can exploit and compromise a machine or network. Now, there is an email 'seemingly' going out from Microsoft alerting users to download a patch, and includes a link to this 'fix'. Unfortunately, the email and the link are fake, instead causing harm to an individual's system if they click on the link. Microsoft will NEVER email individual users about a patch directly. Instead, patches and updates can be automatically downloaded and installed on a Microsoft Operating System, or a user can go to Microsoft's update website to look at, and download needed fixes.

An interesting situation happened to our company last week. A friend of ours had their website hacked and malicious content placed on it. We, unfortunately, did not setup their site, but were brought in to try and rectify the situation. One of the first things we asked was, "is it being backed up?" The company that had done the work for them did not take the few minutes to actually setup the site to backup on a regular basis. This would have saved much billable time and heartache, for the site could have been deleted, and then a slightly older one be restored. 

With gas prices reaching close to $4.50 in the Bay Area, the consideration to allow people to telecommute is brought to the forefront once again. In a recent survey, employees were willing to take up to a 10% pay cut to be allowed to telecommute instead of driving into an office. This not only reduces travel time and waiting for your workers to start a business day because they are stuck in traffic, it allows them to be more productive without stressing over higher gas costs.