Author: Stuart Crawford

Pros and Cons Of Outsourcing Your IT Support To A Managed Services Provider

Paper or plastic? Cash or charge? MSP or in-house IT? There are many choices that you need to make on a daily basis, some personal and some related to keeping your business running. However, the last question can have a serious impact on your business if you don’t get the question. But which option is the best one for your company’s needs? Here’s a quick look to help you decide which one is the best option for you.

Pros and Cons Of Outsourcing Your IT Support To A Managed Services Provider

Your company needs your technology to work. Whether you need to add IT staff to your company or want to free up the personnel used for IT in their business to turn their attention to other projects, one option you may be considering is adding a managed service provider to your options. By outsourcing these tasks, you can focus on running your business instead of solving technical issues. When you hire an MSP, you no longer need to worry about updates, network maintenance, and finding the right solutions to optimize your digital assets. Though they can be expensive, they’ll often save you money because you can avoid serious tech problems. But are they the best choice? Let’s start by learning what they are.

What are MSPs?

A relatively recent development, MSPs provide small businesses with an outsourcing option for a wide range of IT needs. Instead of being stuck with a single generalist or a small team working in-house, you’ll have a team of topic experts that provide a ton of value, often for about the same investment or even a bit less. This can range from supporting your business tech for a flat monthly fee to providing boutique consulting services focused on your business’ specific needs and strategy.

MSPs will handle issues that come up on your network, monitoring for problems and troubleshooting issues that arise. With the accessibility of cloud computing, most IT work can be handled through an outsourced MSP, which has remote access to networks and may deploy solutions from their location. When you work with an MSP, contracts are provided detailing what is included in the service and when the services start and stop. The services can include help desk support, mobile app development, software-as-a-service, backup and recovery services, as well as all-inclusive packages with unlimited resources.

Why do You Need an MSP?

MSPs are a popular option because they negate risks to your digital assets. Rather than waiting until there’s a problem to outsource your IT, MSPs allow your network to be consistently monitored, updated, and maintained by professionals who understand why specific strategies and techniques should be used. Instead of needing to focus on your company’s IT issues, you can focus on your business, while your MSP evaluates your current and upcoming IT needs, providing solid advice on products and services to implement.

Advantages and Disadvantages of MSPs

MSPs support many facets of IT for their clients. Because the cost is spread across many companies, you receive premium expert services without having to hire all the required professionals. This approach gives you more resources from a deeper knowledge base.

But there are some other issues to consider. Will the cost work with your budget? Do you need someone on-site to handle issues such as printer jams? Here’s a quick look at the advantages and disadvantages of MSPs.

Advantages:

1. Change in mode: If the MSP operates efficiently, instead of having to react to technical issues that arise, it constantly monitors aspects of your digital assets to prevent them from happening, acting more proactively.
2. No new tech purchases: On some plans, the MSP provides all of your tech, including workstations, servers, and programs, essentially giving you assets-as-a-service as you pay to rent them, allowing you to spend capital where it’s needed.
3. Expertise: For about the same cost as you’d pay for one general computer tech for everything, you’ll get an experienced team with expertise in multiple areas, which delivers more value for your money while ensuring superior outcomes.
4. Continuity of business: Do you wonder how to restore your business systems and data in a disaster? When you work with an MSP, they’ll create a disaster recovery plan that makes the process easy.

Disadvantages

1. Lack of physical presence: Because the MSP may not be local to your business, they can’t handle physical issues that need to be done. If the company is local, they may or may not offer onsite support, which can be problematic.
2. Cost: Though the cost is comparable to hiring a professional, still costs a great deal, minimally a few hundred dollars a month, but the costs can end up being much higher. However, the MSP may save a lot for comparable technology.
3. Scope: The scope of your contract will almost certainly not cover all technology areas. Your contract will list the applications supported, with third-party software that isn’t supported still being your responsibility.

Whether an MSP will work for you or not, the decisions will be yours. If your company frequently requires IT support or you’re putting a lot of time into fixing problems yourself, an MSP can be a great option to consider.

