MJ's Business IT Blog

My Tablet Test

I avoided a tablet for a long time, primarily because I have longed used a Lenovo Tablet PC, namely the X201 Tablet.  This is a traditional notebook PC with a convertible screen that is easily rotated and laid flat on the keyboard to convert into a tablet, albeit a thicker and heavier tablet than todays version of a tablet, namely the iPad and Android tablet.  What I like about this PC is it's very versatile.  I'm able to use it as a traditional notebook PC and easily convert it to a tablet to take notes in meetings without feeling like I'm being rude banging away on the keyboard.  Instead, I write on it like a paper notebook, which doubles as a safety mechanism for me as I lose paper easily and this way, everything is on my PC.  It's also touchscreen, so I've been used to scrolling a screen and pinching to zoom long before the iPad make it mainstream.

So, my dilemma was, do I need an iPad?  I carry an Android smartphone, so I was somewhat hesitant to jump on the iPad bandwagon for two reasons; 1) My Tablet PC has served me well and the tablet seemed like just one more gadget to carry around and my bag is already pretty stuffed.  2) I didn't want to have to repurchase several apps I already had on my Android phone on the iPad, so I held off.  As it relates to my comments above, one of my critical apps is Evernote, which lets me keep all my notes synchronized between all my devices, PC, smartphone, tablet, etc.  It's a wonderful little app that is well worth the price of admission, free for most users and $45 per year for the Premium version, which is an incredible value that's well worth it.  I used to use OneNote until my notebooks started getting so large that I experienced some nasty corruption.  I have not had that issue with Evernote and my notes are available whereever and whenever I need them.

Back to my test...  In late August, I decided to take the plunge and I purchased a Lenovo Android tablet.  While the iPad is the clear market leader, I am a big Lenovo fan and wanted to support their entry into the market, for several reasons.  Lenovo is very customer focussed and I love their support and their price points.  They offer excellent values across their product line.  Also, the ThinkPad Android Tablet was the first tablet marketed as a true business class tablet, not a consumer device to be used at work too.  Features like built in encryption, tracking, cloud and other features made it attractive.  It also had several intriguing accessories, most notably the keyboard folio case, which I also ordered.  The iPad has a wealth of keyboard options available too, but what I liked about Lenovo's approach was that the tablet docks into the keyboard in a nice leather case that makes it attractive, highly portable and very functional.  ThinkPad notebooks have long been known for their excellent keyboards and my hope was that this keyboard case would carry on that tradition and I was not dissapointed.  The keyboard is extremely comfortable and has some nice hotkeys to jump to common functions.  It also has a very unique optical trackpoint.  It looks like the famous red "eraser head" found on ThinkPad notebooks, but it's optical and operates more like the optical key on a Blackberry.  When the tablet is inserted into the keyboard case, you get a mouse and keyboard that make the tablet mirror a notebook PC.  When used with Citrix, Terminal Server or other cloud application sets, you are truly able to work on the tablet with nearly no restriction.

Over the past two weeks, I had an opportunity to test my tablet to see if I could really use it as a complete tool.  Prior to this opportunity, I have really only used it to take meeting notes with clients and prospects.  I have been carrying the tablet instead of my tablet PC, because it's lighter, turns on instantly and has much better battery life, lasting an entire day on a single charge.  I should also make it a point to mention that another feature that attracted me to this tablet over the iPad was the integrated stylus.  The stylus docks right into the tablet, just like on my tablet PC, which is great, because it's always available.  The tablet comes with a great writing application called Notes Mobile that let's you take notes and either instantly convert them to text, convert them later or keep them as handwriting and save them to an image file or PDF, etc.  This is my primary application for my tablet, using it as my digital notepad to keep meeting notes.  I also use it to check e-mail and surf the web when at home, because it's easy to grab for a quick check here and there and doesn't require me to be at my home office desk.  I also have the Kindle app so I can read my books on it when I want.  I'm really on the fence about this part.  I love the Kindle as it's soft on my eyes and so easy to read on.  I find the color screen a bit more difficult to read on than the Kindle itself, but I'm bouncing back and forth, trying to get a feel for what's best.  Ideally, I'd like to reduce, not increase, the number of devices I use!

