[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

Have you heard of “The Internet of Things,” and if so, do you know what it is? This term is being bandied about in the media a lot recently, but it is certainly not self-explanatory, and we suspected that many business owners – not to mention their employees – do not understand precisely what it is or what it means for them. According to a survey, released last week by CompTIA, a leading IT industry trade association, we were right.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a term that describes a global, interconnected network of objects that can transfer data over a network to other objects/entities without the need for a human or computer to propel the transfer. It is similar to the “smart grid” approach being used by utility providers to interconnect buildings and other facilities powered by electricity. However, with the IoT, network nodes are connected via a wireless data transfer network (like the Internet), instead.

A considerable percentage of science and technology experts predict that it is the future of our world. Per Pew Research, 83% of technology experts and engaged Internet users believe that the dynamic web created by the IoT, the cloud, and embedded/wearable devices will have widespread and beneficial effects by 2025. Furthermore, research firms predict that by 2020, between 26 billion devices (per Gartner) and 30 billion devices (per ABI Research) will be wirelessly connected.  Already, a lot of them are.

In other words, it won’t be long before most businesses and individuals will be connected in some way to the IoT, whether by the watch a company president wears, the smart thermostat installed in a corporate office, or the medical monitoring device that an employee has implanted inside his or her body after a heart attack or stroke. So, what does this mean for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs), and do their owners need to be concerned with it, now?

The CompTIA survey referenced earlier found that 34 percent of SMBs in the United States haven’t reviewed their service or product portfolios to take advantage of the rise of the Internet of things (IoT) and 31 percent have no plans to change their offerings in order to do so. Interestingly, 49 percent of American SMBs think the IoT will help their organizations make more money.

Here at DynaSis, we are highly cognizant of the IoT, not only the benefits it can bring SMBs but also of the risks it may generate. Already, security experts are warning that without proper precautions, a cyber-strike against the IoT could wreak incredible havoc, not only on companies and citizens but also on global infrastructure. They point out that when the majority of “things” can communicate without human or computer intervention, there will be fewer opportunities for a person or a system to detect an attack as it crosses various nodes. This scenario will make robust defenses at the corporate level even more important.

We believe that SMBs should be at least familiarizing themselves with the IoT, now, and should be preparing for the impacts (both good and bad) it may have on their businesses. If you would like to learn more about it or discuss how it might affect you, please give us a call.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

With fewer than eight percent of companies (of all sizes) adopting Office 365 (per a May 2014 Bitglass survey of 81,000 firms), we have to ask ourselves, “What is holding organizations back?” Office 365 is a great product, and its subscription model makes it affordable for firms of all sizes while eliminating the hassle of licensing upgrades. Yet, adoption has been slow.

Based upon investigation and our experience, we postulate that several factors are impacting organizations’ decisions. One reason may be concerns about cloud security. Per the Bitglass survey mentioned above, 42% of companies are currently eschewing cloud adoption due to security concerns.

We find this development unfortunate, because the cloud absolutely can be safe with stringent security mechanisms and a reputable provider. However, that is a discussion for a different article. For the purposes of this discussion, it is evident that even this amount of “cloud concern” cannot be the only factor hampering Office 365 adoption.

In our opinion, another issue is the complexity of the move, itself. Office 365 is a great productivity tool, once it is up and running. However, implementing it is more involved than most organizations realize and ongoing operation is not completely hands-off. Consider these key tasks involved in the migration:

• Determine which versions of on-premise Office are running and who is using them. Decide if everyone is a migration candidate.
• Choose an Office 365 model. There is a variety of price points for the offerings, each of which includes a different set of applications and tools.
• Install the on-premise versions of all applications on user’s machines and devices (up to five per user), potentially with hardware upgrades being involved.
• Document all email accounts and confirm which ones should move to Office 365. If they are web-based, determine if they should remain open and accessible individually (Office 365 will sync with rather than replace them) or if the users can migrate to Office 365’s email service completely. Back up the email stores and import them into Office 365. Notify all contacts of new email addresses, if appropriate.