How Can Business Executives Lead A Remote Workforce Through The Pandemic & Beyond?

The pandemic accelerated an ongoing remote workforce trend by forcing companies to pivot and conduct business with people from home offices and dining room tables. A reported 41.8 percent of the workforce was considered remote at the height of the outbreak, and 36.2 million people are expected to remain offsite through 2021.

Few organizations were prepared for the watershed events that changed the way entrepreneurs, CEOs, and other leaders manage operations and achieve business goals. Decision-makers faced substantial challenges sometimes marked by trial-and-error efforts. But business executives learned some valuable lessons with more than a year of experience managing remote workforces under their belts. If you rank among the many professionals still searching for the special sauce, compartmentalizing leadership into the following areas could prove invaluable.

Does Your Leadership Message Keep Remote Workers Energized?

Videoconferencing and electronic messages cannot replicate the passion executives inspire when addressing staff members in-person. The subtle voice inflections and body language typically doesn’t translate electronically. A recent Gartner study indicates that industry leaders would be wise to consider the following ways to maintain remote workforce enthusiasm.

• Watch for Signs of Distress: Communicate directly and monitor remote workers for indicators they are struggling with long-term changes. Ensure managers and key stakeholders that you have their back, come what may.
• Encourage Discussion: When experienced team members struggle, they may keep it to themselves because they don’t want to impact company morale negatively. While that sentiment is laudable, the pandemic calls for a more open dialogue. Encourage your seasoned veterans to vent when needed. Your office door might be shuttered, but your cell phone works.
• Goal Achievement: Take time to remind remote personnel about company values and goals on a regular basis. In these challenging times, people need more than a paycheck to stay motivated.

Although government officials and news reports point to eventual herd immunity, everyday people still live with a sense of uncertainty. One lesson worth considering is that people do not always remember precisely what you said. But they do remember how you made them feel.

Has Your Workforce Been Restructured To Account For Remote Productivity?

Organizations that succeeded during the early months of the pandemic implemented strategies that reimagined two things — structure and process.

Companies with inherent ambiguities in these areas quickly discovered the remote shift only amplified such disconnects. Remote workers appear more productive when groups are pared down because that helps them communicate well. Consider reducing large teams that functioned well in brick-and-mortar landscapes into more specialized outcome-driven subgroups.

Supporting that initiative, replicating the pre-pandemic process online remains essential. Although some outfits benefited from flexible hours during the early months, restoring on-time work starts, scheduled departmental meetings via online platforms, and reducing process ambiguity help define structure and expectations.

Does Your Organization Possess Sustainable Remote Infrastructure & Technology?

Business executives were widely tasked with ramping up remote infrastructure to handle workforce migrations. Work-from-home realities meant quickly increasing IT budgets and enlisting third-party experts to enhance Cloud-based capabilities, among other challenges.

Just as companies began settling into online productivity, hackers rolled out unprecedented attacks targeting newly-minted remote workers. To say that experience was something of a fluid battlefield would be something of an understatement. But the challenges of the initial workforce shift remain in place, and technology continues to evolve. Decision-makers would be well-served to support remote workers in the following ways.

• Offer cybersecurity awareness training and real-time threat alerts.
• Integrate the latest platforms that improve productivity, such as Microsoft Teams.
• Provide Virtual Private Networks to enhance security.
• Create a 24/7 IT support plan & help desk options.
• Enhance home-office bandwidth to account for increased business activities.

Wide-reaching tools exist that prove beneficial in terms of productivity. If industry leaders expect remote workers to adapt and overcome for the remainder of the pandemic and beyond, they will need the tools and IT support to succeed.

Leadership until the end of the pandemic and the remote workforce realities afterward call for a rethinking of methods. The basic concepts of motivation, structure, process, equipment, and support remain largely intact. Perhaps the critical difference involves leveraging online platforms and IT innovations more decisively.

