Microsoft is set to integrate Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) directly into its Outlook app for many of its Microsoft 365 business users. MFA is a crucial security tool that generates a second, one-time passcode each time you log into an account, thereby protecting against cybercriminals. Typically, this code is sent to an authenticator app on your smartphone, which you must set up and download in advance. Alternatively, security codes can be sent via SMS text message or phone call or by using a USB key.

Although MFA provides added protection, it can also slow down the login process by a few seconds. In response to this, Microsoft is developing a feature called Authenticator Lite, which will streamline MFA by integrating it directly into the Outlook app, eliminating the need for a separate authenticator app or login codes.

At present, it remains unclear whether this feature will be available on personal PCs or for other operating systems. However, businesses are strongly advised to implement MFA for their apps and online accounts as an added layer of protection against cyber threats.

For further guidance on implementing MFA or optimizing the use of Microsoft 365, feel free to contact our help desk for assistance.

 

Productivity tools are supposed to make you more, well… productive.

But if they’re not embedded properly within your business, tasks can actually end up taking longer than they should. That’s frustrating for employees and you. It wastes time, and it costs money – which is the opposite of being productive.

So how can this happen?

Often a lack of consistent training means everyone is using tools differently, or finding their own workarounds. Maybe the tools haven’t been properly integrated with other apps, creating additional work. Or perhaps employees simply don’t find some tools useful and give up on them.

Bringing new technology into your business can be a big step – so big that lots of owners try to avoid it completely. That might be because of understandable risk aversion, or because they simply don’t have enough information to choose the right solution from the thousands of available options. It doesn’t help that nearly all tools work differently and offer different advantages.

What most business owners need is expert help. It’s easy to say you plan to introduce new productivity tools to keep employees happy and to gain a competitive advantage, but in practice it’s a lot more involved.

One thing’s for sure. As AI solutions become more and more integrated into new solutions – and others in your industry start to benefit from the new tech landscape – businesses that don’t keep up, risk being left behind.

Working with professionals can not only help to identify the most suitable tools for your business…

But also to help get the most from them by ensuring all your people are fully trained.

That means you’ll not only be getting all the productivity benefits you hoped for from your investment, you’ll also have a more engaged, better skilled and more productive workforce.

This is something we help businesses with all the time. Get in touch if you’d like us to do the same for you.

 

If we talk about ‘bots’ you’d be forgiven for thinking of the amazing AI chatbots that have been all over the news lately.

But this isn’t a good news story. Bots are just automated programs, and bot malware is a worrying new security risk you need to defend your business against.

Malware bots are particularly dangerous because they steal whole user profiles – that’s a complete snapshot of your ID and settings. This potentially allows cyber crooks to bypass strong security measures like Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA).

Usually, if a criminal steals your username and password, they still can’t access your account because they don’t have access to your MFA authentication method. But with your whole profile available to them, using your cookies and device configurations, they can trick security systems and effectively switch off MFA.

Once profile information is stolen, it’s sold on the dark web for as little as £5.

And it’s not even super-sophisticated cyber criminals deploying this technique. Just about anyone can obtain your details and use them for phishing emails, scams, and other criminal activity.

Since 2018, 5 million people have had 26.6 million usernames and passwords stolen, giving access to accounts including Microsoft, Google, and Facebook.

All this means there are things you need to do – right now – to keep your profiles and your business protected from bot malware.

• Update your antivirus software and keep it on at all times.
• Use a password manager and Multi-Factor Authentication to keep your login credentials safer
• And encrypt all your files so that, if anyone does access your profile, there’s very little to steal.

These are the things we help our clients with every day. If we can help you, just get in touch.

 

Our phones are a goldmine of private information. Just think of all the financial details, personal messages, banking apps, photos and contact information that live behind that little glass screen.

And if your team use phones for work, they’ll often have access straight into company systems – email, contact lists, network access, file systems. So if they’re not kept as secure as any other device in your workplace, they can become a gaping hole in your cyber security.

Criminals know this, of course, which is why they target us through our phones just as much as they do through our networks and servers.