After migration, the organization will also need someone to administer Office 365 and provide Help Desk support. Commonly requested support issues include resetting passwords, setting mailbox and/or folder permissions, and more.

We suspect (and have heard from others) that many companies run the Office 365 “trial” with the intention of adopting it fully. Then, they realize they do not have the time and expertise to merge all their Office resources and set up Office 365 completely. Alternatively, they end up with a partial migration that creates a mess and so abandon the product. In other words, they cannot manage a do-it-yourself move.

Microsoft recently initiated a program, called Fasttrack, designed to help companies get Office 365 up and running smoothly. Unfortunately for small and medium sized business owners, it is optimized for installations of 150 seats or more, and all of the help is remote or online. It also cannot start until a company purchases Office 365. Taking such an approach extends adoption time, because organizations cannot work with a tech team to perform advance planning.

For any company wishing to adopt Office 365, we recommend working with a local IT expert that has technological competence with Office 365 migration and management. We just happen to be one of those firms, so if you would like to know more or discuss such a solution, please fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

In last week’s blog, we introduced you to Shellshock, the software bug that has the entire technology world reeling due to its potential implications. Many firms, especially those with web servers, may have affected (but not necessarily infected) machines on their network and not even know it. Those with UNIX/Linux and Apple OS machines are at the highest risk level, but any network that connects to the Internet could be compromised by it.

As promised in last week’s article, this week we’ll talk a bit about network assessments and software audits. A network assessment is a process by which an in-house technical expert or a third-party provider evaluates all the devices running on a corporate network, including servers, desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones and all other connected devices. It’s an important preventive measure against Shellshock.

At a minimum, a network assessment should be able to scan and see all the network hardware and determine whether it is protected by security software and/or devices. It should also be able to determine if the network and its devices are properly configured for optimal performance. An advanced assessment will also include a software inventory (audit) of all the software running on every machine. This level of assessment is needed to give companies a total picture of their vulnerability to the Shellshock bug.

Equally important to corporate productivity, the individuals or company performing any network assessment should be able to conduct their exploration in the background, with no impact on network resources. If software-based “discovery agents” are used, they should transmit no sensitive data out of the network. They should also be virtually undetectable by system users and should leave behind no traces of their process.

Once complete, the results should be outlined in easy-to-read reports about the network, its security weaknesses and its performance issues, as well as in an overall “score” that gives management a solid, at-a-glance idea of how their network performs. The assessment package should also include suggestions for urgent, recommended and optional improvements, with details about the issues these changes will resolve and/or benefits they will provide.

At DynaSis, we perform network assessments using a custom-built, secure solution that meets all these criteria. However, we have worked with many organizations who ordered network assessments that did not meet some―or any―of these standards.

As a comparison for your own evaluation, here’s a list of what our network assessment findings include:

• A summary of your overall risk score, with charts identifying problem areas and conflicts.
• A Best-Practices Deviation Report of pressure-point issues that warrant investigation.
• An inventory of network devices (routers, printers, PCs, servers and more), including rogue devices operating without the organization’s knowledge.
• A list of network access weaknesses (e.g. insecure passwords or outdated permissions).
• An inventory of installed applications, per machine.
• An inventory of servers (Web, Exchange, SQL) and recommendations for better configuration and management.

Even if your network assessment and software audit reveal that Bash isn’t in use on any of your machines, it will undoubtedly root out performance and/or security problems you didn’t realize were there. After all, nine out of 10 corporate networks have network issues that are hampering worker or company productivity.

To learn more about network assessments or to ask us questions about the current threat landscape, please fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

Have you heard of “Shellshock”―the newest computer vulnerability to hit the news? If so, you may be wondering if your firm is at risk. Or, perhaps you heard that Shellshock doesn’t affect Windows devices, so you have dismissed it as a non-event for your office. In either case, we encourage you to read this alert.

Discovered on September 12 and made public on September 24, Shellshock (also known as Bashdoor) is actually a family of bugs in a program called Bash. Written more than two decades ago, Bash is a “command shell” program―it interprets commands from users and other computers and relays them to the machine on which it is installed. Experts now believe that the bugs in Bash may have been introduced into the software code accidentally in 1992.