5 Things Companies Need to Know About Adobe End of Life

Big Tech corporations have driven the final nail into the coffin of Adobe Flash Player. Its “end of life (EoL),” or “death,” if you will, was long expected. As the popular software timed out at the end of 2020, businesses that still house the program in networks would be wise to have it promptly uninstalled. Not only is Flash defunct, but it could create a cybersecurity gap that invites hackers.

Adobe Flash was a relatively commonplace program that drew little attention over its 24-year lifespan. Now that its death certificate has been signed, these are things industry leaders need to know about making funeral arrangements.

1: How Did Adobe Flash Work?

The multimedia software platform was widely recognized for facilitating the mainstream use of animation, video players, vector graphics, and Rich web applications, among others. Of course, its pop-culture claim to fame was that it helped video games and music work.

But as the use of devices and apps increased in business ventures, Adobe evolved with the times. It would enable a wide range of desktop and mobile applications to be coordinated with Flash. These and others would then be used with Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, and most videogame platforms. Adobe Flash became a standard element in the vast majority of electronic devices and business networks.

2: Adobe Flash Met Its Demise Through Agreement

The EoL of Flash was reportedly not a decision handed down by tech giants. Google, Apple, Mozilla, Microsoft, and Adobe leadership teams agreed that the end of an era was at hand. The decision to let Flash time out was made in 2017. For example, Google Chrome 88 no longer includes Flash, and Adobe has now begun blocking content. Now that the long run is over, support also comes to an end.

3: Adobe Flash May Be Used By Hackers

One issue that hasn’t garnered splashy headlines is that back in 2018, hackers pulled off an attack by exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Adobe Flash. The problem was dealt with promptly, but the lesson should resonate with industry professionals today. As support ends, it should already be considered an unpatched program.

For those who are not cybersecurity specialists, unpatched software is the equivalent of an open door for online criminals to walk right through. Without updates and fixes, digital thieves find ways to manipulate software and gain entrance to entire networks. Cybersecurity experts routinely patch programs and uninstall outdated ones for this very reason. Adobe Flash cannot be updated or fixed. Therefore, it creates a clear and present danger.

4: Uninstalling Flash Can Be Complicated

Business professionals would be wise to have an IT expert remove the program immediately. If you have yet to secure a third-party firm to manage your system, each operating system requires a slightly different process. Windows PC users can download an Uninstall program from Adobe.

Mac users will need to seek out a different version. There are also several Mac Uninstall programs available, depending on which MacOS version you are using. Tapping Uninstall in each device may not be effective. Because a misstep can leave your network vulnerable, it may be worth erring on the side of caution and working with an IT professional.

5: What Will Replace Adobe Flash Player?

The great technology meteor has effectively rendered Flash extinct, but people who relied on the program need not worry. The three-year EoL rollout appears to be time well spent. Browsers such as Explorer and Chrome, among others, have mechanisms to convert Flash-reliant applications. Alternatives such as HTML5, WebGL, and WebAssembly, are reportedly already in play.

If you own any electronic device and store valuable or sensitive data, it’s essential to take proactive measures and deal with the Flash issue. Tech giants may have killed it, but you are tasked with the burial arrangements.

What Are the Key Differences Between IT Services and Consulting?

When business leaders create annual budgets, IT typically ranks among the top investments. More than $4 trillion was spent globally in 2019, and the average company funneled 8.2 percent of its total revenue into IT. The primary focus for too many companies was IT services, without consulting support. Putting all of your eggs in the IT services basket could lead to work stoppages and problems that could otherwise be avoided. By understanding the key differences between services and consulting, informed decisions can be made about an organization’s IT health.

What Are IT Services?

