Insights

What is the Right Antivirus for You?

“What antivirus should I get?” That’s a popular question among personal and professional users alike. With so many options out there, how do you figure out which antivirus is best? Will free antivirus be good enough? Should you shell out for a paid version of Norton or McAfee? In this article, we help you identify which antivirus is right for you.

4 Key Trends Influencing the Trajectory of Technology

As the COVID pandemic stretches on, businesses are shifting from short-term reactions to longer-term strategy. As much as people have talked about this being the “new normal,” the general attitude has actually NOT been to view this time period as permanent. Instead, people act as though it is temporary. While parts of our current environment will certainly change, the trajectory of technology is something that businesses should be considering today.

In some ways, this new trajectory is similar to the path we were on before the pandemic. Many people have made the observation that several trends have accelerated over the past several months, so these key trends should look familiar. What’s changed is the priority of each topic and the way they are now being combined to support operations. When considering budget and skills for the year to come, these are the areas that IT leaders should be focused on.

Artificial intelligence: the good, the bad, and the ugly.

With warnings coming fast and furious from tech visionaries as diverse as Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and the late Stephen Hawking, to name a few, most of us are conditioned to think of the possible dangers of artificial intelligence in the wrong hands. While armies of AI-powered human-like robots have not yet emerged, AI is being harnessed by bad actors in the creation of “smart malware” that infiltrates traditional defenses by using predictive technology.

But if that’s the case, can’t the opposite also be true? Can AI be used to turn against malware?

Experts emphatically say yes.

Artificial intelligence as a tool to stop the bad guys is a clear example of how the technology can be used in good ways, something that some experts think isn’t emphasized enough.

Is having a Microsoft 365 data backup strategy important?

SaaS productivity apps like Microsoft 365 (Formerly Office 365) just make sense in today’s mobile world— the benefits of easy access to documents from any device and improved collaboration are obvious. However, many organizations believe that moving to Microsoft 365 means backup is no longer necessary. According to a recent Enterprise Strategy Group report, one in four businesses don’t believe they need to back up Microsoft 365.

Some of the confusion might be due to the fact that Microsoft 365 offers some safeguards to prevent data loss. Others simply believe that because data is in the cloud, it is automatically backed up. Still others believe that Microsoft OneDrive file sync is a replacement for backup. These are all misconceptions. Backup is equally important for Microsoft 365 as it is foronsite deployments of Microsoft applications.

Why an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) is very important for your business

A power outage due to stormy weather, flooding, the electricity grid going down or even a minor short circuit in the office is but inevitable. When this happens, you can either watch in relief as your employees are able to safely operate your IT or panic about the data loss your business will have suffered.

Why Businesses Need Managed Data Protection

NUMENTIS provides Managed Data Protection Solutions for complete protection of every major operating system, virtual environment, application, and email service.

What is the difference between Cloud Storage and Cloud Backup?

With more employees working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a lot of small businesses are trying to figure out how to protect the files they’re working on outside the office. Some are stuck between “cloud storage” services and “cloud backup.”

Move to the Cloud for Online Backup Storage Solutions

Cloud – one small word that has changed how businesses do business. CEOs and business owners are astounded at how migrating their organization changes how they look at IT. It’s all gone – no more enormous onsite servers, power back up, kilometres of cables, and an army of staff to manage it all.

How you can prevent employees from sharing sensitive company information

Did you know that 70 percent of employees are sharing company information?

Company information is valuable, critical, and most importantly, confidential. The future growth and success of your company could very well be destroyed should this data get leaked.

So what’s the biggest threat for a data leak happening?

How can I protect my business from cyber attacks? 5 Ways To Improve Business Cyber-Resilience

One of those tactics is known as “defense in depth,” which is a layered approach to security involving multiple levels of defense designed to slow the attacker’s progress. Defense in depth is more than just a military strategy. It’s also a useful approach for protecting IT environments. It acknowledges that adversaries, through ever-evolving tactics and brute force, will eventually overrun the outer-most layer of defense. For this reason, it’s necessary to have additional layers of defense in place to anticipate and mitigate lost ground.

How to Calculate the Cost of a Cyberattack

There’s no doubt that ransomware and other cyberattacks can inflict great damage to a company. But how much? How much money and how much opportunity is gone for you and your customers by not maintaining a cybersecure environment?

One narrative, now well-established, notes that a cyber-attack can not only impact the productivity of an organisation but lead to the loss of a production line for a period of time and in doing so cause crippling revenue losses. Something as small as a general email ‘phishing’ attack, where employees are sent an email containing a malicious link, can have a devastating impact.