Bash can run on devices and systems that use the Linux or UNIX operating systems or Apple OS X, but vulnerability doesn’t stop there. UNIX is deeply ingrained into the Internet, and experts estimate that as many as 70% of Internet-connected devices run Bash. It’s also used frequently in consumer electronics, from watches to cameras.

Here are the takeaways you need to protect your firm.

• The National Institute of Standards and Technology rates Shellshock a 10 on a 10-point severity scale. (Heartbleed was a 5.)
• Firms running Windows are at risk, because a variant of Bash that runs on Windows is vulnerable, as well. Furthermore, if employees visit compromised websites, they could pick up malware distributed by the site. Firms that run web servers or have UNIX, Linux, iOS or Android devices on their network have a heightened risk of attack.
• Unlike Heartbleed, a hacker can only exploit Shellshock if the targeted machine uses Bash. Having it installed isn’t enough to result in exposure.
• It is an unsophisticated vulnerability, making it is easy for hackers to make use of it. Unlike Heartbleed it doesn’t just steal information. It takes remote control of computers and can do just about anything with them or the networks to which they connect.
• Companies that run Bash are issuing fixes and patches rapidly. Unfortunately, many of them have been incomplete or ineffective. This situation should improve over the next few weeks.
• As a precaution, companies should ensure all their software is fully updated and check to see if the websites they or their employees use have been patched.
• Internet-connected firms that have not had a network assessment (including a software audit) recently should conduct or order (outsource) one, soon. Proactive assessments, auditing and policy implementation are some of your most important defenses against this bug. (More about that in next week’s blog.)

From a broader perspective, we find it deeply concerning that a software flaw could have existed for 22 years, undetected. It makes us wonder how many other “low-level” programs―perhaps that are also deeply ingrained in the Internet or other systems―have similar flaws.

To learn more about Shellshock or to discuss proactive software updates, vulnerability assessments and/or software audits, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

We recently came across a study, released earlier this year, about the challenges that professionals face with remote collaboration. The survey, which queried some 5,000 business professionals at various levels, was quite interesting.

As a whole, the group named poor audio and video quality to be their number one remote collaboration challenge, with 39 percent of respondents selecting that option. The group cited numerous other leading causes of remote collaboration problems, with technology-related issues popping up quite frequently. Among respondents, 35 percent said they had a hard time sharing content in a remote meeting, and 27 percent indicated that unreliable technology was a challenge for them when collaborating remotely.

Despite these challenges, respondents overwhelmingly said remote collaboration was valuable.  Among methods for collaboration, web conferencing and video conferencing were their top two preferred methods (27 percent and 25 percent, respectively). The least preferred method was instant messaging at 12 percent.

Here’s where it gets even more interesting. Unlike a few years ago, when executives and professionals often cited financial benefits as the primary reason for remote collaboration, according to the study they now cite benefits such as increased corporate efficiency and improved work-life balance.

In other words, many of these professionals believe that remote collaboration has become an important driver, not just of savings, but also of both business productivity and professional satisfaction. Executives, in particular, stressed these aspects. Among respondent CEOs, 88% stated that remote collaboration is key in helping their organizations meet objectives.

What does this tell us? That companies―and especially their executive leadership―are embracing the notion that workers and clients in distributed locations can have productive, collaborative engagements. “Remote” in the traditional sense of “far away and isolated” is no longer an accurate definition. The problem, it seems, is that professionals need a better way of achieving the collaborative environments they seek, no matter where they and their peers, clients, vendors and other partners might be.

At DynaSis, we’ve spent more than two decades helping our customers adopt the latest productivity tools, and we believe that mobility means more than being able to check email from the road. It means having the ability to achieve your work goals remotely, not only when you are working alone, but also when you want your entire team “with” you, even though they are really far away.

