Security for your automobile is so important today due to the current rise in car theft. It is necessary to protect your transportation from this threat.  Your car represents a hefty financial investment, not to mention that it provides transportation for your whole family.

However, many people take auto security for granted. If you’ve ever had your car stolen, then you understand how traumatic it can be. This article will help you better understand how to perform some basic safety precautions to keep your car safe. Many insurance companies offer lower rates if you install extra protection to keep your car safe from thieves. Sit down and relax, so that you can learn how Fob systems work.

How Key Fobs Work

The main Fob systems include electronic devices. These devices function by reading a key Fob when placed in close proximity. If the key Fob is authorized, the reader sends a signal to the door and the user can gain access. Key Fob entry systems offer greater ease of use, enhanced security, and more control.

Once the key Fob is within short range to the access device reader, the system opens the car door to permit entrance only for the owner. The Fob has a special recognition number and the right-to-use system can be programmed to limit or block entry at any time. The biggest advantage of key Fobs and keyless access in general is that a Fob can be instantly blocked in case it’s stolen or lost.

Because of the uniqueness of each car’s key Fob, billions of codes are created so that each one is exclusive.  But hackers have ways of intercepting the wireless signal and then narrowing down the numerical combinations. Within minutes, a hacker’s computer program can figure out the code to unlock your car. This poses a challenge to the security of everyone’s automobile.

Why You Should Wrap Your Keys In Aluminum Foil

Unlocking your car wirelessly is a convenient technology, but it comes with limitations. Thugs have come up with easy ways to intercept the FOBs signal and seize it, locking out alarm signals. The unique key Fob code is sent to the car’s security system using a computer chip. The car has a chip that uses the same algorithm in order to generate codes. Once the codes match, then the car doors open.

Car thieves have figured out how to hack the access codes of your Fob even if it’s not in the car. By capturing and manipulating signals from Fob keys, they can steal your car in just minutes. They use products that assist in intensifying the signal from the key Fob and this allows the car to be stolen effortlessly.

One simple solution to preventing a car thief from stealing this information is to wrap your key Fob in aluminum foil when the key Fob is not in use. The foil blocks the signal, preventing thugs from being able to decode it. Though this is pretty low-tech, it does work and it isn’t hard or expensive to do. Just a bit inconvenient.

How Criminals Attack

Criminals have come up with a way of detecting key Fob signals from a distance of 300 feet away using an amplifier. Signal theft is becoming a much larger problem that even experts can’t deal with. High-powered RFID readers make it all possible. This technology is relatively inexpensive and very accessible to thieves.

Steps To Stop Car Thieves

It is possible to block these amplified signals from reaching your key Fob. One method involves buying a signal-blocking purse or wallet to hold your keys. While this is a simple remedy, it’s important to make sure your keys are properly stored so signal blocking works all the time and correctly. If you can’t afford a purse or wallet with this technology, then try lining your purse with aluminum foil. You can also line only the pouch that holds your keys with foil. Many people keep their keys in the same pocket or area of their purse, so just line that specific area with the foil and remember to place the key Fob there when not in use.

Wrap Up

These days, it’s important to make sure you’re doing everything possible to keep your home and car safe. Though there are many new types of security systems to use, it can be expensive or difficult to install and use them. If your budget won’t allow it, look for easy, low-cost ways like using aluminum foil to protect your key Fob. Make it as hard as possible for thieves to steal from you. They’re often lazy folks who are searching for the easiest targets, so each layer of protection you add, makes you less of a target for car thieves.

Are you using an iPhone or iPad?  It may be worth it to hold off a few days before hitting that update button.

Why?

Reports are surfacing that after updating to #IOS 11.4.1 there are issues with app updates. The App store shows many apps that need to be updated, but when you press ‘update‘ or ‘update all’ the apps updates are failing.

Click Here To Learn More

We recommended holding off until Apple fixes these update issues.

Have any questions regarding the recent iPhone/iPad update?  We welcome you to reach out to us at {phone} or {email}.

Password-Stealing Malware

The acquisition of user IDs has become much easier for cybercriminals in the globalization era. A variety of methods can be used to steal passwords, including spyware, keyloggers, and phishing attacks. This can lead to the total loss of essential data held in company or private databases. Most of the methods used by these cyber criminals involve the use of malware that has been designed to steal user credentials. Based on the objectives of a particular cybercriminal, a variety of malware methods are applied to fulfill those goals.