There are plenty of technical explanations that define “IT services.” But a direct way to understand this term is from the customer’s perspective. You invest in IT services to help accomplish tasks and goals. Company leaders typically broker a deal with an experienced IT services firm to ensure things run smoothly. In other words, you hire someone to keep everyone on your team working at a high level and minimize disruptions. These generally include the following:

• Technical & Help Desk Support
• Backup & Recovery Services
• Software Management Services
• Cybersecurity Monitoring & Threat Response
• Cloud Migration & Maintenance
• Internet-Based Communications Services

The underlying premise of IT services is that a third party is generally under contract to help you maximize productivity and solve routine issues. Companies don’t usually invest in technology for technology’s sake. It’s a necessary tool that requires an expert to maintain.

What Makes IT Consulting Different?

The million-dollar question is that if you already have IT services in place, why invest in a consultant? That’s a fair question from the consumer’s point of view. Your email works, computer restarts are at a minimal level, and Cloud-based systems enable your outfit to connect with remote workers and business partners in real-time. If it’s not broken, why fix it?

The primary reason to invest in IT consulting is that it is proactive by nature. A consultant reviews your critical operations and makes an analysis of the next steps and long-term technology planning. An IT consultant may be only minimally interested in the software and services your organization uses to complete tasks and further goals today. Instead, they consider solutions for the future that deliver the following benefits:

• Bring an Objective Perspective: Your IT service provider and staff members have a way of conducting operations every day. While their methods may work at a high level, an outside perspective can help companies take advantage of emerging technologies.
• Proactive vs. Reactive: It’s essential to understand that IT services are crucial. They can react to technical problems and resolve them quickly. By contrast, IT consulting focuses on future disruptions and innovations and advises business leaders about preventative measures.
• Increase Leadership Focus: When management teams get bogged down with technical problems, they cannot devote the focus necessary to maximize an organization’s potential. An IT consulting firm brings a wealth of knowledge to the table that allows leaders to make high-level decisions about the state of their technology.

As an industry thought leader, perhaps the best way to understand the differences between IT services and consulting is that they are different cogs in a machine that makes your company go. One without the other limits your potential to achieve goals and compete. Technology changes quickly, and companies require IT services to maintain operational integrity and consulting experts to get you ready for critical next steps.

Microsoft Makes Anti-Spam Changes

The year 2020 is not the only thing that is coming to an end. Microsoft is slowly rolling out changes meant to deter spam. This is causing some features to come to an end and changing the way a few Microsoft products, most notably email, is used. As a business owner, it is important to stay on top of changes with the software and programs that your business utilizes. Here is a little bit more information about the anti-spam changes and what those changes can mean for your business.

Why Is Microsoft Making Anti-Spam Changes?

Microsoft recently released an add-on: Microsoft Defender for Office 365 Plan 2. Many of the anti-spam changes were made when this add-on released, and a few more are expected to roll out at the end of January 2021. The primary reason for these changes is to better protect your business against phishing attacks, spoofing attacks, and to limit the number of spam emails that are sent. Some of these changes affect all Microsoft products as a whole, while others are geared toward specific products, such as email.

Why Should Your Business Be Aware of These Changes?

Your business needs to be aware of these changes because they can alter the way your business operates. You may need to update software or you may need to retrain your staff on how to use products. As these changes roll out, many IT professionals are already receiving phone calls from those that they serve letting them know that they can no longer use certain features and asking for a workaround. Releasing an email to your staff or providing them training as a group can help prevent mass emails or phone calls to your IT professional.

What Types of Changes Is Microsoft Making?

One of the biggest changes that Microsoft has made so far is disabling automatic e-mail forwarding. This has changed the way that your office may forward emails to other employees in the business and clients outside of the business. One of the major changes that is expected to happen at the end of January 2021 involves no longer allowing the “allow list” or “block list” from the SPAM policy setting in Exchange Office to function. Instead, you will need to add your allow or block list elsewhere. Finally, Microsoft is making subtle changes to all license-level software to increase protection and decrease phishing and spoofing risk. While you may not necessarily see these changes, you may find that you need to update your software if it does not automatically self-update.

Microsoft is making anti-spam changes to decrease spam and to help prevent phishing and spoofing attacks when using Microsoft Office 365. If you own a business, you need to be aware of these changes, as it can impact these products. Your IT professional can help advise your office on the changes that are being made and update your software to ensure you are using the latest Microsoft Office products.

