Endpoint SecurityCybersecurity is the management of the security protocols of your organization?s computing endpoints. Since the endpoints are the ones that touch the Internet, keeping these machines clear from threats is extremely important. That is why when you talk about cybersecurity, you have to talk about the ability to sufficiently train your staff with the knowledge they can use to ensure they aren?t the ones giving hackers and other malcontents an avenue to infect your business? network and central infrastructure with malware, spyware, or any other software that isn?t supposed to be there. The first thing you?ll have to understand in order to successfully secure your business? computing environments are that upwards of 94 percent of cyberattacks that affect business computing environments are made possible by the people that work for the company–trained or not–that do the wrong thing. It is astonishing that nearly all cyberattacks that have short and long-term effects on an organization’s ability to conduct business are completely avoidable. With this knowledge in hand, it?s up to an organization and their IT administrator to put together a strategy to take their organization?s security seriously. Strategy #1: Network-Attached SoftwareFor the company looking to secure their network, the first place they should start is to put together the resources that are needed to insulate their data, network, and infrastructure from the harmful elements found on the Internet. Software solutions like monitoring, a firewall, a spam filter, an antivirus, antispyware, an access control system, an intrusion detection system, virtual private networks, and a content filter all present value for keeping your IT secure. Strategy #2: TrainingThis goes without saying, but if your people are sufficiently trained to be skeptical about where digital correspondence originates, your business? chances of keeping unwanted code and users off of your network gets expeditiously better. How do you go about this? It?s pretty simple. First you should start with their email training. This is where most of the problems originate, after all. Here is the strategy you should use: Promote awareness of phishing, social engineering, and cybersecurity. Continually test your staff to determine which users are susceptible to phishing. Re-train deficient employees and frequently test all staff. These actions may seem like common sense, but you would be surprised how many organizations will ignore that their employees are the number one reason why they may deal with a major data loss disaster resulting from malware or a network breach. Strategy #3: Don?t Forget About MobileMobility is more important for businesses today that ever before. As a result, more data is being shared between people using mobile devices. Every phone, every smartwatch, every tablet, is a potential endpoint, and needs to fit under the organization?s network security umbrella in order to be effective at securing these endpoints, and thus your central infrastructure, from threats. Strategy #4: Testing and LogsOnce you?ve got all the software, solutions, and other strategies in place it is important to test all of your network security platforms. This means testing your network devices, your servers, your DNS, and all other platforms for potential or active vulnerabilities and threats. The first set of tests should be aimed at your internet-facing systems. These include firewalls, web servers, routers, switches, and mobile platforms. If these come back clean (they likely won?t), you want to make […]

Before we begin, you should always work with your IT resource to make sure that any tips we suggest will work for you. Eliminating Bloatware While you?re going about your business, you might notice that you?ve picked up a couple pieces of software that weren?t there before. Or, perhaps you?ve noticed some on your computer that have been there for a long time, but you?re not sure how long. In this case, it?s possible that you have acquired ?bloatware? or ?adware.? While these programs aren?t necessarily harmful, they can eat up system resources and create slowdown. IT should be able to identify these programs and wipe them from your infrastructure, considerably boosting computing speeds. Adjust the Power Settings Windows 10 comes with a built-in power saving setting, but it?s not necessarily the answer you?re looking for. This setting cuts your device?s processes to a minimum to conserve energy, which makes more resource-intensive tasks more difficult. Since most desktops are plugged into the wall anyway, the chance to use the power saving function isn?t really there. To improve the way Windows 10 works on your laptop, just stick to the ?Balanced? power option when unplugged, then switch to ?High? when power is available. Kill Windows Tips and Tricks We know it?s a little odd to recommend disabling Windows Tips and Tricks, but there are several good reasons to do so. The most important one is that Windows is referencing your usage for these capabilities, meaning that your device?s performance could suffer. You can disable this by clicking the Start button > Settings > System > Notifications & actions. Under this, you want to select Get tips, tricks, and suggestions as you use Windows. You want to deactivate this option. Restart Your Device You should always restart your device before assuming that anything is ever wrong with it. When you restart your device, you are wiping unneeded memory usage and stopping unnecessary background processes. Restarting your device gives you the chance to start the day with a blank slate. For more great tips and tricks, be sure to subscribe to our blog.

Optimizing EHR As noted above, electronic health record technology has been made a priority for healthcare providers for the better part of a decade. By optimizing their EHR system, practices can solve many of the operational shortcomings they are typically falling for. They are able to improve workflows, provide an improved quality of care, improve intelligence of the practice, see more patients, stay compliant with state and federal mandates, and see a substantial increase in their ability to get reimbursed. VR and AR Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are gaining more commercial traction by the day. In the medical industry, the innovations of these technologies hold an extremely important place in what will be the healthcare practice of the future. By being able to successfully simulate (or more accurately emulate) care delivery, they are important platforms for training and understanding the complex systems that make up the human body. By building software that provides visual representation of intricate systems health providers will be able to train staff by emulating a procedure before they undertake it. AI Growth Most industries are trying to find ways to use artificial intelligence more effectively, and healthcare is no different. There are several manners in which doctors, administrators, and medical staff are leveraging the burgeoning technology. From systems that can help healthcare providers communicate with patients with severe neurological diseases or trauma, to monitoring growing antibiotic resistance in patients, to using data analysis to monitor and predict when a person is going to have medical problems, AI is on the cusp of many major breakthroughs in the medical sector. Expansion of Virtual Care Virtual care is the act of providing one-on-one health consultation over the Internet. This practice is expanding quickly. In fact, 96 percent of health systems, or almost the entire market, plans to expand their virtual care systems in 2019. Virtual care, also known as telehealth, is the delivery of health-related services and information over the Internet or other communications platform; and, it has shown to dramatically improve patient health and understanding of the health services they undertake. Virtual care expands a patient?s care from the doctor?s office to the home, offering many different manners in which to communicate, solutions to remotely monitor health, a cost reduction in care provision, and more. By providing outreach and virtual care services, a healthcare provider utilizes the strongest technology available to deliver healthcare services to people all over the world. The healthcare industry is utilizing IT more than ever to connect with their patients, vendors, and other industry professionals. If you would like more information about IT for healthcare, or how your practice could upgrade its use of information technology, reach out to our IT professionals today at (603) 889-0800.

