We found this list of questions (and their answers) on Entrepreneur.com and felt it would be useful for our clients.

Cybercriminals are increasingly preying on small businesses, which often lack the expertise and resources to adequately protect themselves. Last year, companies with one to 250 employees were the victims of more than 30 percent of all cyber attacks, according toSymantec’s 2013 Internet Security Threat Report. That’s a threefold increase since 2011.

But your company doesn’t have to be vulnerable if you simply take some basic protective measures. Here are 10 key questions to ask when securing your company from cybercriminals:

Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/226456#ixzz2U5BoG1Vt

1. Should I install antivirus software?
2. How should I handle suspicious emails from known and unknown senders?
3. Whom should I allow access to my company’s critical data?
4. Should I use a firewall to protect my company’s internet connection?
5. How often should I back up essential company information?
6. Should I use data encryption?
7. How should I communicate company cybersecurity policies to employees?
8. How can I secure my Wi-Fi network?
9. How can I secure company mobile devices?

(The article headline says “10 Questions” but actually skips #3 completely…)

-wim

Today (a Saturday), our technicians Paul and Derek were onsite to cleanup a network for one of our Technology Loving Care ”TLC” clients. Not uncommonly, we inherited another network that hadn’t received much Tender Loving Care “TLC”.  Today we had a scheduled maintenance window to undertake a project to take the network completely offline and cleanup the server room and all the network cabling.

Before

Here is before picture of the rack that contains all the switches, modems, and patch panels:

And here is a shot of a haphazard stack of servers of UPS batteries. Cables everywhere and many of these machines are not even being used.

During

The only way to really cleanup a wiring mess is to rip out EVERYTHING – remove all cables and start over. Of course a key step is to double check that all documentation is correct, since each port on the switch can be configured differently depending on the purpose  such as computer, server, router, printer etc. In this picture, you can see that most of the cables have been disconnected – ready to start over and do it RIGHT!

After

Here you can see that the cabling between the patch panel, switch, and various modems is vastly improved! Good job to Derek and Paul for getting this done on a Saturday!

Old servers/workstations that were no longer necessary were removed, and the UPS batteries and servers relocated. Nothing is on the floor anymore! This is not a completely ideal setup since generally we prefer to see servers stored in a rack, but considering the budget and number of servers this is sufficient for now.

 Summary

We are happy this project is done because:

• It’s good for the client!
• For the VMWare ESX 5.0 server, each power supply unit (PSU) is now plugged into a separate UPS for increased uptime.
• NIC teaming has been setup on the ESX server to reduce the impact of a NIC, cable, or switch port failure.
• Our ongoing support will be reduced, reducing our cost.
• Future network changes and emergencies can be done quickly, reducing our cost
• It was the last thing on our list to finish for cleaning up this inherited network for a client!

-wim

Someone asked for some information about UEFI and Secure Boot on newer computers and how that will affect them putting something other than Windows on their computer.

Their main questions were:

• What benefit does a normal home user get from UEFI and Secure boot ?
• How does the actual signing get done ?
• Who gets to do the signing ?  Only Microsoft ?  Some other company ? How much does it cost ?
• What do I need if I want to put Linux on my new computer ?

(more…)

Sage has a nice page explaining how to set up the windows firewall for its Sage 50 (formerly Simply Accounting) software. I went into the firewall and manually set up the exceptions a few times before my laziness started rebelling. So, I wrote a powershell script to do it for me.

It’s a bit of a hybrid, as I originally wanted to use the Powershell-native New-NetFirewallRule cmdlet, but it’s only available in Server 2012. Instead, I used netshell advanced firewall.

(more…)

If you forget your password for Paymate Acclaim company files, there’s a procedure you can do to remove it. Essentially, you replace your company’s user configuration file with a fresh password-free one from a temporary company. This should work for Paymate Acclaim files from 2004 and onward. I used Paymate Acclaim version 6.11 to make these instructions. Things may look a little different if you’re on a different version. (more…)

There are times when you may want to capture what is currently being shown on your iPad's screen. That’s easy to do on an iPad.

Simply press the Home button and then the Sleep/Wake button simultaneously. When you hear a click, the screenshot has been taken. You can then go to the photos gallery to see all of your captured screenshots.

The big difference between Android and the iOS is the fact that, on an Android device, you can play Flash videos. There are times however when this seeming advantage can be a disadvantage as Flash (such as Flash ads) can slow down your browsing experience or even crash your browser. There is a solution.

You can turn off Flash if you choose to. Simply go to your Browser's Settings by pressing on the Menu/Options button, then go to Advanced and change 'Enable plug-ins' setting from "Always on" to "On demand." Flash applications will now appear as an arrow that you must touch to start.

If you own an Android phone, you can use it as a substitute for an external drive or a USB key. You can load files into your phone simply by plugging it in to a PC with a USB cable, then tapping on “Mount” when you are prompted by the system.

This mounts the internal storage of the device as an external drive relative to the PC, and you can easily drag and drop files or create folders on the device as you see fit. Of course, it is recommended you do this on the SDCard that likely came with the device, or one that you buy for your phone.

If you are using Windows Gadgets (or those small mini-applications that are embedded on your desktop that show interesting things like the latest news, weather updates, or sports scores), you may sometimes wish you can just quickly hide them to declutter your workspace.

In Windows 7, you can do just that. Simply right-click on the desktop, go to View, and then clear the check mark on Show desktop gadgets. This will hide the gadgets. If you want to bring them back, just restore the check mark again.

Have you ever sent an email and then immediately regretted sending it? If you are using Gmail as your mail client, you can do just that with an interesting but buried option in Gmail settings.

To enable this feature, go to Mail Settings in Gmail (upper right corner, under the gear icon). Navigate to the "Labs" tab. In the labs search box, look for "Undo Send" and choose Enable, then save. Now in Mail Settings you will see an option to "Undo Send: Send cancellation period: __ seconds." Enter the number of seconds that Gmail will allow you to change your mind in the future (try 10 seconds).

With this enabled, the next time you send an email, you’ll be able to “Cancel” it from being sent out, as long as it is within the time frame you specified.