The Best Defense Against Ransomware Attacks is Knowledge and Then Applying That Knowledge!

The best defense against ransomware attack is knowledge and then of course applying that knowledge. Knowing what you need to do in order to protect yourself is critical to the safety of your business. The recent "wannacry" ransomware attacks provided us with valuable information, which are basically opportunities, to learn or re-learn how to defend and secure our networks. As with most attacks, our attackers leave behind clues in their wake. The Cyber Ransomware Attack labeled “Wannacry” recently took a "second go" at attacking its’ victims.

The Connectors Executive Network met last night, in Boca Raton, to discuss "best practices for hiring and retaining great employees."  The turnout was incredible!

Some people traveled quite a few miles, some even had to endure rush hour traffic just to attend the event!    The journey was worth it, I can guarantee you that much.  "The whole point of these events are for the guests to gain from them," said David Bennett.  "I want our guests to learn something new, to walk away with an action item, whether it's a new way or idea on how to make results driven changes at work or maybe the event produced some great new business connections!"

It Pays to Outsource Your MSP... The Return on Your Investment is Priceless!

Natural disasters tend to need backup plans!

It's no secret that natural disasters (any kind of them by the way) should all have one thing in common, a backup plan, because, well, you're dealing with something unpredictable--nature. Being confident in your goals should not prevent you from contingencies...life isn't so two-dimensional. A brilliant friend of the family started his company from his garage in 2004 and within 6 months he’d outgrown it, forcing him to lease an office space close to home, which at the time was in Broward County, Florida. His one man operation turned into a forty man operation in less than 2 years. You could say that he was on the fast track to success, in a beautiful high-rise building in Fort Lauderdale. Unfortunately Bill’s company didn’t have a BDR (Backup and Disaster Recovery) plan, this three letter acronym that every managed IT services provider knows so well. In October 2005, South Florida was hit by Hurricane Wilma, the most damaging storm to hit Broward County since Hurricane King in 1950, and Wilma destroyed residential and commercial property in its path. Bill’s office building suffered tremendous damage and because they didn’t have any offsite backup, they lost everything.

I was in college, living paycheck to paycheck, eating Ramen Noodles and buying all non-brand name products.  So outsourcing any type of service wasn't really an option for me. It wasn’t a choice, it was reality and it was the way it had to be. I was living on a budget so that one day I could enjoy the finer things in life. My beautiful college girlfriend (who by the way is now my beautiful wife) nagged and nagged about the color of our walls until one day I decided I’d just paint them myself. I couldn’t afford to outsource the paint job. How hard could it be? I went to the local paint store, bought the cheapest brand of paint I could find, came home threw on some coveralls and began to paint.  Close to 2 weeks later, I was done. I stood in front of those walls and I knew deep down I’d done a crap job! I knew that it would have looked a thousand times better if I had outsourced the job to the professionals. But the cost was right and that was that.

We depend on many different tools, services and securities in life to help keep us safe. Question is, do we take the proper precautions to make sure they’re working, that they're doing their function? We don’t live in a perfect world and that's exactly why we should be testing our managed security systems often.  Last night I decided to test my home security system. I tested the signals within the house and then tested the signal from our home to the monitoring center. Protecting my family is single-handedly the most important thing in the world to me.  If you have a home security system, I think that you should think about breaking into your house this weekend (I think you know what I'm saying)   

Don’t fall victim to Cybersecurity scams. Be on alert from fraudulent email senders.

Earlier this week I received a spoof email (under most circumstances this wouldn't be weird), however I received the email while writing this article about "email spoofing." Talk about coincidence. Email spoofing is a relatively newer form of spam, it’s a term used to describe fraudulent emails in which the sender’s address and other parts of the email header are altered in some way to appear as though the email originated from a different source.

Shock, anger and disbelief are all victims' reactions to bank fraud. Although you need to always be on alert, International Fraud Awareness Week (November 15-21) serves as a good reminder of just how damaging these crimes can be. Companies lose an estimated 5% of their revenue annually due to fraud as reported in the 2016 ACFE Report to the Nations.

Phishing Email Scam: Don't Fall Victim to Cybercrime!

If your small or medium sized business is struggling with new or existing technology systems, you're probably asking yourself: what is managed IT services? For the last 40 years, Connections for Business has been helping companies implement and maintain high functioning, superior IT infrastructures in a cost effective manner.