A significant proportion of methods used to steal user credentials consider the use of malware. Additionally, phishing attacks use malicious attacks through communication channels such as emails where malware-loaded websites are disguised as genuine ones to trap unsuspecting users. Other types of attacks include spyware and keylogging which, for a variety of incidences, has been observed to continually grow in both complexity and frequency of attacks.

Signs of a Malware Infected PC

One of the diagnosis methods of identifying whether a computer is infected with a virus is through the observation of random pop-ups and significantly increased booting time. Instances like these are associated with spyware configured to steal essential data from users without them noticing.

The objective of using spyware on user PCs is to ensure that information stored in browsers and other sensitive areas is well camouflaged. This includes communication channels such as email. Cyber crooks will attempt to acquire your passwords without you noticing that anything is wrong. Though this seems like a flawed technique that wouldn’t work all the time, the truth is that it works exceptionally well. For instance, 158 million social security numbers were stolen in 2017. That doesn’t include all the other types of records and data stolen from individuals and companies.

Malware Injection Technique

For reliable security dodging methods, process injection is a method of integrating malware and lifeless adversary strategy in trade-crafting accounting for the integration of custom codes within the address bars of other processes. The variety of injection techniques includes the following methods.

Portable Executable Injection

Shellcodes and Create Remote Threads are among strategies used in malware injection where malicious codes are copied into accessible active processes commanding them to execute as the originals. Through this strategy of attack, the malware does not require writing malicious code on a disk. Instead, it does so by calling Write Process Memory on the host procedure. The impact of this procedure is that the injected code copies its PE to another process with an unidentifiable base address commanding it to re-compute the original addresses of its PE.

Process Hollowing

Process hollowing is a technique that malware applies to take into account the mapping or hollowing out of the primary code from within the memory of the target’s procedure while overwriting the memory target process with an executable malicious code. The function of the malware is to create a new process designed to host the malicious code presenting it in a hanging form awaiting for the Resume Thread Function to be called in order to execute.

This process leads to the switching of the original file contents with the malicious payload. Processes used for mapping the memory include two API examples, the ZwUnmap and the NtUnmap Views of Section. In order to succeed in assigning new memory for the malware, this procedure takes advantage of the malware’s unmapping of the memory and proceeds to execute the loader, VirtualAllocEx that facilitates the application of the malware to the Write Process Memory on the identified vulnerable target.

Classic DLL Injection Through Create Remote Thread And Load Library

This technique is among the most popular method used in malware injection into other processes. By commanding the implicit address space to process the malware code using the dynamic-bond library, the approach facilitates the creation of Remote Threads in the target process through process loading.

The primary objective of the malware is to target a process for injection. This procedure is generally performed through a search of the processes to call a trio of APIs that include CreateToolHelp32Snapshot, Process32 1st, and 2nd. The specific functions of each of these APIs include the cataloging of heaps and returning a snapshot, retrieval of the first process, and the iteration through the previous two processes respectively. After successfully allocating the target process, the malware is able to execute through Open Process calling.

Conclusion

This article reported on a number of techniques used by malware attackers in concealing unauthenticated activities in other processes. Two procedures are observed to facilitate the functionality of malware and include open injection of a shellcode on another processor or the command of other processes to load malicious libraries on behalf of the malware. Cyber thieves are constantly updating their attack procedures to stay one step ahead of IT professionals. That makes locating and eliminating malware threats a full-time job.

If there is a product that has proven itself worthy of Microsoft’s pride, then it is Dynamics 365, the company’s cloud-based combination ERP (enterprise resource planning) and CRM (customer relationship management) enterprise system.

It turns out that Dynamics 365 recorded a growth of 65 percent during the first three quarters of Microsoft’s 2018 financial year. This growth momentum makes the cloud-based product one of Microsoft’s fastest-growing businesses, outpacing even the celebrated Office 365.

Microsoft announced this development at the Inspire 2018 partner conference, where its channel leadership outlined the key opportunities for partners and the tech giant’s investment plans for the coming fiscal year.

Microsoft boasts a vast network of partners comprised of hundreds of thousands of innovators who drive positive and global impact. The Microsoft partner ecosystem builds everything Microsoft – from gaming experiences to business line applications to industry-specific solutions on the company’s cloud environment, Dynamics 365.

