Microsoft BPOS users are being notified to plan now for a transition to Microsoft Online Services in the next 30 days. If you are currently using BPOS, you should have received an email by now, if not, you should visit the Microsoft Online Services transition center web site for more information. As a Microsoft partner, Homeland Secure IT can help …
Seven must-have technologies for your small business
One conversation new or potential business owners may want to have with their IT professionals is about what technologies exist that can improve their life. Below you will find some that are must haves… Smartphones: Whether it is an Android, iPhone or even a Windows based phone, you cannot survive without one. These devices provide instant communication with your clients …
Cisco OnPlus service available now to small & medium businesses
Large businesses have full-time IT staff or fully outsourced IT support that provide monitoring of their infrastructure and keep them up to date and now small & medium (SMB) businesses can have the same level of support when it comes to devices on their network. Cisco OnPlus works by allowing Homeland Secure IT or your Cisco SMB service provider to place …
SSL encryption broken – Proof of concept demo later this week #ph33r
My first reaction to the news that read “Hackers break SSL encryption used by millions of sites – Beware of BEAST decrypting secret PayPal cookies” was, “What took ’em so long?” The article above gives all the details you can stand, and a quick search of Google for news articles will tell you everything else you want to know. The …
Cloud Computing Allows for Millions of People to be Down at Once #Office365 #CloudComputing
The Microsoft issue today that prevented millions and millions (over 300 million) of people from getting to their email for several hours serves as a reminder that “The Cloud” is not perfect yet. While most businesses who have a typical Microsoft Exchange Server might experience an outage that affects their users, when a cloud provider has a glitch, it affects a …
Is your premise security and video surveillance all that it can be?
Here’s a sad story… A local (Spartanburg, SC) music store was broken into over the weekend and 40,000 dollars in gear was taken. The theft doesn’t look like your typical smash and grab either, because the thieve/s appear to have known the layout and went to great lengths to avoid detection. They entered through a skylight, after cutting power to …
Don’t trust those external portable USB hard drives with your important data!
I’ve posted this before… External, portable, USB hard drives are convenient to store some data on, but dang it, don’t put everything on one and trust that it is forever and always going to be there for you. These devices use 2.5″ hard drives like you would find in a notebook computer, and while there is nothing wrong with those …
Your mailbox has NOT exceeded the storage limit as set by your administrator
One thing I am asked weekly is, “I just received an email alert telling me my mailbox exceeded the storage limit, why is that?”. Wellllllll, first of all, these messages, though they come in email and look all official, signed by “System Administrator” or something similar, are likely phishing attempts. If you hover over the URL listed to “re-validate” your …
Don’t forget – the 2011 South Carolina Sales Tax Holiday excludes items used in your business or trade…
It’s almost that time again! Starting tomorrow, August 5th at 12:01am until August 7th at midnight, South Carolina’s Sales Tax Holiday will be in effect. During this time, you can save 6% state sales tax on purchases in many categories, including the one we are most interested in, electronics. A few examples from the www.sctax.org website of exempt products: …
FCC – Measuring Broadband America Report Released #SamKnows #FCC #Broadband
I have been participating in the SamKnows / Test My ISP program that the FCC has undertaken in an effort to better understand what internet providers are offering, and what consumers are ultimately getting. The first report has been released and it sure doesn’t look good for DSL technology! If you have DSL based internet (AT&T U-Verse included), then you …