Sudbury Computer Repair Blog

Your email has been hacked. An E-mail worm is an infection that uses your system to send out mass mailings.  It will generally grab your address book and send an email to everyone you know. They expect that your colleagues will open mail if it comes from you.

The new generation of E-mail worms are getting trickier and using address spoofing to help hide the worm.  When a system gets infected, the worm sends out an infected E-mail to everyone in the address book.  The difference is that it uses a random address in the address book as the from address.  This makes it look like the infected mail came from someone totally different that may have a clean system.  This person generally gets blamed by everyone for sending out the infected E-mail when they actually had nothing to do with it thus making it more difficult to track down the actual infected system.

If you are accused of-, or think you may have an infected computer system, take these steps.

1. Run a virus scanner and a malware scanner to make sure that your system is actually clean.
2. Look at the headers of the E-mail to see where it actually originated from as this can help convince people that you are not the one who is infected.  Here is a good site to help you interpret E-mail headers.  http://www.mxtoolbox.com/emailheaders.aspx
3. Send a link to this article to your accuser so they can better understand how Worms and Spoofing work.

For more information or assistance, contact Sudbury Computer.

Too many businesses still have unsecure networks. Fortunately or unfortunately it is easy for a small or medium sized business to have a wireless network. Unfortunately, those same companies may have unsecure wireless networks. In fact, the default settings on your companies Wireless Router usually come with no security. As a result, your wireless network can leave your business open to hackers who can ruin your computer, compromise your system, and steal information.

Did  you know that there are sites like http://wigle.net/ that are dedicated to mapping wireless networks and finding out whether or not they are secure? You can type in a zip code and see a map of all wireless networks in the area.

Hackers use these sites to practice their skills and try to access computers on a wireless network to see what they can steal.  They also use this technique to attack business systems and put viruses and SPAM sending applications on company computers.

It is essential that your company take the necessary steps to secure your wireless network. Why is your wireless network more vulnerable? With a traditionally wired network, a hacker needs physical access to that network. With a wireless network your system works with a radio signal, and it is easy for hackers to access this signal from outside.

When data is being transferred via this radio signal, it can be easily accessed or corrupted. With a hard wired network, the data travels and stays within the wires. A wireless network is an easy and economical way to set up a business network, however, they are not secure. The threat of hackers, viruses and spyware will only grow over time, set up a secure wireless network to keep your computer, data and company safe.

For a secure wireless network, contact Sudbury Computer.

There are certain risks your company must deal with if you host your email network in your physical office on an exchange server. If your office building is physically damaged from fire, leaking pipes or other natural disaster, or if your onsite server is accessed by unauthorized personal your business could suffer serious ramifications. Additionally, your company must upgrade the software and hardware at  your own expense.

If you are worried about the safety and security of your commercial email account, you may want to consider hosting business email on a cloud platform.  When you use cloud-based hosted email many of the problems associated with an onsite server disappear. All of your company’s servers, licenses, and system updates are maintained by the hosting company.  As a result, your system will be far more secure.   

Your company E-mail will be synched across all devices (desktop, laptop, IPad, IPhone, Droid Phone, Blackberry).  This means sent items and subfolders will carry across all devices, and once an email is read or deleted on one device, it will be read or deleted on the others. This makes time and email management much easier, while making your employees more productive.   This synchronization also goes for all calendars and contacts.

Cloud computing allows you to host email and other digital services in another, central location that is accessed via the internet. This eliminates the need for onsite servers.  In fact, many companies now use cloud technology. It is usually cheaper, your company merely pays a monthly hosting fee, it is more scalable; and it is easier to upgrade to the latest technology.

With hosted email in the cloud you will have access to business class webmail synced across all devices.  Also, you will no longer have to worry about E-mail back-ups with a cloud-based system.  Sudbury Computer will perform this task automatically. Contact Sudbury Computer to discuss how hosted cloud mail can benefit your business.

Every business, at some time or another, will suffer from some form of computer hard drive failure.  The biggest threat to your business during a hard drive failure is data loss. There are many causes of data loss, including hard drive failure or malware, but each scenario is unique. If there is no data backup in place it is likely that not all data will be recoverable.

If you have previously backed-up your system or data, you can restore your data from that previously created backup. But, never assume your system backups are running.  System backups need to be monitored constantly. Data loss can put a company in a position where it is unable to conduct business because important data cannot be accessed.  
 
Do not overlook the importance of backups to your business. If system backups are being done regularly, either daily or hourly, your business is safe and protected. Data can be restored from the backup, with minimal loss or downtime. However, establishing a system back up plan for your data is not the end of your responsibilities as a business owner. Be sure you have an offsite copy of those backups – either carried offsite or streamed to online storage.

Sudbury Computer highly recommends that your business devise a system backup plan. You should also review this back up plan regularly.  Unfortunately, sooner or later all systems will face some type of failure which will require data to be restored from your system backup.  Depending on the type of business you own and how your data changes from day to day you need to determine how often to perform computer backups - weekly, daily, or several times per day.

Protect your business; ensure that you have safe and secure system backups that are not being stored on-site. Additionally, be sure those backups are being performed properly so your business will have them when you need them.

If your business has made backups of all the data stored on your computer hard drives, restoring that data in the event of a loss will go much more quickly. For more information, or to create a system backup plan, contact Sudbury Computer.