Through a series of announcements at the Inspire 2018, Microsoft made it clear that the coming months are going to be a time for acceleration, hinting that there’s no time like the present for partners to seize the opportunities occasioned by Dynamics 365.

Here’s a rundown of the key takeaways from the Microsoft Inspire 2018 partner conference.

Microsoft to provide partners with free training

In the coming year, Microsoft is seeking to provide members of its vast partner network with free training opportunities to assist them with getting involved in the cloud-based Dynamics 365 and multiple other business apps such as Power BI business analytics service.

Microsoft partners will now be able to access the company’s Dynamics online learning environment free of charge. Partners previously had to pay a fee to access this service.

Dynamics learning is a mammoth suite of self-service sales and technical resources, which are extremely essential to the partners’ innovation processes. Microsoft is also launching a four-day boot camp training for its partners involved in a FastTrack engagement solution architecture – to be attended in person.

The best opportunity for launching a new practice with Microsoft: Dynamics 365 

At Inspire 2018, the executive vice president of Microsoft’s Worldwide Commercial Business organization, Judson Althoff, was not slow to pinpoint Dynamics 365 as the ideal product area for any partner or innovator who wishes to launch a new practice with the company.

According to him, Dynamics 365 presents a surging opportunity that would suit anyone who wishes to start a new line of products and services from Microsoft. He was keen to encourage partners to invest in the Dynamics 365 business, noting that it is currently unmatched by any business in the multinational tech company’s portfolio. That automatically makes it great for entrepreneurs who wish to build a thriving business in the near future.

Partner capability indicator – for data-driven business decisions

This is a new offering available to partners within the Partner Contribution page. It is designed to empower partners to be able to make more informed business decisions based on actual data. The offering is replete with metrics that show the users (partners) their successes, their customers’ accomplishments, as well as areas that could use some more attention.

Through the partner capability indicator, people can also see how they’re doing compared to other partners and use this information to inform the planning of new, richer business goals.

Overall, the offering is designed to ultimately help partners with tracking their success and improving their business decision-making. They will be able to see the overall health of their system following the implementation of the offering, across all Microsoft business lines.

More incentives for every new customer acquisition and cloud usage

Microsoft partners have always enjoyed alluring incentives from the company. Following the Inspire 2018, these incentives are either doubling in figures or multiplying with significant margins.

In the coming business year, new customer acquisition for business applications will now allow partners to earn incentives in the range of 10 to 50 percent more than what they’ve been earning in the past.

Additionally, users will now earn double the incentive package for cloud usage and adoption of business app seats. This, according to Microsoft, will likely place it above its competitors’ rates. This incentive is intended to ensure that the company not only promotes the buying of new seats, but also the rewarding process of turning those seats into active ones. The incentives are also meant to encourage the expansion of seats beyond the initial seat count.

Incentives for co-selling solutions

Microsoft has been offering special incentives for its salespeople involved in co-selling solutions from Azure partners for a year now. Going forward, the company is rolling out the co-selling incentives to Dynamics 365 as well.

Through these co-selling incentives, the company’s salespeople that co-sell with an ISV partner will receive a 2-times multiplier in quota retirement.

Wrap up

Whether Dynamics 365 is going to maintain the pace or accelerate further remains to be seen. However, it’s clear that Microsoft partners are the biggest winners from the Inspire 2018 announcements.

Are You Prepared for Windows 2008 Server End of Life?

Windows Server 2008 has been a sensation and many people have had a positive experience utilizing it, but what does its end of life mean?

There’s a lot to it. First, Windows Server 2008 end of life infers that the manufacturer, Microsoft, will no longer update this product unless a warranty compels them to do so.

However, Microsoft mainstream support will still be under obligation to provide bug fixes and vital improvements through extended support. This implies that you can still enjoy using Windows Server 2008 as long as you don’t need any further updates currently offered by the mainstream support.

How much time do you have to change out your equipment?

You need to change over from the Windows 2008 Server to a supported server by January 14, 2020. To keep your data safe, experts recommend making the switch six months earlier than the set date. That’s how much time users have till Microsoft stops offering bug fixes and security updates through the extended security support.

Will 2020 be the real “End” of Windows Server 2008?

An end to bug fixes and those all-important security updates may be the ultimate deal breaker for users. Data managers will tell you that not having these fixes makes your data vulnerable to access by unauthorized parties and nobody wants to take chances with sensitive data.