For my test, I had two quick trips over the past two weeks to use as my true testbed for the usefulness of a tablet.  My first trip was a Tuesday to Thursday trip to Miami for a CompTIA Board Meeting.  On this trip, I was still a little hesitant, so I took both my tablet PC and my Android tablet.  In my hotel room, I used my PC but at the Board meeting, I brought along my Android tablet and took my notes in Evernote using the keyboard case and it worked well.  During meeting breaks, I was easily able to jump over to give e-mail a quick check and more.  This week, I spent a day at High Point University, in High Point, North Carolina.  I'll blog about that trip over the next few days.  On this trip, I only took the Android tablet and it was a great success.  I brought my standard folio case and my keyboard folio case.  While traveling I mostly just used it as a tablet, to check e-mail, read, etc.  At my meeting, I docked the tablet into keyboard folio and used it as a near PC.  I was able to take all the notes I wanted, check e-mail during breaks, check web sites when they were referenced, etc.  The Android operating system does a nice job of letting you mutitask on the tablet, easily switching between running applications, like you would do with the alt-tab key combination on a PC.  I was totally productive and able to remotely connect to my terminal server to run some specific applications I needed to check in on in the evening.  On the way home, I was able to work on the plane while listening to music and make the most of my time.  I flew Delta because I knew that all by one leg of my trip would have inflight WiFi, so I didn't lose my travel time and was working almost the entire time, which was great as it allowed me to travel during the work day, instead of my usual practice to fly very early in the morning or in the evening hours.

If you've been struggling with whether or not a tablet would be a good tool for you, I hope my test will help you with your decision.  I have to say I was pleasantly suprised with how productive I was able to be.  I definitely enjoyed carrying a lighter bag than my standard notebook bag, which is heavy with all my accessories in it. I often call it my office in a bag and this was a refreshing change.  It was also nice to slide through TSA security much more simply, without having to pull out the PC, etc.  All in all, a positive test result.

Urgent iPad 2 Alert

iPad 2 Security Vulnerability

If you do not have iPad's in use at your business, you may ignore this message.

A critical vulnerability has been discovered with the iPad 2 Smart Cover.  This ia a semi-magnetic cover that automatically turns the iPad 2 on and off, and/or locks the iPad 2, when the cover is opened and closed.  A simple refrigerator magnet, or similar magnet, may be used to get past the iPad 2 security lock.

If your business has any iPad 2 users that may have business data or company e-mail connectivity on their iPad 2, you are urged to advise them of this issue and have them disable their Smart Cover until Apple is able to resolve this vulnerability.

The turn off this feature of the Smart Cover, perform the following steps on the iPad 2:

1) Go to your home screen.

2) Go to Settings.

3) Go to General.

4) Find the iPad Cover Lock/Unlock setting and set it to OFF.

Again, if you have users of the iPad 2, your urgent attention to this is necessary to ensure the security of your IT systems.  If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call our office at (603) 431-7864.

Your Jenaly Team

Blackberry Service Issues

Blackberry Service Issues

This alert is only for those of our clients who have users with Blackberry devices.  If you do not have any Blackberry devices in use, you may ignore this alert.

Over the past several days, we have been monitoring Blackberry service issues that have mainly been isolated to Europe and the Middle East.  Today, we can confirm that users of Blackberry devices in North America are now also impacted.  Specifically, e-mail delivery to and from Blackberry devices may fail, be dramatically delayed or come and go in random batches.  Please understand that these issues are related to the Blackberry service network maintained by Research In Motion.  Your internal e-mail systems are not effected and are running fine.  Once RIM resolves these issues, normal mail flow will return to your Blackberry devices.  Until that time, you should not rely on your Blackberry devices for reliable and timely e-mail communication.

If you have any questions or concerns about this, please do not hesitate to contact our office at (603) 431-7864.

As always, thank you for being our client.

Your Jenaly Team

Weathering Irene

Yes, the pun IS intended :)

This weekend, Hurricane Irene roared up the East Coast of the United States and severa lessons were learned, as it relates to secuing your IT infrastructure and data.  I want to share the following two e-mail messages that Jenaly sent to all our valued clients, both before the storm and after.  I hope you will be able to find some value within these messages that may help you survive any future event like this...

The following message was our preparatory e-mail, which we sent out on Thursday:

  
 
Preparing for Hurricane Irene

Dear Tim:

It appears likely that Hurricane Irene may make a direct hit on New England over the upcoming weekend.  The latest reports suggest the wee hours of Monday morning and into the day.  We want you to know that Jenaly is actively monitoring the forecasts and taking several steps to assist our clients in the event of any impact.