Top 15 Microsoft Teams Tips and Tricks

Microsoft Teams is one of the most popular and influential digital team-building solutions available for startups and business teams of any size. Using Microsoft Teams as your company’s preferred collaboration tool provides access to myriad features, from private messaging and group chats to file and document-sharing. With a few tips and tricks, optimize your time and productivity whenever you and your team put Microsoft Teams to use.

How Can I Get Better Organized with Microsoft Teams?

In order to use Microsoft Teams as efficiently as possible, getting organized with the system is a must.

1. Bookmark Important Messages and Content

Whenever you receive a noteworthy message or content from another member of your team, select the bookmark icon next to the message. You can search for bookmarks by browsing for content within the message you are trying to find via your search bar or by typing the command “/saved” into the bar when searching for a list of your saved bookmarks.

2. Use Drag-and-Drop Features to Stay Organized

Use Microsoft Teams drag-and-drop features to organize messages, teams, files, as well as calendar events and important dates.

3. Create Groups for Users

Grouping members of your team or users who have joined you on Microsoft Teams is a way to keep better track of those you communicate with throughout each day. Create a new tag for specific groups to communicate with more team members in less time.

4. Select Favorites

You can also choose favorite channels and teams when using Microsoft Teams to gain quick access to those you use most. Favoriting or bookmarking channels and teams will keep them at the top of your list.

How Can I Increase Team Engagement?

5. Add Subject Lines

Adding subject lines throughout conversations and group messages can help to keep communications more organized and clutter-free. The icon for creating subject lines is located in the bottom left corner of the messaging section of Microsoft Teams.

6. Use Animated Graphics (GIFs) and Other Visual Media

Using visual media is a great way to break up conversations, make a point, and send a message without a wall of text. Use GIFs as well as other relevant imagery or visual media during conversations to keep track of the overall theme and direction of the conversation.

7. Use Urgent Messages and Notifications When Necessary

If you are looking to get in touch with a member of your team immediately, send an “Urgent” message from the messaging tab of Microsoft Teams.

8. Use Polls to Increase Engagement

Increase the engagement of your team members by implementing a question or a poll with the messages you send out en masse.

9. Use Eye-Catching Headlines and Titles

Use appealing and eye-catching headlines and titles when communicating with your team to keep them focused and interested in the content of your conversation or meeting.

Improve Meetings Altogether With Microsoft Teams

10. Putting Together Mode to Use

Use Together Mode from Microsoft Teams to emulate a full conference room of participants.

11. Instantly Call a Team Member Within a Chat

If you are in need of more one-on-one communication, instantly call a team member from directly within a private conversation.

12. Record Your Meetings

Record your meetings from the main control panel in your Microsoft Teams account. It is also possible to use this section to transcribe each of your meetings for future use and reference.

13. Use Microsoft Teams Meeting Notes

Using Microsoft Teams Meeting Notes section is another way to keep track of conversations, topics that are covered, and tasks for teams and individuals alike.

14. Blur Out Your Current Background at Home or at the Office

Whether you are working remotely permanently or want to minimize and limit distractions during team meetings, you can blur your background from the main settings area of your Microsoft Teams bar.

15. Title and Log Meetings Appropriately

In order to maximize overall productivity, be sure to title and log all of your meetings and conversations in Microsoft Teams appropriately for future searches and use.

Using Microsoft Teams for your business, startup, or brand is a great way to effectively communicate with co-workers and team members remotely, regardless of your location and time zone. By taking the time to optimize Microsoft Teams for you, increase productivity and overall efficiency among all of your team members and employees.

Need a quick book on Microsoft Teams: Click here to check out one we recommend.

9 Meeting Tips for Using Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is a simple, yet effective tool for hosting meetings. It has both audio and video capabilities as well as a chat feature. It can handle conference calls and one on one meetings, with members of your organization as well as guests. Plus, it has a convenient chat feature that can be used to share documents and spreadsheets. Here are a few tips for using Teams effectively in meetings.