We’ve spent quite a bit of time researching the options for small and medium-sized businesses to achieve this goal, and we’d be happy to share our insights with you. For more information, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

DynaSis, Atlanta’s premier provider of IT services and support for small and medium businesses (SMBs), today announced it has transitioned Atlanta law firm John Foy and Associates to its end-to-end IT monitoring, proactive management and technical support services. With the service, the noted Atlanta law firm is receiving 24/7/365 network and system monitoring and proactive troubleshooting, plus round-the-clock IT support.

“We recognized the need for more robust IT than we had previously―more bench strength,” said John Foy and Associates Administrator Andy Wys. “The structure of DynaSis’ offering appealed to us, and once we agreed to go with them, the transition was very smooth and easy.”

With Digital Veins, expert technicians will continuously monitor and proactively troubleshoot John Foy and Associates’ network and systems at DynaSis’ network operations center (NOC), processing trouble tickets as they are submitted, as well. Should a problem arise that cannot be resolved within four hours, DynaSis will send support technicians onsite. (The majority of DynaSis’ support tickets are resolved within 15 minutes.)

“Like many small, successful businesses, John Foy and Associates’ technology was working fairly well for them before we came on board,” said DynaSis VP, Business Development Chas Arnold. “Management didn’t realize how easy and cost-effective it was to transition to a fully monitored, preventive & proactive IT platform that would boost productivity and reduce the incidence of future problems dramatically.”

To implement Digital Veins, DynaSis technicians installed a small, load-free software agent on each of John Foy and Associates’ machines. The agent connects to and communicates with the DynaSis NOC, enabling computer experts to Secure, monitor and troubleshoot the systems and receive alerts if any evidence of impending trouble occurs, or any performance measurements are out of range.

“In addition to fixing problems that arise, they have already helped us make some improvements, such as helping to free up space for our backups,” said Wys. “DynaSis provides us with peace and comfort.”

About John Foy and Associates
John Foy and Associates was founded in 1999 by Milwaukee native John M. Foy, a graduate of the University of Dayton and Ohio Northern University Claude W. Pettit College of Law. He was admitted to the practice of law in 1993 for the state of Georgia. Foy is admitted to the U.S. District Court Northern District of Georgia and the Supreme Court of Georgia, and is a member of the State Bar of Georgia, the American Association of Justice, the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association, The American Bar Association and the Atlanta Bar Association. The firm's 16 lawyers specialize in representing individuals who have been injured in accidents. They also help clients file claims for Worker's Compensation and Social Security. For more information, visit www.johnfoy.com.

About DynaSis
DynaSis is a managed IT service provider for small and medium-sized businesses in Atlanta, Georgia. DynaSis specializes in offering on-premise and on-demand managed IT service plans, managed hosting and professional equipment installation. For more information about DynaSis’ services visit www.dynasis.com.

By the DynaSis Team

The results of a survey, conducted this year at an IT support conference, indicates that corporate IT departments are stretched way too thin and at the same time constricted by lack of budget (36 percent), resources (24 percent) or team skills (20 percent). Furthermore, 44 percent of IT managers polled for the survey said lack of technological awareness at the executive management level has created a divide between the board room and the IT department, in terms of priorities.

If you are an IT professional reading this, you are probably nodding your head in agreement. If you are a small or medium-sized business (SMB) owner, you are probably thinking, “That doesn’t apply to my firm.”  This disconnect is precisely where the problem lies.

According to the survey, if given free reign over IT decision-making, 58 percent of IT professionals would prioritize long-term, back-end infrastructure investment. Another 24 percent would pursue virtualization, and 18 percent would add more storage. Yet, according to survey respondents, none of these long-term investments topped the priority list at the upper management level. The executive priority most often cited by survey respondents (20%) was upgrading productivity software―such as Microsoft Office.

We’re not discouraging anyone from upgrading their productivity software. In fact, DynaSis is behind Office 365 (Microsoft’s new subscription-based licensing model for Office) 100 percent. We even offer a solution package for this product that includes planning, migration and support.

We are suggesting that the ability of many companies to operate effectively and competitively is being hampered because overtaxed IT professionals are trying unsuccessfully to run shoe-string operations with stressed out, often insufficient or inadequately skilled IT teams. In some cases, they’re trying to do everything themselves.