Please review the following list of 8 recommendations and share it with the appropriate members of your team.  We obviously hope that none of us will suffer any impact, personally or professionally, from this storm.  One of my favorite sayings is "Better to have a plan and not need it than need a plan and not have it", so hopefully the simple step of reading this e-mail and taking these recommendations seriously, will help you weather the storm (yes, the pun is intended) without issue.

1. Prepare For a Power Outage:

It is highly likely that you will lose power during this storm.  As a result, we are strongly recommending that all non-essential equipment be powered down.  All personal computers, printers, copiers, phone systems, scanners, etc. should be powered off and unplugged from the wall outlets for the weekend.  All your servers are protected by battery backup power (UPS), however, it is highly likely that you may endure a power outage that will outlast the ability of your battery backups to keep your systems up and running.  This will result in the UPS properly shutting down your servers when battery power runs low.  If you are in an area that is known for power outages or spiking during storms like this, we also recommend you consider shutting down your servers as well, to ensure maximum safety.  Obviously if you power down your servers, you may lose the ability to send and receive e-mail during this time, so you want to evaluate what the impact of not having e-mail during this time may be.  For those of our clients that subscribe to our RADAR-Lite 30 Day E-mail Archive or our RADAR Unlimited E-mail Archive, you will always have the ability to send and receive throughout the storm using the Cloud hosted RADAR servers at https://jenaly-radar.reflexion.net.  All your users will need is their VSA E-mail Security username and password.  Anyone who does not know this information may request it be re-sent to them.  All Jenaly clients will have e-mail protection throughout the storm as all mail will be held for delivery to any server that may drop offline during the storm, either planned or unplanned.  You may rest assured you will not lose any e-mail.

2. Remove Backups Off-Site:

If you are not presently using an automated off-site backup, to ensure that your backups are safely outside of your office, you will want to be certain that you have a complete copy of your most recent backup taken off-site Friday evening.

3. Find Out What Your Building Management Office Plans Are:

The loss of power is expected when a hurricane hits. Some building management groups have turned off power on the complete building before the storm hits. If these are their plans, please shut down your equipment in order to avoid abrupt shutdowns. This includes computers, servers, phone systems, fax machines, copiers, UPS's, etc.

4. Remove Equipment from Floor & Move All Equipment Away from Windows:

If your office has a risk of flooding, this can obviously create significant issues with the computer equipment. Please make sure that all equipment is at least 12" off the ground. Make sure to move all equipment at least 6 feet away from windows.

5. Document ALL Emergency & Support Numbers:

It is important to document all emergency and technical support numbers and take them with you off-site. As an example, your Internet Service Provider and telephone line provider. If you do not have access to your office, you will need to contact these providers quickly to make other arrangements.  Please make sure you have this documentation on paper since computers may not be accessible.  Emergency contact details for Jenaly are included at the bottom of this e-mail.

6. Take Pictures of Your Offices and Equipment:

Digital pictures can be stored on multiple pieces of equipment and backed up on your server as well. These pictures will be very handy if your office were to be effected by the hurricane.

7. Make Arrangements to Use Other Vehicles of Communication:

If your server and/or ISP are not up and running, you should be able to communicate through a different vehicle. Please remember that cell phone service should remain up, but may be interrupted.  Texting or free e-mail services like Gmail may provide a short term way to communicate should your office lose power for an extended period of time.  Again, Jenaly clients using our RADAR services will have these capabilities throughout the storm.

8. Business Continuity Plan (BCP):

While today is not the time, you should periodically dust off your Business Continuity Plan (BCP) plan and see how well it still applies. If possible, go through a test and make sure all of the required personnel and systems are still available and aware of their roles. Your BCP should include how to contact fellow employees and clients in case the office is unavailable, where to meet and what you will need to function as a company. Distribute cellular numbers as well as home numbers to key team members. Assign an out of area contact to be available to receive information from your employees in case of emergency. If you don’t have a BCP, you should.  Once we get through this Hurricane, please feel free to contact me to discuss getting a BCP in place for your company so you will always have that plan that we all hope you will never need.

To access our emergency support during the storm, please call the main office number at 603-431-7864 and select extension 301.  A live operator will ask you for some specifics related to your emergency and then page our team who will call you right back.  Should our office phone system be impacted, our lines will auto forward directly to our answering service (which is located outside of New England for redundancy).