After January 14, 2020, Microsoft will no longer offer security updates and bug fixes for this server and that will create loopholes in data security which prying hackers would be interested in exploiting. These security breaches can be avoided by installing a newer generation server with supported security updates. So, yes, 2020 will be the real end of life for Windows Server 2008, especially for data management centers.

What you need to do before Windows Server 2008 End of Life

The most logical action would be to update all equipment. There are many Microsoft products available on the market with more convenience, efficiency, and better virtualization attributes than Windows Server 2008. Do some research to ensure that you get a proper replacement that will address all the functions needed for your organization.

These servers come at a high cost (especially for large data centers) and installing them can be challenging, so the sooner you start the better. Upgrading a server system will definitely take some planning and precious time. Ample time should be devoted to installing the system. Unexpected delays are common; things don’t always go as planned with today’s sophisticated hardware and software. Don’t take chances with such important technology. With six months leeway, you can ensure that your new server is fully functional and your data is safe before the end of the Windows Server 2008.

Is it the end of life for all Windows Server 2008 versions?

No, it’s not. There are 16 Windows Server 2008 versions and this is not the end of life for all sixteen. However, mainstream security support for all Windows Server 2008 products ended on January, 13th 2015. But newer products like the Windows Server 2012 still have many years ahead.

More recent products like the Windows Server 2016/R2 offer users immense improvements in performance and may make it worth your time and money to switch.

Will I still be able to use Windows Server 2008 after End of Life?

While Microsoft will terminate the extended support service after the end of life, these servers will still run smoothly. The obvious drawback is that your data will be vulnerable and you will be missing out on many newer virtualization features. Even if it wasn’t the End of Life for these servers, newer features alone would warrant a server upgrade.

It’s not the End of Life for mainstream support

There are many data centers that will find themselves in a situation where they need help with a few issues after Windows Server 2008 End of Life. If you find yourself in this situation, Microsoft’s mainstream support may come in handy.

Get ready for the move

To plan for an infrastructure upgrade, rewrite and migrate all applications based on SQL Server 2008 to a safe storage place. The new server may need extensive troubleshooting, which can affect your timeline and efforts. SQL databases can be hosted on the Windows Server 2008 hardware as you install the new system.

During the transition, put a data protection infrastructure in place that will eliminate the risks of data vulnerability during a server upgrade. This will protect the data from the fragility of the old server and risks associated with the new system. While this may be costly, the fines associated with a data breach are often far more expensive.

To undergo this transition smoothly, work closely with organizations tasked with planning for Windows Server 2008 End of Life. These IT professionals can offer a great deal of assistance. They know what types of issues to look for and how to make the switch successful.

New Scam Exploits Visitors to Canada’s Wonderland Theme Park

Canada’s Wonderland theme park in Toronto has issued a warning about a social media scam appearing on Facebook and other sites. This new scheme targets people who enjoy the park’s many thrilling rides, including radical roller coasters, but can’t afford the high price of a ticket. Ticket prices for one day start at $41.99 with season passes starting at $89.99.

How the Scam Works

An ad is displayed that says you can win 5 free tickets to Wonderland Park simply by completing a survey, then sharing the link to get free tickets with friends. A link in the ad sends people to a landing page that contains the survey. The additional instructions say that the link must be shared online with friends before the tickets will be released.

A spokeswoman for Wonderland, Grace Peacock, confirmed that the Facebook scheme is fraudulent. Ms. Peacock advised consumers to purchase tickets only from the authentic Wonderland website or other authorized ticket sellers.

“Canada’s Wonderland takes ticket fraud very seriously. If anyone has any concerns about the validity of their ticket or a dealer, please call guest services,” said Ms. Peacock. “We caution people to be wary of discounted ticket deals from individuals, third-party websites, apps or social media,” she added.

She reminded people that these offers are not sponsored by Canada’s Wonderland Park, confirming that a similar scheme was spreading on WhatsApp. She also said that York regional police have been notified about the ticket scam and cautioned consumers to be wary about responding to ads that seem too good to be true.

Park officials are advising everyone to purchase tickets from Wonderland’s official website or at the front gate. Tickets can also be purchased from authorized ticket dealers including Perkopolis, Costco, and Venngo.

