The world of IT can seem like a scary place. After all, computers often do weird, unexplainable things! Not to mention the hackers, spammers, and scammers who troll the internet looking for their next target. But through it all, it’s nice to know the good guys have our backs, when things go bump in the night (or during the day).In the spirit of Halloween, we’re highlighting the mysterious, often silly, and truly creepy tales told by the unsung heroes of tech support, (some from our own staff), who stand ready to banish the ghosts, ghouls, and supernatural hijinks of computers and networks everywhere.
How Managed IT Services Can Improve Your Workday
Are you still relying on an in-house employee or team of employees to manage your organization’s technology?
While it may seem convenient to have your IT staff under your own roof, it may actually be creating an unnecessary expense to your business, in terms of both time and actual dollars.
Under your current IT structure, you may find that you’re often involved in tech-related “crises” that distract you from running your business. Perhaps you don’t even have an employee whose official job title is IT manager, but someone with another title wears the IT troubleshooter hat when necessary, and it’s not really working for you.
Whatever your current setup, you need to consider outsourcing your IT services. (And not to a foreign country, if that’s what you’re afraid of when we mention the “O” word!)
There are major benefits to externally managed IT services for small and medium-sized businesses like yours, and we want to show you how they can make every single workday easier for you and your employees.
The Security Risks Posed by Social Media
As companies flock to social media for their branding needs and employees continue to spend time on the likes of Facebook, Twitter, and other social sites, there’s a growing concern about the risks associated with using these sites—concerns that could threaten the security of your business.
How to Spot and Avoid Phishing Emails
While we may envision hackers sitting in dark rooms hovering over computers with lines of code scrolling down their screens, the portrait of modern hackers is much more sinister. In fact, today’s hackers and cyber attackers are much more akin to the con artist or snake oil salesman of old.
Instead of using technical skill to infiltrate complex computer networks, most attackers use good old-fashioned deception and trickery to acquire information and money from their unsuspecting victims.
Yet despite more awareness about phishing than ever before, phishing attacks have increased exponentially in recent years, with 92,000 phishing attempts every month, a reported 5,753% increase since 2004.
The truth is, cybercriminals are getting better at their craft. While it was once a fairly simple matter to identify phishing emails designed to part you with your money or personal information, it’s more difficult than ever to separate legitimate emails from fraudulent ones.
But there are ways to protect yourself and your business from being victimized. The key is education. Knowing what to look for makes it easier to unmask the marauders before you become their next victim. Here are some tips to help you identify phishing attacks and keep your money and your personal information out of the hands of cybercriminals.
Why You Need to Worry About Physical Network Security
When it comes to protecting your computer network, we spend a lot of time talking about hacking, viruses, and cybercrime. While it’s incredibly important to protect your business from digital attacks, you also need to think about the physical security of your network.
For most small businesses, your server is the center of your computer network. You could have all the digital protections in the world in place, but it wouldn’t matter someone with malicious intent could simply walk into your office and gain physical access to your server. That would be like giving them an all-access pass into your network and your business data.
How You Can Train Employees to Have Safer Computing Habits
People have many commonsense ways of protecting themselves, their homes, and their belongings. You likely practice safety habits daily like locking the front door or keeping valuables out of sight, yet how often do you think to lock your work computer before walking away?
The unfortunate truth is that employees are often the cause of security breaches and malware infections. Companies owe it to themselves to help employees develop safer computing habits and be more conscientious of their use of the company’s computers.
8 Time-Saving Hacks for Microsoft Outlook
Every single minute, over 149,000 emails are rushing toward inboxes around the world. Keeping up with that flood of messages can take up way too much time, so we found a few tips and tricks that can help! Here are some Microsoft Outlook hacks to help you stay organized, focus on what’s important, and minimize interruptions so you get more done each day.
Looking for more Microsoft Office Hacks? Check out our other articles:
9 Time-Saving Microsoft Word Hacks
9 Time-Saving Microsoft Excel Hacks
13 Time-Saving Hacks for Better (and Prettier) Powerpoints)
9 Time-Saving Microsoft Excel Hacks
Whether you’re crunching sales figures, importing an email list, or analyzing data for a monthly report, chances are you need to use Microsoft Excel for some of your day-to-day work. While most of us aren’t die-hard spreadsheet junkies, learning some time-saving shortcuts can help you get things done faster and more efficiently in Excel.
Here are nine of our favorite Microsoft Excel hacks that make quick work of resizing columns, changing number formatting and even embedding a spreadsheet into a Word document.
If you’re looking for more time-saving hacks, also check out our articles covering other Microsoft Office programs:
8 Time-Saving Microsoft Outlook Hacks
9 Time-Saving Microsoft Word Hacks
13 Time-Saving Hacks for Better (and Prettier) PowerPoints
How to Tell if Your Computer Has a Virus
Your computer is acting weird. Strange messages are popping up, everything has slowed to a crawl, and you can’t get your work done. Obviously, something is wrong. You fear your computer has a virus, but you’re not sure.
The first step to curing a computer virus is knowing if you have one. Sometimes it’s obvious, but other times, viruses can cause symptoms that are very similar to other common computer problems. Here are a few ways you can tell if you have a computer virus:
Why You Need to Stop Using Internet Explorer
Internet Explorer (IE) is Microsoft’s classic web browser, originally released way back in 1995. For years, the terms Internet Explorer and web browser were essentially one and the same. IE came installed by default on every Windows computer, so nearly everyone with a PC used it. In the early 2000s, IE held about 95% of the market share.
Since then, many new web browsers have overtaken it (like Chrome, or Firefox) – and for good reason. Over the years, IE has been plagued by bugs, security problems, and performance issues. Now, likely less than 10% of people use IE. If you’re still one of them, we’re going to explain why you should get a new browser. (If not, you may want to skip to the bottom where we compare some of the other browser options).