All of us at Jenaly hope you will weather this storm without issue and that your family, friends and co-workers will all remain safe and sound.  If you have any questions or concerns about preparing for this weekend, please feel free to call our office at (603) 431-7864 and talk with a member of our team.  We will be here throughout, with all hands monitoring the storm and any potential impact on you, our valued clients.

Stay Safe,

MJ

We next followed-up with this e-mail, this morning:

 
Dear Tim:

I wanted to take a brief moment to e-mail you this morning and let you know how thankful we are that your office has come through Irene without issue. We appreciate you taking our advice last week and performing the recommended steps to keep your IT infrastructure safe through the storm.

Your Jenaly team has completed our initial, post Irene, triage and we are thrilled to see all but two clients online and functional. Those two clients are currently experiencing an Internet outage, so at least they are able to work internally until this is resolved. If you are experiencing any issues this morning that may concern you, please do not hesitate to call the office 603-431-7864. We are maintaining a proactive, all hand on-deck, stance this morning and throughout the day until we are 100% confident that all our clients are working at normal capacities.

Myself, that’s a slightly different story. Last Thursday and Friday I was in San Diego for a technical training on Cloud computing (something I’ll be communicating with you about more after Labor Day). As a treat for me, my wife and son came along so we could visit some family in the area and have a little mini-vacation over the weekend before school starts this week. As you might imagine, our flight home was cancelled. We were supposed to come back on a Red Eye last night. Believe it or not, the first flight home they can get us on is Friday September 2^nd! Yes, you read that correctly. We’re hoping they will add capacity as we’re one of many who are stuck, but if you have to be stuck somewhere, there could definitely be worse places. Fortunately, our girls and our dogs are safe and sound and well taken care of. I’ll be working East Coast hours all week while my wife and son get to explore the area a little more than planned. Feel free to call my mobile or e-mail anytime between 8:30 and 5 as that’s when I’ll definitely be online and working, as usual. Just for fun, I thought you might get a kick of my office view this morning, East Coast time (can’t work in the room at that hour and wake the sleepy heads :).

 
This first picture is at 5 AM Pacific, 8 AM Eastern and the second is an hour later at 9 AM Eastern.  I never envisioned a California office for Jenaly, but as that famous saying goes, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade”, so it appears this will be my office for the week.  Fortunately, we are completely configured to work remotely and securely, so while I won’t be able to meet with you in person this week, I am able to interact with you just as if I was sitting in my office. I’m going to be the ultimate remote worker this week!

If you are not setup to work remotely and securely, you need be, just in case anything like this ever happens to you.I hope your home and family all came through the hurricane just as well as your office. Happy Monday!

Best,

MJ

As I said, I am so relieved that our staff and our clients have come through this storm easily.  The two minor issues we had to deal with were ISP outages and are resolving themselves without major impact.  It could have been considerably worse.  The storm took a more westerly track and as you can see from this picture, the western part of our state was not so lucky.

This is a building in western New Hampshire, near the Vermont border.  The servers were within 3 inches of going underwater when they were rescued.

If this is not a striking example of why it is so important to have a business continuity plan and automated, secure and monitored remote backup, I'm not sure what is.  Had the data all been on-site, and the techs been just a few minutes later to rescue those servers, this could have been truly catastrophic.  Instead, the servers and data are safely off-site and the staff is working remotely, either from home, or if they don't have power and Internet, from a safe location where they do, so that their operations are able to continue, even while they deal with a very serious facility issue.

As I mentioned above, for me, secure and reliable remote access have saved my day.  We were not allowed to rebook our flight in advance of the hurricane, at least not without paying rediculously high change fees.  Our flight was finally cancelled Friday evening and jetBlue is really struggling to get their capacity back in shape, as are all the airlines.  Because US airlines run so lean these days, they just don't have the available aircraft to put on extra flights to get stranded people home.  They have to insert all these people into what unsold seats may be left on the flights they regularly schedule.  That's why my family and I don't have seats until Friday, September 2nd.  The airlines really need some motivation to do a better job dealing with situations like this and those that do have seats available, should not be aloud to price gouge to the tune of $695 and $1,275 per ticket.  Yes, you read that right, PER TICKET, for the only two flights we could find between now and our scheduled return on the 2nd.  That just not right and I'm not too thrilled about that, but at least my family can enjoy the sites and attractions around beautiful San Diego, CA and I can sit by the poolside with power and high speed Internet and securely connect to the Jenaly office and work with our team and our clients.  The only thing I'm not able to do is meet with a client in person, but under the circumstances, I'm sure they will understand.  I do have to give kudos to the Marriott Marquis and Marina in San Diego for helping us deal with our unexpected stranding.  Not only have they allowed us to remain in our same room, they have given us a steeply discounted rate for the extra time, nearly matching our group rate that we had during our planned stay.  Their willingness to go the extra mile is truly appreciated and one of the reason why Marriott is my preferred hotel brand.  Thank you!