Technology is simply too important―and too much of a productivity builder―for executive leaders not to listen to their IT managers and work towards giving them the budget and resources to do their jobs. This doesn’t mean that organizations have to hire and train more workers or make major directional shifts.

At DynaSis, we have long assisted companies in a “back-up” capacity―coordinating closely with IT managers and taking over important tasks, such as help desk support or hardware installation, that they do not have time to manage effectively. In doing so, we give them the “breathing room” they need to focus on planning, coordination and strategic initiatives.

Of course, at some point business owners also must increase their budgets and give their IT managers some measure of control over decision-making to achieve the best outcomes. Frequently, we find that once business leaders stop and really look at the bottom-line benefits that more technology can bring them, they find those increases aren’t as painful as they expected.

If you are a business owner (with or without an IT manager), we would be happy to sit down and talk with you about what your next step should be. If you are a frustrated IT manager, we can help pull together the metrics you need to persuade executive leadership to see things your way. We can also back you up, wherever and whenever you need help. For more information, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

In August 2014, a new study about small and medium business (SMB) adoption of VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol―also known as Internet calling) was released by Software Advice. The results were so compelling we thought we’d share them with you.

The study found that although SMBs still rely heavily on landlines (31%) and mobile phones (13%) as their sole business telecommunications medium, VoIP is now the frontrunner. Of the 350 SMB owners surveyed, 42% have already adopted VoIP for at least some of their phone communications and 57% indicated they were currently exploring VoIP solutions for the first time.

Perhaps more important for the future of VoIP in the business market were the reasons these business owners cited for exploring VoIP. Seventeen percent of respondents said they were experiencing reliability issues with their current phone systems and felt VoIP would be more reliable. Another 15% said their current solution had outgrown the business, and a VoIP system would be more scalable, and an equal percentage thought VoIP would be more affordable.

Coming in a close fourth was “increased functionality,” with 14% of business owners citing this reason for evaluating a VoIP platform. Finally, respondents overwhelmingly preferred a hosted (cloud-based) solution to an on-premise one, a move that is proven to increase reliability (assuming the business uses a quality provider).

We consider these results pretty amazing, given that only a few weeks earlier, Software Advice published another report that indicated 71% of consumers could not even define VoIP, and many had serious concerns about its reliability. In other words, the small business owners had a much better handle on VoIP and its benefits than did their consumer counterparts.

This is great news for both business owners and VoIP providers, because VoIP technology truly does deliver exactly the results that these business owners anticipate. VoIP provides companies with an amazing arsenal of special features, including automated attendant (the top feature SMB owners wanted), voice mail to email, Internet faxing, remote location services and more.

Furthermore, VoIP systems are more readily scalable than traditional landlines and more affordable than mobile-only platforms. Moreover, when a VoIP solution is hosted, business owners have the confidence of greater reliability―and a partner that is managing the service. If you have not looked at VoIP yet, or you are considering making the switch to a new provider, we’d love the opportunity to discuss the technology with you. DynaSis has partnered with some VoIP providers who are truly turning the industry on its ear. To learn more, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]
By the DynaSis Team

In our last article, we talked about some important technology assessments and their value to your business and IT success. In this article, we’ll talk about another type of IT assessment― establishing a workable goal for the level of “uptime” (technology continuity) you require.

Ultimate availability, in the technology world, is 99.999% uptime. At that level, companies should have barely five minutes of unplanned downtime (system outage), per year. In reality, obtaining such an uptime figure is prohibitively expensive for the average business. Even dropping a decimal―to 99.99% (approximately an hour of yearly downtime)―doesn’t reduce the cost substantially.

So, how can you decide where your business falls, on the scale of attaining maximum uptime and productivity? In our viewpoint, a more realistic goal for many businesses is 99.9% uptime or better. At that level, a company can anticipate fewer than nine hours of unplanned downtime each year.