But cyber crime isn’t the only concern. Just losing your phone, or having it stolen, can put your data at huge risk.

So, whether you issue company smartphones, or your employees use their own, you should make sure everyone implements some simple security steps to protect your data and avoid disaster.

Start with making sure your people set up a PIN and a biometric login (like a fingerprint or face scan) to open the device.

Only install apps from trusted sources to make sure you’re using genuine software.

And enable Multi-Factor Authentication on all apps that store even a small amount of sensitive data.

Be careful about where you connect to Wi-Fi. If you work remotely or often connect to public networks, consider using a VPN – a Virtual Private Network – to add another layer of security. You never know who’s monitoring traffic on a public network.

Finally, ALWAYS make sure your phone is running the latest version of its operating software, and keep all apps up to date.

Smartphones have changed so much about the way we live – at home, and at work – but it’s too easy to take them for granted. And that could be a costly mistake.

If you need help to keep your smartphones safe, just get in touch.

 

The whole world is suddenly talking about Artificial Intelligence.

From Alexa in your kitchen, to Siri on your phone, AI is already all around us, but new names like ChatGPT, Dall-E, Jasper and more feel like they’ve blown up the internet.

These new concepts take things WAY further, helping us to write articles, search the web with natural conversation, generate images, create code, and introduce new ways to make our daily lives even easier.

But emerging technology nearly always launches in a blizzard of geek-speak before it settles into everyday life. Early PC users might remember the ‘DOS prompt’. And when did you ever have to ‘defrag’ your phone?

Experts believe that these new AI tools will become the building blocks of a whole new world of tech, redefining the way we interact with computers and machines.

So let’s help you decode some of the terms you’ll hear this year.

Chatbot Starting with the basics, a chatbot is an app that mimics human-to-human contact. Just type or speak normally, and the chatbot will respond the same way. ChatGPT is a chatbot. If you haven’t tried it out yet, give it a go.

Deep learning This is the technique that’s used to imitate the human brain, by learning from data. Current search tools and systems use pre-programmed algorithms to respond to requests. AI tools are trained on concepts and conversations in the real-world, and learn as they go to provide human-like responses.

Machine intelligence The umbrella term for machine learning, deep learning, and conventional algorithms. “Will machine intelligence surpass human ingenuity?”

Natural Language Understanding (NLU) helps machines understand the meaning of what we say, even if we make grammatical errors or speak with different regional accents.

Weak AI is the most common form of AI in use right now. Weak AI is non-sentient and typically focuses on a single or small range of activities – for instance writing, or repurposing video content. Strong AI, on the other hand has the goal of producing systems that are as intelligent and skilled as the human mind. Just not yet.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but trust us – you’re going to be hearing a lot more about AI in the months and years to come.

If you’d like more help to understand how AI might form part of your business, just get in touch.

 

Have you ever tried to buy tickets for a huge event and found that the seller’s website has collapsed under the weight of thousands of people all trying to do the same thing at the same time?

The ticket site falls over – usually temporarily – because the server is overloaded with traffic it doesn’t have the capacity for.

Criminal Distributed Denial of Service attacks – DDoS, for short – exploit the same principle.

When a DDoS attack targets a business, it floods it with internet traffic in an attempt to overwhelm the system and force it to fail.

This results in the business and its customers being unable to access services. That may trigger a temporary failure, or it could be more serious. Last year, the average DDoS attack lasted 50 minutes.

That may not sound like a long time, but it’s enough to create angry customers, or to bring business to a grinding halt. And downtime can be costly.

The really bad news is that DDoS attacks are not only lasting longer, but they’re becoming bigger, more sophisticated and more common.

Recently, the biggest ever reported DDoS attack was reportedly blocked. At its peak, it sent 71 million requests per SECOND to its target’s servers. Prior to that, the biggest reported incident stood at 46 million requests per second.

Worse still, more businesses are reporting being targeted by DDoS attacks where criminals are demanding huge ransoms to stop the attack.

What does this mean for you?