So, there you have it.  The key messages here are to prepare and be proactive.  Having all your emergency contact information assembled and your data safely backed up and off-site is critically important.  Being able to work remotely and securely, without notice is equally important if you want to stay productive.  Sure, I could have just taken a forced vacation, but being the person that I am, I want to work and keep our business and our clients projects moving forward, without having to work around my situation as an inconvenience or worse.  Because of the time difference, I get to knock off at 2 PM local time here on the West Coast and still enjoy a few hours of play each day.  It just means getting up a little earlier than usual to be online for our normal East Coast starting time :)

I truly hope you and yours came through the hurricane without any problems and I hope I have shared some good information and tips that will help you now and in the future.

Safely Using Wi-Fi When Traveling And An Vacation

Memorial Day is almost here, the official kickoff for the summer season. The weather reporters are teasing us that after a cool, wet and gloomy week, we may have our first warm, sunny weekend ahead.

With warmer weather and summer vacations near, more and more of us will be using free or other public Internet access. Do you know how to safely use a wireless network that is not your own? I hope the tips I offer in this column will help you enjoy safe use of public Internet connections.

It's commonplace in today's world to find wireless networks available almost everywhere. In downtown Portsmouth, there is free wireless Internet access sponsored by the local Chamber of Commerce and eCoast. Starbucks has made a name for itself as an office with good coffee, thanks to providing patrons with wireless Internet access, and even McDonald's has jumped on this trend. Then there are hotels, conference centers, condos and even airplanes, all offering free or paid for wireless access.

The availability of all this access is great for staying connected, but there are risks. Make smart decisions when using Internet access other than your own, so that you do not accidentally expose your personal or business information to would-be hackers.

Fundamentally speaking, you would be wise to treat any publicly available Internet connection as not safe. Public wireless networks, the type you will find in the aforementioned locations, as well as libraries, trains, buses, bookstores and more, are not encrypted, which means any data you send over them is vulnerable to be "seen" by a hacker. These days, a hacker could be someone like the kid next door, equipped with a common piece of software called a packet sniffer, that will allow them to see everything you type and send across the Internet, like the password to log in to your e-mail or your work network.

Using technologies like a VPN or SSL encrypted connections will help defeat this risk. With the rapid proliferation of smartphone, tablets, netbooks and notebooks, almost everyone has some type of portable device to access the Internet. Using them safely is not something to take lightly.

For any type of device that connects to the Internet, it's a best practice to keep your wireless connection turned off unless you are specifically using it. Once you connect to a public wireless network, your device will automatically re-connect to it whenever it is in range, even if you do not intend to. You should pay close attention to options presented to you when connecting to wireless networks. I recommend not saving any public connections, which will help prevent you from automatically reconnecting the next time you are in range. If you don't do this, your device will reconnect without any interaction from you and you could be exposing your information. More smartphones and tablets have a software switch to turn your wireless on and off. Many netbooks and notebooks also have a physical switch to turn the wireless on or off. When you are not using it, turn your wireless connection off.

On netbooks and notebooks that run the Windows 7 operating system, you will be presented with options that will allow you to control whether or not you share files and printers across your wireless network connection. It's recommended that you never engage sharing on a public Internet connection as that opens up a point of exposure to others using the same wireless connection that you are. You should also always ensure your computer's firewall is enabled to block random probes from the Internet. The latest information suggests an unprotected computer connected to the Internet will become infected or hacked within 20 minutes of being placed online. This is nothing to fool around with.

If you are using your device for business use, I strongly recommend the use of a Virtual Private Network and encryption for any sensitive business data that you have with you. A VPN secures your network connection between your device and your company network. No matter what type of device you use, there should be a VPN available for your company firewall that will create a safe and secure path from your computer to your work network, keeping anything you do away from would-be hackers.