Some companies decide they can live with even more downtime. At 99% downtime, businesses experience approximately 87 hours of downtime, per year. We don’t recommend any business set its bar so low, especially if it relies heavily upon technology. Nevertheless, every business owner has to decide what is appropriate for his or her firm. Some business owners find a happy medium by opting for higher availability for mission-critical systems like email, but accepting a higher level of risk and downtime for information they can go a day or two without.

Beyond deciding how much downtime you can live with, also consider how much business disruption you can tolerate. Given that the work day consumes only one-third of each 24-hour period and most firms are closed on weekends, most business owners might assume that with 99% uptime, they would experience far less than one-third of their 87 hours of downtime during the working day. In many cases, they would be wrong.

The reality is that systems tend to fail when they are under heavy load. In many cases, issues can arise at night or over the weekend, but only when workers start using their systems do those issues cause trouble. If an IT provider proactively monitors your network and systems 24/7, troubleshooting and resolving issues as they arise, there is a good chance most of your downtime will happen when the office is closed.

If your provider doesn’t guarantee after-hours monitoring and problem resolution, then system glitches and issues may result in office-hours disruption while you wait for a technician to arrive. Furthermore, your availability figures may be skewed unfairly in the provider’s favor, because the provider also may not be monitoring your availability after hours or on weekends. As a result, no downtime that occurs outside business hours will count in any performance penalties you negotiate.

Finally, many IT providers exclude “planned” downtime (such as system maintenance) from their uptime guarantee. Before you sign with a company that takes that approach, be sure they’ll perform your system maintenance after hours or on weekends, or your total downtime figure could soar.

In the final analysis, finding your “sweet spot” for system availability requires more than deciding what level of unplanned downtime you can live with. It also involves partnering with a provider (or hiring an in-house team) that supports your goal in the least disruptive manner possible.

If you’d like to learn more about how the IT industry approaches downtime, as well as other considerations for achieving IT continuity without unpleasant surprises, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.

[featured_image]

By the DynaSis Team

There’s an old adage that says, “You can’t know where you are going if you don’t know where you’ve been.” With technology, we think it’s more accurate to say, “You can’t decide where you want to go unless you know where you are, right now.” Many companies work with technology every day without any real idea where they are―how well their networks are working, whether their systems are functioning efficiently or even what IT assets they have in the building.

Not knowing this information makes it impossible to prioritize and manage technology initiatives cost effectively, and it also opens the door to downtime, security issues and other problems, big and small. A great way to address such a knowledge gap is with a variety of IT assessments. Following are a few that we recommend to our customers.

Network Assessments: This procedure incorporates network performance tests to benchmark how efficiently and securely your network is running. The test is (or should be) followed by reports that identify network issues and weak spots and provide recommendations for resolving urgent network security and performance issues. Network assessments should also include a “risk score” and recommendations for better server and device configuration and management. They should be secure and invisible to company personnel when they are running (little to no effect on network performance.)

Asset Inventories: This process gives you a clear picture of what devices are operating in your business― and what applications are running on them (which also helps you explore whether or not you are in compliance with licensing requirements). In many cases, your network assessment will include an inventory of network-connected devices such as routers, printers, PCs, servers, etc. as well as an inventory of installed applications, which is why we recommend it, first.  (DynaSis’ network assessment includes this inventory.) Depending upon how many devices you have that are not network connected (and what their condition is), a second, physical assessment might also be appropriate.

Strategic Assessment: With this process, you explore and adjust (or develop) your current IT approaches and plans to ensure they support your business objectives. Usually conducted with a “CIO” level resource (either in-house or third-party), a strategic assessment moves beyond operation conditions to such considerations as optimal replacement cycles, anticipated challenges, future business plans and other aspects of business operation that involve technology. The result should be a comprehensive IT strategy that will reduce unplanned equipment downtime and replacement, boost productivity and keep budgets in check.

Would you like to explore where your company currently is, in terms of its IT solutions? Do you need help developing a workable yet proactive vision for the future? DynaSis offers all these assessments (and more), and we’d be glad to help. To learn more, fill out our inquiry form or give us a call at (770) 569-4600.