Before we begin we should mention that many smartphone manufacturers are now creating devices that are at least water resistant. These devices are given an IP score. IP stands for International Protection as drawn up by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), which is a classification given to a device that rates the type of protection a consumer should expect. If your device is classified as IP67, it is resistant to dust and can be submerged in water no more than one meter deep for up to a half an hour. The only difference between IP67 and IP68, is that devices that are classified as IP68, guarantees protection in water up to one and a half meters deep for a half hour. Regardless of how your smartphone is classified, it is probably not a great idea to expose it to water for very long. If it does happen, following these steps will give you the best chance of saving the device. 1. Turn off your device. If it is off, do not turn it on. In fact, there are a bunch of things you will not want to do. Don?t plug it in. Don?t shake it. Don?t blow in it. Don?t try and use a blow dryer to save it. In fact, if this happens to you, don?t do anything to the device except the outlined suggestions in this list. 2. Remove your SIM and any expandable storage you have inside your device. 3. If your phone has a battery that can be removed, remove the battery If you don?t have a phone where you can easily access the battery, don?t just pry it open. Either take it to a professional to do so, or check out the many YouTube tutorials available to properly take your phone apart and remove the battery. 4. Use an absorbent rag to dab your phone dry. Do not wipe it around as it could spread the liquid to more, harder to reach parts of your phone. 5. Bury the phone in a ziplock bag filled with uncooked rice. The rice will absorb the liquid. 6. Let your phone dry for a day or two before trying to turn it on. 7. After that time, try turning it on. If it doesn?t turn on, try charging it. If it doesn?t charge, your battery was probably damaged. At this point you?ll want to take it to a professional if you haven?t done so already. 8. If it seems to work properly, makes sure it does. If all seems well, you?ll want to test the display for responsiveness, test your speakers and your microphone to makes sure they work properly. If you follow these eight tips, you may just have a chance to save your (likely expensive) smartphone from the eWaste pile at your local landfill. If you like this tip, return to our blog weekly for more tips and tricks to help you get the most out of your technology.

The Criteria When evaluating your messaging solution, ask yourself: Are my messages encrypted (and how encrypted are they)? How transparent is the application to scrutiny? How are messages deleted? How much metadata is kept? We?ll review why these questions are the important ones to ask. Are my messages encrypted (and how encrypted are they)? Encryption is a method of scrambling data so that it is incredibly difficult to interpret, accomplished through an algorithm known as an encryption key. Without going into too much detail, this makes any data that has been encrypted extremely secure. Most major messaging applications use encryption today, but not all of them follow the most secure practices. For instance, applications like Google Hangouts and Skype encrypt the messages that their users send? but also retain a copy of the encryption keys. This is so they can access the messages sent and collect data to power advertising. This also means that your data is left vulnerable if a cybercriminal makes their way into the application?s servers, or if the government waves a search warrant at them. More common, fortunately, are apps that utilize end-to-end encryption, where the application only holds the keys that encrypt the data, accessible by the users. The users, on the other hand, hold the keys that decrypt the data again. As a result, not even the company hosting the messaging application can access the contents of their users? messages, nevermind cybercriminals or law enforcement. WhatsApp and Signal are two apps that now leverage this approach. In fairness, Skype does offer this capability as well in its Private Conversation feature, but it isn?t enabled by default. How transparent is the application to scrutiny? Taking the developer at their word is one thing? it?s quite another for independent and impartial experts to be able to confirm the claims that are made about an application?s security. For this reason, applications based on open-source code are generally more trustworthy, as they are scrutinized by experts who discover and report any vulnerabilities. A few applications provide their source code openly, including Signal, Telegram, and Wickr, while WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger don?t quite qualify but are based on the open-source Signal protocol. If an application is closed-source, like iMessage is, a user is entrusting the developer completely to maintain the security of the messages sent. How are messages deleted? While sending a message securely is key, the security of the message once it reaches its destination should not be overlooked. After all, if someone without authorization gains access to the device later, encryption isn?t going to do squat to protect your data. However, if you are able to delete the message after it is delivered, security is suddenly much more likely. Skype, Telegram, and Signal all allow a user to do so. In fairness, so does WhatsApp, but it needs to be deleted within 13 hours. Some apps feature self-deleting messages, described under various names, that destroy themselves after so much time has elapsed. Signal has ?disappearing messages? with a customizable time. As we have established previously, not all apps offer the same functions, and this does nothing to delete any screenshots of your message that the recipient may have taken. How much metadata is kept? In addition to the contents of your messages, you want to know that […]