Patriot Tech Services Inc. Blog

Whether you are suspicious or not, today seems like a good day to talk out what can happen if some bad luck interferes with your business. Disasters can come in all shapes and sizes, from a freak storm destroying your place of business and every IT component you had inside, to an employee whose path was crossed by a black cat accidentally spilling their coffee on their keyboard as they access some key data.

A surprising number of security issues come from inside your organization. User error on the part of the employee can present major problems for your workflow, data security, and the integrity of your business. User error could be something as simple as an employee clicking on the wrong links when they receive a suspicious email in their inbox, or if they are accessing data that they simply have no business accessing in the first place. Sometimes businesses will even completely forget to remove employee credentials when they leave a project or the company creating a breachable hole in your network. Regardless of the reason, user error can be a detrimental occurrence, and one which must be prepared for.

It seems hard to believe that the smartphone has been around for over a decade. When Apple rolled out the first iPhone in 2007, it triggered a momentous shift in the way people access information. Over the past 10 years these devices have gone from somewhat of a novelty to a staple of modern computing. More data is transmitted and accessed by smartphone than by any other means, and Apple has been at the forefront of this computing shift from its inception.

Most small businesses don’t have the luxury of an in-house IT department. Even if they do have one, it’s likely a small department run by a handful of folks who have their hands full with either implementation projects or simply staying afloat. With opportunities to invest in the improvement of your infrastructure few and far between, a network audit can help you identify where your network suffers most, and what you can do about it.

Many computer users are afraid for their privacy--and judging by the discussions surrounding the FCC and Net Neutrality, they should be. Now that users are responsible for the privacy of their online activity, they are finding new ways to make sure that corporations aren’t taking advantage of their Internet activity--namely through the use of a Virtual Private Network, or VPN.