• Send Invites through E-mail: Anyone in your organization who has access to your company communications can be easily searched and added when you create a new meeting. But if you’d like to add someone from outside of the organization, all you have to do is enter their email when you create an event or add it later on. They will receive an invitation in their inbox that will allow them to enter the meeting when it starts.
• Admit Guests from the Lobby: Members of your organization who are invited to the meeting will be able to join automatically when it starts. But those who are not must be admitted. When guests enter the meeting, they will be placed in the lobby to await your admittance. You will receive a notification and see them waiting in the lobby – all you have to do is click the checkmark next to their name and they will be able to enter the meeting.
• Keep the Noise to a Minimum: Conference calls can get noisy. A loud air conditioner or nescient conversations in the background of one guest’s location can disrupt the entire call. Attendees can mute themselves while others are talking to reduce interference. Or if one particular guest is not complying with the request, as the host you can mute them.
• Make Sure Guests Download Teams: To join a Teams meeting, guests must download the app or browser extension. It’s free to download and doesn’t require any fancy plugins. But guests may be confused if you don’t make them aware that the call is being conducted through an app.
• Decide on an Audio or Video Call: Teams has video capabilities as well as audio. It may be awkward for some if they are not aware that they will be visible during the meeting if it’s a video call. So, to make things run smoothly decide beforehand whether a video call is necessary and make sure everyone is on the same page.
• Share Documents in the Chat During a Call: The chat feature allows you to seamlessly share and view documents and text communications while on a call. If you have an important memo or chart you want everyone to see, simply drop it in the chat and participants can view it without leaving the call.
• Join with Audio Conferencing: Teams is generally run through Wi-Fi, but if you or a guest is in an area with limited internet access, you can always join a call through audio conferencing. Audio conferencing allows members to dial in manually using their phone line. Those who have audio conferencing available will see dial-in instructions provided alongside the meeting info.
• Record Your Teams Meetings: Teams has a recording function if you want a video of the meeting to reference or transcribe. All you have to do is select the “…” button in the meeting and press record. But keep in mind, you may want to make participants aware that they are being recorded, so no one feels uncomfortable.
• Share Selected Applications: Teams allows you to share selected applications with meeting participants, rather than your entire desktop. So, if you want to show your browser, but not your email, you can do so with application sharing.

Teams is a powerful app and there are a variety of innovative yet simple features you can play around with. Employ these tips in your next meeting to increase your productivity and efficiency.

What’s New With Microsoft Forms

Microsoft Forms gives you a plethora of features to utilize to your advantage. It easily creates useful documentation for your business and is accessible to virtually everyone in your organization. Forms integrate well with many other Microsoft Office products, including Outlook, and it is completely free to use. Microsoft Forms makes it possible to organize documents, create tracking data, and support large-scale projects — and in today’s dynamic business environment, nothing is more important than data collected and analyzed. Microsoft Forms is an essential piece of software that transforms the way we work by connecting everyone into a collaborative environment.

With its many features, Microsoft Forms makes it easy to visualize real-time data and use an automated form of predictive analytics to capture rapid insight. Customization allows users to create forms that fit their own needs. Businesses use Microsoft Forms for more than just keeping track of data; they use it to implement customer research and manage their various social media presences. Sales teams can collect and organize all of their prospecting surveys and then store and analyze the results of their data collections to the cloud.

Businesses can use Microsoft Forms tools to survey employees, gather feedback, and even ask for advice on projects and other key decisions. Many businesses also use it to share interactive quizzes that allow them to create proprietary data stores, which they can then mine for insights.

Data Visualization

Another great benefit of the Microsoft Forms tool is visualized data. Once the form data has been collected, the online software converts it into graphs and charts that make your data more accessible and easy for others to interpret. Easy data visualization is at the core of Microsoft Forms, and what they have can be seen as an upgrade over other top survey tools.