It’s important you check all your security measures are up-to-date and working as they should be. Are your firewalls up to the task, with DDoS monitoring and prevention tools set up? And is your team fully aware of the importance of staying vigilant?

We can help make sure your business stays protected. Just get in touch.

 

If you employ anyone aged between 16 and 19, you need to pay special attention to the cyber security training you’re giving your team.

A new study has revealed that a host of worrying online behaviour has become almost normalised among many young people. And much of this activity is illegal.

We’re not talking serious cyber crime such as ransomware attacks or stealing data.

But one in three 16 to 19-year-olds have admitted to digital piracy; and a quarter have tracked or trolled someone online.

Most of these behaviours may not directly affect your business. But some are so commonplace that too many young people view them as a part of everyday life.

That’s not something you want them bringing to work.

Casual software piracy or illegal downloads on devices used for work could open the door to a massive security breach.

The answer is simple: Hold cyber security training for all your employees on a regular basis.

This training should:

• Highlight the impact of bad online behaviour and potential for security breaches
• Help everyone understand how this kind of activity can harm people – and your business
• Make everyone aware of the scams and attacks that your business is vulnerable to, as well as the part they play in keeping everyone protected
• Make the consequences clear for anyone found to be engaging in this behaviour

If this is something you need some expert help with, it’s what we do. Get in touch.

 

How’s the January health kick going?

Lots of us take our health seriously – once a year, anyway – and it’s good to spend time thinking about whether you’ve been looking after yourself (and better still, doing something about it).

Your doctor would probably like to see you once a year for a health check, just to pick up any small problems and stop them getting worse.

It’s exactly the same principle with your technology.

So why not book in for an IT check-up, to make sure everything’s in great shape for the journey ahead?

You do this for yourself, you do it for your car, and it’s a good plan to think the same way about your workplace tech. Because it might have to work pretty hard in the year to come.

Getting everything checked out now will pay dividends later.

We’ll help to pick up any minor-but-urgent fixes that could help prevent a disastrous breakdown in a few months’ time. Sometimes a simple software update will speed things up dramatically – which means less time watching the egg timer!

If there are bigger, but non-urgent jobs that you can safely leave for another day, we’ll tell you that too.

And if you’re all good to go, you can carry on with confidence.

It may even be a great time to think about new technology and prioritise your IT projects. Do you know what you need to prepare for if you want your system to develop as your business grows? That could be something as simple as switching to cloud storage, or it could be a larger project, such as digital transformation.

Our experts carry out top-to-toe IT health checks for all kinds of businesses, and we’ll give you honest, jargon-free advice on the best solutions for a trouble-free tech set-up.

To book your check-up, get in touch.

Published with permission from Your Tech Updates.

It seems that Gen Z and even some Millennial employees are less tech savvy than many employers might expect. It’s an assumption that’s leading to a sense of ‘tech shame’.

Younger workers may have grown up using Snapchat, TikTok and Minecraft, but they’re not always equipped with the skills they need to adapt to the workplace.

A recent study has found that one in five employees aged 18 to 29 feel judged when they encounter technical issues at work. That’s compared to just one in 25 employees aged 40 or over.

The solution may lie in providing better training, not just for younger colleagues and first-jobbers, but for the whole team. Some Gen Z workers may have started their careers during the pandemic. That means they will never have experienced anything other than a digital working environment. Especially if they work remotely or in a hybrid role.

As well as fixing any skill gaps there may be, whole-team training can provide a much-needed confidence boost for young employees.

Another consideration is the provision of tools and devices your team has access to – especially if they’re working remotely.

Younger workers with less available income to spend on home office equipment may be less likely to speak up if they’re struggling.

Simply checking in with employees – particularly if they’re not in the office – can make a big difference to their engagement, productivity, and confidence. If there are any issues, big or small, find a way to put them right, and you’ll notice a positive shift in the whole business.

If you’d like any advice about tech shame or help with training, boosting efficiency or sourcing equipment, we’re here when you need us. Just get in touch.

Published with permission from Your Tech Updates.