And when you are surfing Web sites, be sure you use https and not just http in your URL if you are logging in to a site or doing any type of online banking or shopping. Using https ensures your connection is encrypted and anything you do will be safe and secure. So if you've forgotten to bring your bathing suit on your vacation and you have to go online to buy one and have it shipped, be sure you use https to secure your purchase and know you will be safe and able to hit the beach without worry once your delivery arrives.

This piece was also published in the May 19, 2011 Portsmouth Herald.

Jenaly Earns CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark!

We are very pleased to let you know that Jenaly is one of the first three companies in the nation to earn the CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark.  As you may already know, Jenaly was the first company in the nation to earn the inaugural CompTIA Security Trustmark in January 2009.  The release of the CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark continues CompTIA's initiative to credential businesses in the IT industry that are providing outsourced technology services their clients.  It's important for consumers of IT services to have a reliable benchmark to hold their partners to and as the global, vendor-neutral IT trade association, CompTIA is the right organization to provide this assurance.

The following is the press release that we issued yesterday, upon learning of our sucessful completion of the accreditation process:

 For Immediate Release

Jenaly Technology Group Earns Industry Credential
for Managed IT Services Providers

CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark signifies commitment to high industry code of conduct,high level of customer support

Portsmouth, New Hampshire, May 17, 2011 – Jenaly Technology Group, an outsourced IT services firm, announced today it has received the CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark for its use of industry-accepted best practices for service delivery and customer interaction.

The CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark developed by the leading non-profit association for the information technology industry, signifies that Jenaly Technology Group is committed to serving its customers in a manner that’s based on the industry’s best practices.

“This credential identifies Jenaly Technology Group as an IT service provider that’s demonstrated a high level of competency through their use of prescribed industry best practices and processes.” said Todd Thibodeaux, president and chief executive officer, CompTIA.

To attain the CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark, Jenaly Technology Group was evaluated on their a number of aspects of their business operations, including organizational structure, technology tools and systems they utilize; standard operating procedures; and IT service specific activities they’re engaged in, for network, server or end-user devices.

Jenaly Technology Group also agreed to abide by an industry code of conduct that requires a commitment to conducting advertising, service delivery and overall business practices in an ethical manner.

“I am very proud of our team.” said MJ Shoer, president and virtual chief technology officer of Jenaly Technology Group, Inc.  Our attainment of this credential clearly demonstrates the exemplary quality of our staff and systems as well as our equally exemplary commitment to our clients.  I have long felt that is very important for an accrediting body to certify businesses in our industry so that clients know they are engaging with partners that are leaders in our industry and capable of meeting and exceeding their business needs.” Shoer continued.

The CompTIA MSP Partners Trustmark is one of several business credentials offered by CompTIA to IT industry companies as a way to demonstrate that their business adheres to the industry's best practices and demonstrates to current and potential customers they have the dedication, knowledge and resources to perform quality service. Visit CompTIA Business Credentials to learn more.

About Jenaly Technology Group
Founded in 1997, Jenaly Technology Group provides outsourced IT services to its clients, small and mid-size businesses, from its headquarters in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.  Jenaly's vision is to provide a more client centric approach to delivering IT services and support, helping clients to stay focused on their business objectives without having to worry about the day to day health of their IT infrastructure.  For more information, please visit www.jenaly.com or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/jenalytech.

About CompTIA
CompTIA is the voice of the world’s information technology (IT) industry. As a non-profit trade association advancing the global interests of IT professionals and companies, CompTIA is the recognized authority for IT education and credentials and the primary advocate for IT businesses and workers. Through its foundation, CompTIA also enables disadvantaged populations to gain the skills they need for employment in the IT industry.  CompTIA’s vision of the IT landscape is shaped by more than 25 years of global perspective and more than 2,000 members and 1,000 business partners. For more information, visit www.comptia.org or follow CompTIA on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/comptia.  

###

Contacts:
MJ Shoer
President
Jenaly Technology Group
603-431-7864
mshoer@jenaly.com

Steven Ostrowski
Director, Corporate Communications
CompTIA
630-678-8468
sostrowski@comptia.org

This is why we take security seriously and why you should too...