There are also advanced analytics capabilities along with an impressively professional user interface. With all of these upgrades over other online survey alternatives, it becomes clear why Microsoft Survey has been gaining so much traction. Microsoft Forms allows for handling multiple surveys at a time. This not only makes it easier to gather data, but it also makes it a better tool to manage your surveys. Quizzes can handle complex functionalities, even when built from scratch, due to the modular user interface and extensible components that the software affords.

Microsoft Forms in the Classroom

Forms are set to become a vital, fundamental, and integral tool for ensuring that students are continually up to date with the world around them. Using Microsoft Forms, students can conduct transactions, undertake research, and apply real-time data to various tasks. In addition to taking advantage of all the Office Online tools and bringing with it the power of Office Web Apps, Forms sports new features that help with collecting surveys during specific time periods, retrieving input from third-party software, and integrating it with Microsoft Teams — another platform that is gaining an impressive following from the academic community.

One of the powers of Microsoft Forms lies in its ability to bridge student needs from both web, email, and text, facilitating communication along with the data that drives it. With Microsoft Forms, students can maintain private electronic environments — which comes in handy for classes run by the same institution. The software is slowly becoming the standard for student needs, and as such, it is imperative that students effectively utilize Microsoft Forms when interacting with external and unstructured data sources. By staying synced online in an isolated cloud environment, students can also use Microsoft Forms for composing collaborative survey documents, a practice that students have used as a vital tool for research purposes.

As Microsoft continues to fit their needs, a growing number of students will continue to get the most out of their academic careers by utilizing the platform’s features.

COVID-19 Vaccine Related Phishing and How You Can Protect Your Organization

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to claim lives across the globe and infection rates continue to soar, scientists are continually looking for a solution to end the world’s suffering. In the past weeks, vaccine manufacturers, such as Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, have published encouraging results from the last stages of their vaccine trials, giving the world a glimpse of hope.

However, with all these vaccines that have been developed and those in their final stages, none has been officially released for mass consumption. As the population continues to get overwhelmed with pandemic fatigue and scientists get closer to developing a real vaccine, cybercriminals are now using the developed vaccines as a ploy in their extortion activities.

What are phishing emails?

Phishing is a form of social engineering often used by cybercriminals to trick their targets into providing them with their personal information and account data. Once this information is obtained, these malicious actors use the targets’ credentials or install malware into their systems to obtain data. Phishing is carried out via text messages, instant messages, social media messaging platforms, phone calls, or email. However, phishing emails are the most common. The recipient of the email is usually tricked into clicking on a malicious link, which may lead to the installation of malware that may obtain sensitive information or freeze the recipient’s system as a way to deny services as part of a cyberattack.

At the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, these emails came in different forms with luring subject lines such as:

• What to do if you have come into contact with someone with COVID-19.
• Free COVID-19 testing emails.
• Advice on what to do if you have violated COVID-19 health protocols.

The main aim of these emails was to exploit the anxiety surrounding the pandemic. With the vaccine in sight and the topic naturally arousing excitement and attention, these emails are now being tailored to announce the promise of COVID-19 vaccines.

How can you identify phishing emails? As an organization, you have probably already started seeing vaccine-themed phishing emails or may expect to start seeing these emails in the next few weeks. But how exactly do you distinguish these fake emails from verified ones to protect your employees and ultimately protect your organization’s systems?

Here are several tips to help you identify phishing emails:

1. Legitimate companies don’t request sensitive information via email: The chances are that if you receive an email purporting to be from a legitimate institution that provides you with an attachment or link and asks you to provide sensitive data, it’s a scam. Most verified organizations don’t send emails asking for credit card information, account usernames and passwords.
2. Legitimate companies don’t send unsolicited links or attachments: Unexpected emails that contain links and attachments reek of hackers. Authentic organizations don’t randomly send you emails with links or attachments; they usually direct you to their websites.
3. Look out for spelling errors: The easiest way to recognize a phishing email is terrible grammar. Emails from a verified organization are usually well-written.
4. Legitimate companies have domain emails: Don’t only check the name of the person sending you the email, also check the email address. Most companies use their domain email addresses when sending out emails. However, this is not a foolproof method of identifying phishing emails.

