Email Spoofing Costs Almost Nothing to Pull Off Email spoofing is the practice of sending an email that appears to come from a trusted source when it actually comes from somewhere else entirely. For small businesses, spoofed emails are one of the most common starting points for fraud, data theft, and unauthorized access to business…
The Problem With Running Without an IT Policy Most small businesses run without a written IT policy, and most of the time nothing obviously goes wrong because of it. The trouble is that the lack of clear rules creates a grey area that tends to cause problems at the worst possible moments. When an employee…
Why a Surge Protector Isn’t Enough Without a UPS Battery Backup A UPS battery backup is one of the most practical and most overlooked investments in IT reliability. Most small business owners have surge protectors plugged into the wall and assume that’s enough, and while a surge protector is better than nothing, it only handles…
There’s No Universal Answer on a Small Business Server Whether you need a small business server doesn’t have one correct answer. It depends on how your business operates, what software you run, how many people you have, and what you need around data storage, performance, and access. Cloud services have made it possible for plenty…
Most Small Business Networks Need Network Segmentation Network segmentation solves a hidden problem that shows up in most small business networks. The typical office runs everything on one flat network, which means every connected device can potentially talk to every other device. The guest Wi-Fi in the waiting room shares a network with the computer…
When Your IT Problems Keep Coming Back, It’s the Same Call Again If your IT problems keep coming back, you’re not imagining it. Maybe you’ve called your IT company about an issue, gotten it fixed, and then found yourself calling about the same thing a few months later. That pattern is real, and it’s one…
When Skipping IT Maintenance Feels Like Everything Going Right IT maintenance is easy to put off when everything seems fine. Equipment got set up at some point, it all appears to be working, and nobody’s complained lately, so the instinct is to leave it alone. If it’s not broken, why fix it? The challenge with…
When IT Says Restart Your Computer, There’s a Good Reason If you’ve ever called IT support and been told to restart your computer, you might have felt like the advice was a little too simple, or even a polite way of getting off the phone. Restarting is actually one of the most effective first steps…
What Least Privilege Actually Means in IT Least privilege is a simple idea with a big impact on security. In IT, the word privilege refers to the level of access a user account has to systems, files, and resources. A highly privileged account can do almost anything on a system, including installing software, changing settings,…
Reactive IT Makes Sense Until It Doesn’t Reactive IT has a certain practical appeal, since there’s real wisdom in not fixing what isn’t broken. Businesses have limited time and limited budgets, and it’s natural to prioritize the things that are visibly on fire over the things that seem fine. The problem is that technology tends…