The security of your IT infrastructure is a very important and continually evolving thing.  It always bothers me when I meet with prospective clients and they poo poo my recommendation to install a robust firewall appliance on their network or implement a secure password policy.  Fortunately, I don't run in to this as often as I used to, but occassionally I see a consumer router or just the ISP modem and no firewall.  Personally, I like the Cisco ASA 5505 series and they are not expensive, certainly not compared to the potential damage or bad PR that could come with a security breach.  Not to mention that this is just one of several security considerations that must be taken into account, especially if you deal with others sensitive infomation.

Here is an example of a security breach that has taken place at one of the best known companies in the United States, Best Buy.  Now let me say right now that I like Best Buy.  I think they are a good company and offer good values, especially when they have a sale.  What I don't like is how they have handled this incident.  It's important to note that the breach was actually with a company that they use for e-mail communication, so technically speaking, it does not appear that Best Buy was the cause of this breach.  However, how you respond to an incident like this is just as important as working to prevent it in the first place.

Following is the e-mail I received from Best Buy this morning. 

Dear Valued Best Buy Customer, On March 31, we were informed by Epsilon, a company we use to send emails to our customers, that files containing the email addresses of some Best Buy customers were accessed without authorization. We have been assured by Epsilon that the only information that may have been obtained was your email address and that the accessed files did not include any other information. A rigorous assessment by Epsilon determined that no other information is at risk. We are actively investigating to confirm this. For your security, however, we wanted to call this matter to your attention. We ask that you remain alert to any unusual or suspicious emails. As our experts at Geek Squad would tell you, be very cautious when opening links or attachments from unknown senders. In keeping with best industry security practices, Best Buy will never ask you to provide or confirm any information, including credit card numbers, unless you are on our secure e-commerce site, www.bestbuy.com. If you receive an email asking for personal information, delete it. It did not come from Best Buy. Our service provider has reported this incident to the appropriate authorities. We regret this has taken place and for any inconvenience this may have caused you. We take your privacy very seriously, and we will continue to work diligently to protect your personal information. For more information on keeping your data safe, please visit: http://www.geeksquad.com/do-it-yourself/tech-tip/six-steps-to-keeping-your-data-safe.aspx. Sincerely, Barry Judge Executive Vice President & Chief Marketing Officer Best Buy

While they do a good job communicating the issue and what they are doing about it, they really take a credibility hit when in the same message where they acknowledge a breach, they recommend you click a link to their Geek Squad for information on keeping your data safe.  When you click on that link, you are brought to a page with six steps, except Step 2 is not a step at all, it's just a comment:

"Viruses and spyware can creep into your computer and easily degrade performance and corrupt or even destroy data."

Maybe I'm not being fair, but that seems painfully obvious and not exactly new information about how to keep your data safe.

My poing in posting this is two fold.  First, take your IT security seriously.  Yes, sometimes this can make things not as convenient as we would like, but it's for the best.  Why do we lock our cars and our homes?  It's certainly less convenient to have to take out the key and unlock the door rather that just walking up and opening it with one turn of the handle, but we do this to keep our home, possessions and family safe and secure from those who would do us harm.  It should be no different with your IT infrastructure.  Using a simple password or not having a good firewall is akin to having no door, leaving it unlocked if you do or hanging the key on the side of the door jamb so it's easy for anyone to unlock.

Please think about this and if I can help you assess your IT security, please give me a call and let's talk about your concerns.  It's important for you and your business.  Just consider the cost of seeing your company name on the front page of the paper one day as having had a security breach that exposed all your customers data.  The cost to secure your network will pale in comparison.  Be safe!

 

Make A Data Storage Plan Before It's Too Late

As our use of computers and digital data continues to evolve, the amount of data we save is growing at a breakneck pace. Managing, safeguarding and storing this data can become a challenge for some businesses. This column will focus on some simple strategies to address this challenge and help you have a plan so you don't break the bank storing your data over the long term.

Statistics on how much data an average business produces or stores in a given year are all over the map. It's highly dependent on the type of business, number of employees and more, as you would expect. Simply put, what we used to measure in megabytes (MB) is now measured in gigabytes (GB) and even terabytes (TB). I'm sure you remember one of your earliest computers and being excited about a 40 MB hard drive. Today, the most basic of computers has, at a minimum, a hard drive capacity of 160 GB, four times larger than those early computers. Extend that metric simply, and you may assume the average user is creating and potentially saving four times as much data as they did several years ago.