Contents of the Ad:

The ad reads: “Canada’s Wonderland providing 5 Free tickets Per family to celebrate its 51st year of quality service!”

Next, consumers are taken to a landing page that says:

“You have been selected to take part in our short survey to get 5 Free Canada’s Wonderland Tickets! We only have 212 tickets remaining so hurry up!”

Once the survey has been completed, consumers are instructed to share the page and click on the like button. Afterwards, they’re told they will receive five tickets valued at over $100. Wonderland Park officials advised people to call guest services at 905-832-8131 if they believe they’ve been sold fraudulent tickets.

Making the Most of Email Marketing Service Providers

Email marketing provides businesses with the most direct line of communication for connecting with customers and turning leads into sales. It is also one of the most cost-effective marketing methods available.

While you can use any number of methods and a suitable tool to easily acquire subscribers and build your email list, the actual email delivery part comes down to your choice of email marketing services.

An email marketing service provider, or ESP, is simply a web-based service that can help you organize, manage, automate, and track your marketing emails.

Your choice of ESP can make or break your overall marketing campaign. You don’t want to end up shelling out a lot more money for fewer features and perhaps an inefficient delivery system, which could translate into losing money and subscribers.

So, if you’re looking to start using an email marketing service, or if you’re switching from your current provider, here are some helpful facts to jumpstart your research.

What To Expect From Your ESP

Any email marketing service provider will normally offer you a number of essential features. Of course, the level of service varies from one ESP to another depending on the cost.

1. Spam test – to gauge the score of an email against a known factor or set of factors that would place the email at risk of being flagged or blocked.
2. Ability to import, create, and manage subscriber lists – these management features usually include list segmentation and customizable fields.
3. The ability to use templates for sending an email – this often includes testing of the templates for compatibility with emailing apps.
4. The ability to track and review statistics of emails sent – usually as a way to measure and test the success rate of campaigns.
5. The ability to send both HTML and plain text emails – these format varieties help to improve delivery success rates.
6. The ability to dynamically customize the content of emails that are sent out – helps with tailoring personalized and relevant email communication.

Why You’ll Want To Include An ESP In Your Email Marketing Strategy

Using an email marketing service comes with a number of benefits that may be a great boon to your overall marketing strategy. Let’s have a look at some of them.

Preventing intentional (or unintentional) email marketing abuse

These web-based emailing services provide methods that are within legal boundaries, thereby creating natural constraints for marketers to work within the acceptable limits. This can go a long way in ensuring that email marketing campaigns are successful – often by keeping marketers from overwhelming recipients with their emails and risk getting flagged as spam.

Saving time and money

With ready-to-use email templates available in multiple formats, you won’t have to spend time creating emails from scratch each time you want to send one. This, added to the fact that ESPs provide list management and organization, automation, testing, and targeting, as well as tracking and analyzing of emails. These tasks would be very time consuming to perform yourself. An ESP can ensure that you shave tremendous amounts of time off your campaign management duties.

Which Way To Go: ESPs Compared

Often, you’ll have to choose from the long list of email marketing service providers available in this industry. The popular ones today include MailChimp, AWeber, ActiveCampaign, ConvertKit, GetResponse, and ConstantContact. There are many others.

All these ESPs have their various appeals and relative differences that will determine the best option for your needs. It will help to know what to look for, in order to choose the right one.

Cost and your budget

How much are you willing to pay and what number of subscribers are you targeting with your email marketing campaign? What you need is a pricing structure that fits within your budget and will fit into your email strategy. Charges and pricing terms vary from one ESP to the next, so be sure to analyze the pricing plans and terms from various vendors before settling on one.

Age of the ESP

If you are all about industry experience, then you’ll want to think about the level of experience that an ESP has gained from being in the market for longer. Of the six ESPs listed here, ConstantContact is the oldest, having been founded in 1995. AWeber comes in as second oldest, having been founded in 1998.

List of features and user experience

Various ESPs offer hundreds of different features. More importantly, pay attention to the IP (do they provide a dedicated IP or will you share with other users), email types (automated daily emails, real-time ‘triggered’ emails, one-off marketing newsletters), API database integration, dynamic merge fields, A/B testing capabilities, analytics, and any other feature(s) that you find essential for your business.

Wrap up

With a clear knowledge of what to look for, you can profile your ideal choice of vendor based on your simple list of requirements and go to market assured of getting the best ESP for your email marketing needs. It takes a bit of research but should pay off with better results for every campaign.

