ATECH MSP Blog

Despite what some songs say, the best things in life aren’t always free. Take, for instance, your software. If you or one of your employees find and download a “free” version of some business-critical application instead of properly purchasing a license, you risk catching the eye of the BSA.

In case you haven’t heard, the credit bureau, Equifax, has suffered a data breach that may have exposed the records of 143 million Americans.

The modern business needs a reliable source of information technology support. Historically, this was provided through a method known as break/fix—if your business technology was to break, a technician would come in to fix it. While this approach works, there are many trade-offs to using it that a business shouldn’t have to accept. Now that there is the managed services model, businesses no longer do.

Have you found that your smartphone battery doesn’t last as long as it should? If you’re a business owner who uses your mobile device very frequently, you might notice a rather significant change in the quality of your device’s charge over time. How can you make sure that this decrease in power doesn’t create problems for your productivity?

When it comes to hacking and cybercrime, it can literally be a few seconds that will ruin your business. One single chink in your network’s armor is all it takes for your data to be compromised. Modern SMBs need to take every opportunity to ensure they’re using best practices to help keep their network safe and secure. Here’s a look at four network security bad habits that you and your team can fix today.

A corruption case in Pakistan has taken a new twist, thanks to an unexpected source: Calibri. The font is being examined as key evidence, as its presence in key documents has caused a few bumps in the case. This is because the font is used in documents that are dated a year before the font was released.

You may have noticed how social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter often share the location of any pictures you post, if they are set up to do so. Well, you’ve probably asked yourself if your device will share this information automatically, or if you have to enable this setting yourself.

We are never shy about insisting that certain standards are met when devising passwords, but many major companies are seemingly far less worried about password security than we are. A recent study conducted by the password manager developer Dashlane paints a troubling picture of the state of password security, providing anecdotal evidence in the form of some very well-known and trusted companies scoring at the low end of the password security spectrum.

We talk about network security a lot, and for good reason. The majority of today’s businesses rely heavily on their information systems and there is plenty of danger presented by Internet-based threats. However, some organizations spend so much time worrying about cyber threats that they forget that physical threats exist outside the technology plane. Your organization needs to take steps toward securing its on-site premise, as well as the digital space in which your business exists.

There’s a lot to be gained by utilizing a company letterhead on your correspondence and other printed materials, especially in terms of company recognition and professional impression. Utilizing Microsoft Word makes it easy to add this detail to your documents. For this week’s tip, we’ll show you how easy it is to create a letterhead in Word.

Cloud computing has helped many businesses over the past few years. The many benefits it provides have enabled a variety of businesses in many industries to improve their functionality. The retail sector is a prime example of one such industry. Here are a few benefits that the cloud has imparted to those in retail--benefits that your business could enjoy as well.

Of any solution that might help your business out of a jam, a data backup is possibly the most important. However, a backup is only as reliable as it is configured to be. To ensure your backup is optimized to your business’ needs, we’ve compiled a few questions to ask as you examine your backup solution.

A slow computer is many things, but most of all, it’s an annoying problem to have. When you have work that needs to get done, a slow computer can hold you back from reaching your maximum potential. Do you struggle with technology that’s running at less than maximum efficiency? We’ll discuss some of the ways that you can resolve the issue of a slow computer.

Your business is running as smooth as can be and your employees are performing their day-to-day duties in an admirable fashion. Everything is falling into place as you close in on a project deadline with extra time to spare. In a single moment, however, that all comes crashing down as your server experiences a fatal error, or your workstations start to run sluggishly. If your organization suffers from technology difficulties, how do you approach them?

A Dark Web marketplace known as AlphaBay has been brought down by an international law enforcement effort between the United States, Canada, and Thailand.

Since its launch in September 1998, Google has basically become the undisputed King of the Internet. Their search engine receives more than 3.5 BILLION searches every single day and has crawled 1.2 billion active websites. With so many websites indexed, finding the information you’re looking for can be a challenge. Luckily, Google has a few features and settings that you can use to customize and refine your search.

Your data is a critical part of your business, and as such, needs to be protected. One of the most effective means of doing so is to maintain reliable backups. However, not just any backup will do. In today’s blog, we’ll review what you need to keep in mind in order to successfully maintain a data backup.

As with all innovative technology, there is only a certain amount of time you’ll have until someone inevitably finds ways to exploit it. One such exploitation of a common technology that has flown under the radar and avoided widespread knowledge by users is VoIP fraud. VoIP fraud is no different than other cybercrime - the exploitation of a network or data to procure ill-gotten gains.

Your Internet connection is arguably one of the most important parts of your information systems, but you might find yourself limited by the hardware provided by your Internet service provider (ISP). This could come in the form of a modem-router combination provided by your ISP, which prompts the question of whether or not you really need to use what they provide.

If you suddenly were to find yourself in a data-loss situation, you would want to have some sort of backup in place to protect your critical data. However, not all backup solutions are the same, and some will do a better job than others at keeping your data safe while remaining convenient to the needs of a business. As an example, let’s compare tape backup to a cloud-based backup and data recovery solution.