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How to Travel with Your Tech

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  Introduction: We have grown very dependent on our technology devices, so it’s natural to want to take them with us when we travel. However, traveling with phones, tablets, or laptop computers exposes them to more threats than normal including liquid and physical damage, theft, loss, and cyber attacks. Planes, cars, trains, and hotels are technology-hostile environments. The following recommendations are gleaned from millions of miles of business and personal travel as well as customer experiences.   Liquid Damage: Don’t put a water bottle in the same backpack or carryon as your phone, tablet, or laptop computer. Seems obvious, but we see the consequences all the time. Water bottles are prone to leaking anyway, but on planes, the pressure changes significantly increase the probabilities. Don’t have drinks and your devices on airplane seatback trays at the same time. Turbulence or someone accidentally bumping into the seat or tray can cause liquid damage. Liquid spills caus
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Backups – Why You Need Then, and How to Plan Them

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  Threats, Risks, and Backups: Things go wrong. Devices fail and are subject to accidents, cyberattacks, theft, loss, fire, and natural disasters. You can protect your devices from some of these threats. Other threats can be mitigated but not completely eliminated. If an unanticipated event occurred that rendered your device unusable or unavailable, what would you lose? Does your device store irreplaceable or costly-to-replace data: ·         Tax, financial, legal, or medical documents? ·         Work products? ·         Photos, videos, or recordings? Maintaining one or more current backups of your valuable data and/or entire system is a critical security layer that can mitigate the risks associated with the threats listed above.   Backups: Backups are copies of your data and/or system stored on a different device or in the cloud. If you want to back up a Mac, just use Apple’s Time Machine, and if you need coaching, we’d be happy to help. If you have a PC, you sho
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How to Keep Your Technology Secure – the Big Picture

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  Introduction: If you connect your technology to a network or plug in any type of portable storage device, there are bad guys out there trying to attack you. Without protection, some of those attacks will succeed. You have probably heard of at least some forms of attack: viruses, trojans, worms, spyware, keyloggers, ransomware, adware, and rootkits. The good news is that you don’t need to be a cyber-security expert with detailed knowledge of attacks and protection tools to protect yourself. However, you do need to know a few basics and to take responsibility for getting them in place.   The Basics: There are five basic components to home and small business security: ·          Secure wireless network credentials, ·          A capable and properly configured firewall ·          Capable anti-malware software ·          Phishing attack awareness and avoidance ·          Backup Together, they provide a layered defense (a defense-in-depth) against cyber-attacks. In this
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Anti-Malware Software – What You Need to Know

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  Malware: The word “malware” derives from malicious software. Malware is software designed to gain unauthorized access to systems and then do harm. Its purpose might be theft, extortion, damage, or disruption. Malware infects systems either through networks or plug-in storage devices. You have probably heard of at least some forms of malware: viruses, Trojans, worms, spyware, key loggers, ransom ware, adware, and root kits. The only things that you really need to know about them are that they pose a huge risk and that you need capable anti-malware software installed to prevent them.   The Risk: Successful malware attacks can be extremely expensive and disruptive. If your technology stores financial data, your bank and credit card accounts might be drained, and you may have to shut down all of your existing accounts and open new ones. If your technology stores personal data, your identity might be stolen. If the data stored on your technology is valuable, it might be held for
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Firewalls: Don’t Get Burned

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  First, the bad news: if your computer has access to the internet, bad guys on the internet could have access to your computer to carry out a cyber attack. Now, the good news: a properly configured, capable firewall will provide an important layer of protection.   What is a firewall? A firewall is a security component that blocks unauthorized message traffic from entering and/or leaving a network. Network messages are sent in packets, and firewalls inspect those packets against a set of rules to identify and block threats. Those rules can be based on message source, destination, and/or content. For example, you could configure rules that block messages from specific countries or websites. Firewalls can be implemented as physical network hardware devices, software that runs on network routers, or as software that runs in your computer.   What is the best firewall for you? Most of our customers’ networks serve homes or small businesses. For those applications, separate physi
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What is Phishing, and How Not to Get Caught

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  Protecting your technology from cyber attacks is very important, but even if you have good antimalware software and properly configured firewalls on your devices, hackers may still attack your devices by phishing. No, that’s not a misspelling. Phishing is an attack that tries to fool you into giving a hacker with malicious intent access to your technology.   The Risk: Successful phishing attacks can be extremely expensive and disruptive. If your technology stores financial data, your accounts might be drained, and you may have to shut down all of your existing accounts and open new ones. If your technology stores personal data, your identity might be stolen. If the data stored on your technology is valuable, it might be held for ransom.   How Phishing Attacks Work: A phishing attack starts when you receive an email, phone call, or text message that appears to come from a company or person you know but is actually from a bad actor trying to get access to your technology
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