New Consumer Privacy Act to Take Privacy Protection in California a Notch Higher

No consumer really knows the exact amount of data that companies collect about them online at any particular time. It is nearly impossible to determine exactly what information is collected and how it will be used. This has always been a sore spot with consumers. Everyone enjoys the convenience of shopping online. Up to now, there has never been a way to control how your personal information is collected, stored, or used.

In California, this is about to change. With the recent passing of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), consumers will now have some control over this.

The law, which goes into effect January 1, 2020, is designed to empower consumers with knowledge about how their personal information will be collected, used, and stored.

To break it down, here are the rights that the California Consumer Privacy Act, also known as AB-375, gives the residents of California:

1. Knowledge about the kind of personal information that companies are collecting about them.
2. Knowledge about whether the information collected about them is getting sold or disclosed to some other entity. The law entitles Californians to know the identity of the party obtaining their data from the original collector.
3. Consumers can refuse the sale or disclosure of their personal information.
4. They can gain unrestricted access to their personal information in its “readily useable format” that makes it viable for transfer to third parties.
5. They can still enjoy equal services and prices even when they exercise their privacy rights. Companies can’t charge more or decline services to a consumer who wants to obtain information about how their information will be used.

Working Toward Stronger Consumer Privacy Protections

The creation of the California Consumer Privacy Act is the culmination of a move to address growing user privacy concerns and the continued rise in data breaches in many parts of the country.

In particular, the law explicitly attributes its genesis to the major privacy scandals witnessed in recent months, including the incident where Cambridge Analytica misappropriated Facebook user data of at least 87 million people. It is against this backdrop and other similar news that the law gained much of the political impetus that drove its successful passage.

The passage of this law comes on the heels of episodes of intense negotiation especially from US tech giants and leading internet service providers. The discussions also brought to the table various privacy advocates, a number of technology startups, and other concerned parties.

Many have described this new piece of legislation as a landmark policy that constitutes the most rigorous consumer data protection regime in the US. It is joining the likes of the Canadian Anti-Spam Law (CASL) and Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which constitute part of a global movement toward greater data transparency and stronger protections around consumer privacy.

What Sets CCPA Apart?

First, compared to the GDPR, which continues to have an extensive influence across the globe, the California law exclusively applies to the State of California and its residents, not the entire United States of America. But considering that California boasts a population of 40 million, it’s only likely that every company involved in collecting user data in the U.S. will be affected by this law.

While GDPR requires that by default, businesses opt out of collecting consumer data unless the consumer gives them the explicit rights to do so, the California Consumer Privacy Act does not impose such a requirement. It doesn’t require companies to seek people’s permission to collect their personal information from the get-go. The legislation is rather focused on empowering consumers to have a say over their privacy and the collection of their personal information.

For the rest of the US, there is a separate bill in the pipeline, AB-2546, that is set to amend California’s anti-spam law in a bid to strengthen its provisions. As it is, this law will not be limited to the State of California, but rather, will have a sweeping effect throughout the United States of America.

Who Is Affected By This Law?

According to the text of the California Consumer Privacy Act, companies that fit the following criteria will have to abide by the provisions of the new law:

• Businesses that are involved in brokering data, as well as those that buy the data, sell, or share the personal information of approximately 50,000 or more individuals, devices or households.
• Companies whose annual revenue mostly comes from the sale of consumer personal information.
• Businesses that have at least $25 million in annual gross revenues.

Failure to abide by these provisions would attract legal action against the errant companies – with the cost of damages stipulated to be anywhere from $100 to $750 or higher. With California law in effect, citizens have the right to bring a civil action against any business that operates in violation of the law.

The law also allows the state of California to bring charges against errant companies directly. In such a case, the fines levied will be $7,500 for every violation that remains unaddressed within a 30-day window.

Wrap up

The cost of violating the California Consumer Privacy Act can be significant. Companies that are bound by this piece of legislation must obey it or run the risk of paying huge fines. Both government and consumers will be on the look-out to see whether companies will adhere to these new regulations or run the risk of being fined. An even greater penalty, companies that refuse to abide by these regulations may damage their reputation and lose the confidence of consumers.

Want 7 Great Mobile Computing Tips?

