Business Solutions & Software Group Blog

Upgrading to a new operating system is a challenge that many businesses face, especially in light of several prominent older systems reaching their end-of-support date in recent times. For example, Windows XP reached its end of support date just a few years ago, and this past January, Microsoft pulled the plug on Windows 8. While unsupported software is certainly a problem, why does a business ultimately choose to upgrade away from their current OS?

Every business wants to be equipped with the latest and greatest IT equipment and software. Yet, due to realities like budget shortcomings, time constraints, and the lack of knowledge about IT trends, it can be difficult for the average SMB to attain that dream technological setup on their own. However, by being smart about how you approach IT, your company can still have a network that exceeds your expectations.

The number of high-profile hacks that have occurred over the past several years continues to climb, and it won’t let up anytime soon. Now, another incident involving Time Warner Cable, a large ISP in the United States, shows that even large companies that deal with sensitive information aren’t invincible from data breaches.

In a world where technology is continuously being improved upon to suit the needs of the modern business, your organization’s needs can quickly (and drastically) change. The need for cloud services grows more apparent with each passing day, primarily because it has so much to offer for a small business. Granted, talking about the cloud and implementing it are two entirely different things. So, it's important that business owners ask, "What can the cloud do for my organization?"

Cloud computing has reached a point where the majority of businesses are utilizing the technology to some extent. According to a 2014 survey, about 70 percent of enterprises either have infrastructure or applications in the cloud. As more companies migrate more of their operations to the cloud, we’re getting more questions about what it takes to make such a transition possible.

Many businesses go about their daily duties without understanding the difference between a cloud computing solution and virtualization services. Contrary to popular belief, they are, in fact, NOT the same thing. Rather, virtualization itself is an important part of integrating a cloud solution.

Cloud computing is here to stay. Yet, there are still companies hesitant to adopt the cloud. While every business that hesitates migrating to the cloud has its own reasons, one common source of conflict that we’ve seen is the opposing view between the business owner and their IT department.

What separates the average PC user from the IT technician who routinely takes care of your technology issues? In essence, the only difference is the amount of technical training. Our years of technical expertise have given us the ability to diagnose and resolve varieties of problems, but we don’t hold our knowledge close to the chest. Rather, we want to share it with you.

Despite cloud computing being commonplace, there are still some businesses holding out when it comes to migrating their data to the cloud. In most scenarios like this, a company has objections to the cloud that are preventing them from taking advantage of its many benefits. Are these objections valid? Let’s find out by addressing two of the most common objections to the cloud.

Outsourcing your company’s IT services is an easy way to cut back on IT costs. For years, outsourced IT has been a growing trend with more companies making the switch, but just because your businesses has outsourced its technology services, doesn’t mean that backsourcing isn’t a valid option.

A while back we discussed the POODLE vulnerability found in SSL 3.0 SSL encryption technology. This vulnerability is found in all operating systems, as it is found within the web browser’s abilities to process SSL encryption. Thankfully, major companies are stepping up to tackle the issue, and Microsoft has released a basic solution to fix the vulnerability in Internet Explorer.

The POODLE vulnerability itself is used to obtain information encrypted with SSL technology by analyzing web traffic. This technique is used to steal information such as credit card numbers, Social Security numbers or other private information. In non-tech speak, SSL (Secure Socket Layers) is an encryption protocol used to keep data safe on the web through security certificates. This method of encryption has long since been replaced by the more secure protocol TLS (Transport Layer Security), but several systems will revert back to their old SSL certificates in the event something has gone wrong with their TLS. TLS isn’t vulnerable to this issue, so in theory, a hacker could force their way into a network, exploiting the traffic coming in and out of the network for any worthwhile information.

According to the Microsoft security advisory, hackers exploit a man-in-the-middle attack to take advantage of this vulnerability:

In a man-in-the-middle (MiTM) attack, an attacker could downgrade an encrypted TLS session forcing clients to use SSL 3.0 and then force the browser to execute malicious code. This code sends several requests to a target HTTPS website, where cookies are sent automatically if a previous authenticated session exists. This is a required condition in order to exploit this vulnerability. The attacker could then intercept this HTTPS traffic, and by exploiting a weakness in the CBC block cipher in SSL 3.0, could decrypt portions of the encrypted traffic (e.g. authentication cookies).

Due to the nature of POODLE as a design flaw, it’s not something that can easily be patched. Therefore, most experts are saying that you’re better off disabling SSL 3.0 for their web browsers. Most servers don’t rely on SSL 3.0 anymore, which makes it obsolete. In fact, most major browsers are looking to disable SSL 3.0 completely within the next few months. Firefox is fixing the issue with the November upgrade, while Google is working to disable SSL 3.0 on all of its products. This makes the vulnerability obsolete for two of the biggest browsers, but what about Internet Explorer?

Turns out Microsoft has a way to fix that one, too. Microsoft has released a Fix It tool, which can help users disable SSL 3.0 without navigating through their Control Panel. Just click here for the tool on their official website. Otherwise, you must disable SSL 3.0 and enable TLS 1.0, 1.1, and 1.2. Follow these steps to do so:

In the Internet Explorer Tools menu (or your PC’s Control Panel), click Internet Options.

In the Internet Options window, click the Advanced tab.

Scroll down to the Security section. Notice there are checkboxes next to the available SSL and TLS options. Uncheck Use SSL 3.0, and check the following: TLS 1.0, TLS 1.1, and TLS 1.2. Be sure to check all of the TLS versions. Failing to do so could result in connection errors.

Finally, click OK, exit, and restart Internet Explorer. This allows Internet Explorer to refuse a connection with any servers which only support SSL, which ensures that the web traffic isn’t vulnerable to the POODLE vulnerability.

Business Solutions & Software Group believes that quality security is key to a minimal-risk online environment. This fix isn’t a viable replacement for the latest security updates and patches, so you will want to ensure that you are always running the most up-to-date versions of your software, applications, and especially your operating system.

Business Solutions & Software Group can apply all of these patches for your business’s systems so you don’t have to. Call us today at (954) 575-3992 to learn more.

With so many new trends popping up in today's technology industry, it's only natural that a change of pace, or even a change in strategy, be considered by any business hoping to take advantage of what the world has to offer. Your company needs to adapt to change if it hopes to be successful in the future business world.

The cloud is becoming a very important part of the modern-day business, and for good reason. It frees companies from the restricting physical nature of servers, desktops, and other hardware. In fact, according to Joe McKendrick of Forbes magazine, four-out-of-five small businesses will soon operate on the cloud.

The world is changing as technology grows ever more mobile. Cell phones have gone from bulky, large pieces of hardware to smaller, more compact specimens. Fifteen years ago, if you were to tell someone that your cell phone could connect to the Internet, you would quickly be dismissed. If you look past the surface laden with Candy Crush Saga and Words with Friends game requests, you can get to the heart of what smartphones have revolutionized – the way we communicate with others.

Those paying attention to technology industry news may have noticed the current trend of declining PC sales. Any way you spin it, the latest statistics dealing with the PC market are not favorable toward the future of widespread desktop and laptop computer purchases. Let's take a look at some of the numbers and their implications for your business.