Cybercriminals can infect a manufacturer’s network with malware or ransomware, rendering its IT systems unusable, impacting its reputation and leaving it with a sizable bill.

Why Hackers Hack: Behind the Hoodie

Most social stereotypes are easily debunked, and hoodie-clad hackers are no exception. The average hacker comes in all shapes and sizes––often disguised as the boy or girl next door. Targets of cybercrime are equally diverse. Many hackers will seek out low-hanging fruit, and the biggest vulnerabilities are often the result of human error. Weak passwords, lax email security, and out-of-date technologies are all easy wins for hackers, and no business or industry is truly safe. In fact, hackers can specialize in breaching specific business types or industries, such as healthcare or finance, refining their expertise with each new attack.

Email Threats You Need to Know About

There has been a jump in cybercrime ever since COVID-19 forced millions of Canadian workers into remote work. Digital communication in the form of messaging platforms (Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat) and emails have replaced, to a large extent, the natural verbal communication people are accustomed to. So it’s no surprise cyberattackers have tried to manipulate these channels of communication.

5 Reasons You Should Upgrade To Windows 10 ASAP

In January 2019, Windows 10 became the most popular version of Microsoft Windows around the world. After nearly four years of being on the market, it overtook Windows 7 as the most widely used operating system.

In the business environment, IT consulting companies in Toronto discover that so many businesses rely on Windows 7 and Windows XP. Not all these machines are daily-use systems. No, custom application software, manufacturing control, and even server control systems have remained on old versions of Windows.

Work from Home is the New Norm – Build Your Network for It

Lockdowns are in effect around the world to prevent the spread of COVID-19. This means a new era of work from home. Small, mid-sized and large businesses are preparing their offices for work from home and the ‘virtual office’. That’s not to say working from home is just a matter of sending a few emails. A network must be able to handle VPNs, vast amounts of network traffic and offer low latency.

Building a network that has the bandwidth and security framework to handle such varied traffic requires expert IT support in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver.

Innovative IT Services in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver

NUMENTIS has architected and deployed to several clients a solution that allows organizations to deploy an always-on VPN network connected to the office. This provides several advantages from a performance and management perspective – as well as enabling IP telephony and other peripherals.

The solution consists of five or more routers and 1 head end device (a more capable router) deployed at the client’s head office. The end user/employee simply has to plug their laptop or desktop into the router for the same experience as they would have at the office.

Our lightweight and cost-effective solutions make us one of the few IT companies in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver that are great business partners for clients.

Essentials of a Telecommuting-Ready Network

There are three things that are indispensable for building a network that can support operations reliably: bandwidth, VPN, and security.

Bandwidth

It may be a good idea to invest in additional bandwidth if your organization runs resource-heavy applications over the network. File sharing applications and remote desktops can consume a lot of bandwidth; bandwidth that may have been adequate during normal working conditions can feel woefully insufficient when dozens of employees are trying to log into their workstations remotely.

An alternative to adding bandwidth is adopting Platform as a Service or Software as a Service. Employees still have access to the requisite capability but aren’t using any network resources to access them.

VPN

Does your organization have sufficient VPN licenses to allow all employees to work simultaneously? Raising the user limit is a first step to continuing operations safely. However, VPN usage increases server runtime; capacity may have to be increased to ensure VPN requests are handled promptly. Also check if the firewall can handle the additional VPN connections. Security hardware can have hardware limits on the maximum number of users, and additional firewall capacity may have to be added here too. Our IT services in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver offers efficient VPN solutions that work seamlessly with your network.

Security measures

VPNs provide a secure connection between remote devices and the company network. For an optimized setup, consider split tunnelling, which directs critical traffic through the VPN and non-essential web traffic through public internet. Two-factor authentication provides an additional layer of security. Companies should also review security policies about device usage and file storage.

IT Services in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver

Perhaps the most important thing that helps you keep running your operations smoothly is IT support in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver. Our rapid response team helps keep employees connected to the company network and troubleshoots problems remotely. Our helpdesk is recognized as one of the best of all IT companies in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver. Speak to a representative to find out about cost-effective work from home solutions.

How to Keep Your Computer Working Like New

Does it feel like your computer is not running as snappily as it used to? Don’t worry; over the course of a few years, computers become cluttered with leftover software and junk files that can hamper their performance. In this article, we look at a few simple fixes (many of which you can perform yourself right now) and make your computer feel fast again.