How can you protect your organization against phishing attacks?

To protect your organization from phishing attacks, you need to practice vigilance. Training your employees on what to look out for when it comes to distinguishing phishing emails goes a long way toward protecting your organization from malicious attacks.

The following pointers will help to mitigate risks for phishing attacks:

• Use two-factor or multifactor authentication methods to add an extra verification layer when logging in to sensitive applications.
• Integrate firewalls to establish a barrier between your internal network and incoming traffic from external sources to block malicious traffic.
• Keep all your software and applications updated.
• Install security software such as antivirus, antispyware and anti-malware programs to help detect and remove malicious programs.
• Enable email filtering to filter out incoming emails for phishing content and automatically move them to a separate folder.

No matter how secure your company’s network is, it only takes one reckless employee to fall victim to a phishing attack and send your company’s data into the hands of cybercriminals. Your employees need to understand and be able to recognize phishing emails to protect your organization.

Microsoft Teams and the Future of Video Calling

Microsoft Teams is a free cross-platform collaboration software that focuses on users, enabling great collaboration with teammates and customers across any device and empowering customers to work faster. Teams aims to propel traditional productivity experiences to the future, giving all kinds of teams a purpose and a reason to stand alone from other software. Team members set their own notifications based on their roles and priorities, so they never get too few or too many messages in their inbox. This flexibility to prioritize notifications with peers and outside users will be appreciated by anyone on your team, and it encourages trust, collaboration, and increased productivity. The Microsoft Teams alert feature alerts team members when necessary, and you can assign a timer to notifications, helping you better manage the number of people and alerts by priority.

Why Microsoft Teams Integrations

Teams has thought long and hard about their integration with Microsoft Office 365. This implementation is available at no extra cost. Teams also integrates with other popular tools from Microsoft, such as Skype, Slack, Excel, PowerPoint, Word, and OneNote. This flexibility helps make collaboration and communication easy and available to everyone on your team that uses other Microsoft products. Team members set their own notifications based on their roles and priorities, and this is a crucial feature to assist in prioritizing notifications with peers. Just like the dial-in phone number in Teams, the notifications now include the message, your team number, and additional information. The call response options are now easier to navigate and make it easier to initiate a group conversation than before. You can call an entire group at the same time to save time when calling similar groups of people. Team members will receive a notification when they get a new call in a conversation screen, so they can respond quickly.

Why Is Microsoft Teams Growing So Fast?

At first, when a topic dominates the news, it is easier to assume that the reality won’t measure up to the hype. But the reason why Microsoft Teams is growing so quickly is because it adds a lot of substance to the hype. All types of teams need this service, so they love that new features are being added at an alarming rate. We’re continuing to see customers and business teams increasing their usage of Microsoft Teams. The stream of good news continues to grow at this time, surrounding the features that make their video collaboration and presentation features rival and exceed competitive online software. Organizations are not just embracing Microsoft Teams; they are making their own success stories. General Mills uses Microsoft Teams to help its broad base of users, along with its IT support team, brand partners, and suppliers on teams worldwide.

More than 500 companies use Microsoft Teams at this time, and big data continues to remain at the heart of every digital transformation project, so Teams has made improvements in facilitating this area as well. Today’s customers expect businesses to leverage the insights provided by big data and to inform decisions for the future – driving better business outcomes. These are never binary decisions: Users want to be part of the conversation. To achieve big data success in partnership with great service that empowers them, IBM collaborates with Microsoft Teams to provide real-time communications, conversational commerce, and customer insights to help understand “what they see, hear and do.” IBM announced a new privacy-focused version of IBM Smart Answer — information about people, tasks, and interests — for Microsoft Teams, giving customers worldwide a secure, central view of their data to learn about their customers, behaviors, and how they choose to interact with their businesses.