What is Social Media?  Well, it is a lot more then simply posting articles.  It is about being an on-line expert and taking advantage of tools that allow you to simultaneously publish to multiple areas of the Internet.  Want to know more?  Read on…

Our favorite company that shares information about Social Media is directive.com founded by Chris.

He has recommended the following articles that explain, for free, exactly what you need to do to take advantage of Social Media on the Internet.  And when I say exactly what you need to do I am talking about step-by-step instructions.

Enough talk.  Check out this link for starters->  http://www.joomconnect.com/socialize/joomconnect-blog/the-ultimate-social-media-rig-for-msps.html

This provides step-by-step instructions on how tom implement social media.  It is what we are doing as well as a company and will be posting our findings and results on our business Facebook page.

More to come soon!

Ben

Ben's Sweet Home Robotic Archive Solution

Here is a real world example related to a business we are currently serving. They are a construction business and after 15 years have got over 5 Terabytes of data (which is 5,000 GB).  Two terabytes of that data is on an e-mail server which means that if that server has a problem we would need to rebuild the server and it would take a very long time, likely a couple of days, to get all of that data back off the backup devices to rebuild the server.  They are also running out of hard drive space on the e-mail server.  A final point is that probably 90% of that data is attachments to e-mails which, the moment they are sent, are not going to change.  Lastly, the cost to backup that amount of information is very expensive.

They have over 250 people using e-mail which means low cost solutions aren’t really low cost when you try and implement them for that many people.  They need more of an enterprise solution and we are recomending a product that will strip all the attachments off of the e-mails and put them on the local hard drive in such a way that the end user didn’t even know that they aren’t on the e-mail messages.  They still look like they are on there, it’s just that when you open them they happen to be opening from the local hard drive.  And the tool we are using to archive will also keep a copy of all this data on an archive drive that we will be taking off-site, that way if their laptop is stolen or their laptop hard drive goes bad we won’t loose any data.  The real benefit is that the e-mail backup should be about 10-20% of the original size, which makes backups and restores happen much quicker.  And now we will have plenty of room to grow.

Ben's Summer Home Archive Solution

Now onto a personal computer situation.  I’ll start with my personal/work desktop that has over 150 GB of pictures, most of which are not that good.   I do backups of my local computer using a great software program called Acronis but I back these up to a USB hard drive that is starting to fill up.  Not only that but my local computer hard drive is running out of space.  My recommendation?  Purchase two 1 TB USB hard drives from Best Buy at about $80 a piece.  Copy all of the pictures to both hard drives then remove them from the local hard drive.  Leave one drive attached and put the other, with the power adapter, at a friends house in a safe place.  This is “Simple Archiving” but is fast and easy and utilizes the same principals we use for larger clients, namely to keep the data local because you never know when you will need it but get a copy off-site so that if disaster strikes you will be OK and always have your data.

Thanks for reading and let me know if you have any comments, Ben

What is UTM?   Well, businesses used to have Antivirus on the computers and believe that they were protected.  Unified Threat Management is a broader phrase that really encompasses business continuity.  The idea is that you want your computers to work all of the time without issue AND you want control over who can go where on the Internet.  Here are the basic parts of UTM:

• Antivirus – This is a part of UTM that we are all familiar with if you have a Microsoft Windows computer.  You have to have Antivirus and if you want a recommendation consider AVG Internet Security.
• If you have Antivirus does that mean that your computer will not become infected?  Unfortunately, antivirus is the “first layer” of protection but we have found it is not capable of ensuring that your computers will be free of malware and adware, which are just as damaging as viruses.   We have special Unified Threat Management techniques at businesses where the firewall (which is the device between all the computers and the Internet) can provide additional Antivirus and Anti-Malware functionality.  But at home consider downloading and installing MalwareBytes to offer additional protection.

• If you have kids, are you OK with them surfing Porn and participating in Chat Rooms? 
  

  Do you know where your kids are surfing?

  This is a very important part of Unified Threat Management at businesses, if staff are surfing porn then they aren’t working, are they?  Many businesses are interested in implementing Content Filtering  tools that block inappropriate sites so that staff simply can’t spend half the day shopping on the Internet (which they will do, believe me, and we have ways of proving it!).  At home we recommend installing software like NetNanny that can “categorically” block Porn, Gambling, other adult sites and much more.   NetNanny also has a Mobile edition that can be used on certain types of cell phones allowing you to keep track of what your kids do on their cell phones.  Most kids don’t purposely go to porn, they are lured there from gaming sites which advertise porn heavily, unfortunately.

• Lastly, consider the Internet Browser that you are using.  It is amazing how the Microsoft Internet Explorer software is targeted by young boys ages 14-22 who want to write malicious software programs that take over your computer (did you know that almost all viruses and malware programs are written by young boys and the last time I checked NEVER by girls?).  So consider installing and using an alternative browser such as Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome to keep your computer running without getting infected.

These are a few tips on how to implement better UTM in your household!  Please let us know what other recommendations you have by posting a comment to this page.

Ben