Mobile computing is now the new norm. We’re no longer tied to our desktops like we were years ago. Whether you’re traveling or running from meeting to meeting, your laptop and cloud computing can be your best friends. However, mobile computing also creates challenges for us and our businesses. The following are some tips to keep things under control.

Keep A Plug Splitter Handy

If you travel a lot like I do you can find yourself sitting in an airport boarding area waiting longer than you had planned to. I always take this time to be as productive as I can and get work done on my laptop. But there are times when I need to recharge the battery and I can’t find a spare wall plug because others are doing the same.

This is when you need that handy plug splitter. It converts one grounded outlet into three. A 3-outlet splitter is usually rated at 15 amps. You can plug three different devices into it. Just make sure their combined load is less than 15 amps or 1,875 watts.

Always Use A Secure Server

It’s essential that when you send and receive information from your laptop or any mobile device that you know it won’t be intercepted.  Public WiFi hotspots don’t ensure your data security. If you must use one be sure it’s connected to a secure server.

Look for a locked padlock icon on your browser. This tells you that you’re using an SSL (secure sockets layer)-encrypted session. You can also check any website you access by looking for “https://” in its address, rather than the usual http://.

Encrypt Your Data And Employ Mobile Device Management

Encrypt the data on your laptop so if it’s stolen, criminals won’t be able to access it.  Better yet, ask CCS to implement Remote Management Monitoring and Mobile Device Management on all your computers. Threats can be detected, blocked, and deleted. Your mobile device can be wiped clean if it’s lost or stolen. Otherwise, if someone steals your laptop, they can hack your system, stealing your login and password, then read everything in your files.

Watch Out For Hotel WiFi and DarkHotel

Hotel WiFi is designed for easy access. Just because it’s provided as part of your room charge doesn’t mean that it’s totally private. Typically, public and hotel WiFi don’t utilize WPA (WiFi Protected Access) like you do in your office and home.

Last year, a group of hackers by the name of Darkhotel came out with a new attack, aimed at exploiting hotel WiFi. Their goal was to target business travelers who stay at high-end hotels. They typically use phishing attacks that contain links to Trojan viruses.  Lately, they’ve been using the Inexsmar malware and multi-stage Trojans. The DarkHotel criminals have been stealing data for ten years targeting thousands of businesses around the world via WiFi infrastructures in hotels.

Don’t Take All Your Business Data With You

Don’t put more data than necessary on your laptop. Just store what you need. If you carry all your company files with you and you lose your laptop, or a thief steals it, they have all of your company records and client data.

Better yet, ask CCS to set up a hybrid or private cloud for your business. This way everything is stored in a secure data center and you can access it via the Internet with your private credentials (keep these safe too!).  You can easily download exactly what you need and upload it when you’ve completed your work.

Use Microsoft Office 365

We can’t say enough about this software. You pay an affordable monthly or yearly subscription based on the number of users and it provides email and communication services, document sharing and collaboration, and so much more.  You can work on documents and projects with your teams in real time, and it’s easy because you’re probably already using Microsoft solutions like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. You’ll have 24/7 access to all your applications and documents via the Internet. Microsoft takes all the responsibility for reliability and security so you won’t need to worry about this.

Microsoft Office 365 is easy to sign up for, but it’s often a struggle to migrate your existing platforms to it. CCS can help and assist with the transition.  

7. Turn Off Your Bluetooth When Traveling

This is always a good idea. Criminals are now accessing the infrared on our phones and laptops to deposit spam, viruses, and steal data like contact information. This is called Bluejacking and Bluesnarfing.  Whenever you travel, be sure to disable the infrared port on your laptop and smartphone. Also, configure your Bluetooth device to “nondiscovery mode.” This could pose some inconveniences for you, but it will protect your data and privacy.

Considering Working With An Email Marketing Solution To Help Grow Your Business?

Email marketing plays a critical role in helping you to reach the right people and expand your client base, share important information with prospects and clients, and promote your services and products.

Tune into our complimentary on-demand training and learn what email marketing solution is best.

Click Here To Tune In Now

An Email Marketing Service Provider has the tools and knowhow to take your email marketing efforts to the next level.

Our latest On-Demand Training Video covers ESP 101, discussing topics including:

• What is an Email Marketing Service Provider?
• What are the benefits of using an Email Marketing Provider?
• A comparison of the top EMail Marketing Providers.
• An in-depth look at the most popular Email Marketing Providers.

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