All this translates into large data storage requirements for most businesses. Even if you create a nominal amount of data on an annual basis, you will want to be saving that data for many years, if not forever, and that compounds your requirements in a very straightforward, mathematical way. In most professional environments, company data is stored on the network server, not on the employees' computer hard drive, therefore, theoretically, if you have 10 computers with 160 GB hard drives, you could theoretically need 1.5 TB of storage on your network, using very simple math of 160 times 10. However, as you probably know, that is not a realistic example as the amount of data on a given computer is usually only a fraction of the hard drive capacity or not at all related to the computer hard drive as many people work in financial or database systems that store nothing on the user's computer and everything on the network server.

So what strategies can businesses use to manage the amount of data they are storing and backing up? Archival policies are an excellent start. We amass a large volume of data throughout the year. E-mail messages, attachments to those messages, documents, spreadsheets, graphic files, databases, accounting data — the list goes on and on. Industries like architecture and engineering produce larger data files, on average, than say an accounting firm, by the nature of the data that they work with. Advertising and public relations firms have very unique requirements, as do publishers, due to the nature of systems they use and the creative work that they do.

Setting policies around active data and archived data can help manage your short- and long-term storage requirements. Keep your active data on your primary network systems that are efficient, highly redundant and well protected. This will ensure your access to the data is fast and reliable, as well as safely backed up and protected against loss or damage. Archival data (historical information that does not need to be updated on a regular basis) may be placed on a device like a network attached storage (NAS) appliance. These are self-contained devices that are essentially large hard drives arranged in a redundant fashion to provide efficient access and basic protection. A NAS device is a very cost-effective and efficient way to add large amounts of data storage to a network and can be leveraged for purposes like what I am describing and more.

As we move more toward a paperless operating environment, another strategy that is relatively simple to employ is managing the resolution of digital documents. Most paperless environments involve scanning paper and converting it to digital form for further work. Scanners have several settings that control the final size of the data created from the paper source. Depending on the type of data you may be scanning and how you will need to work with it, you may be able to adjust these settings to keep the final file size relatively small. Many software applications also allow you to compress certain types of data, so that it requires less storage space without compromising the quality of the retained data.

These are just a few ideas for how you can manage data growth without it becoming overly cumbersome or costly over a long period of time. One thing is certain: We will continue to generate more data in our business, so if you have not taken the time to think about your data storage and retention policies, I encourage you to do so before you find yourself running out of space.

This article was also published in the February 17 edition of The Portsmouth Herald.

How To Enjoy The Snow And Still Get Your Work Done

So far, 2011 has been the year of weekly snowstorms. Personally, I love it.

This is what winter in New England should be like and it's what I remember from my childhood. For businesses, these weekly storms have presented quite a challenge; do you close the office or ask people to take to the roads when it may not be safe; how do you continue to serve your customers without inconveniencing them due to the weather. The list goes on and on. This is a great example of where the right IT infrastructure can pay huge dividends for you and your customers. The ability to securely work remotely is one antidote to the never ending string of snowstorms.

I can work whenever and wherever I need. It's one of the benefits of being an IT professional for sure, but there is no reason you can work remotely, too. I often wonder why I haven't uprooted my family and taken up work from a Caribbean beach, but that's a topic for another day. Whether you are finding yourself stuck at home due to the snow, kids being home from school or any other reason, you can still do your job if you rely on technology to do your work.

The key is not to wait until the snow falls to set this up, but the continual storms made me think the time was right to write this column. Technology to productively work remotely is not very expensive and has become mainstream over the years. The key consideration is what you need access to do your job. For those in sales and customer service roles, a phone is their most valued resources, followed closely by access to the customer database. Cell phones are an easy alternative when working out of the office and voice over IP (VOIP) telephone systems make it seamless to have your work phone with you no matter where you are. You may have a physical phone at your home office or you may have a softphone, a software telephone, on your portable computer that lets you use your phone like you are sitting at your desk.

With a proper firewall and remote access policies, you should be able to connect to the applications you need to use and even your entire company network. Again, it all depends on what you need access to in order to perform your job.

There are many different ways to set your business up to support remote work. You may be familiar VPN, or virtual private network, which allows you to make a secure connection from your computer to the company network. In this model, your computer connects across the Internet to your company network and makes a “tunnel” through the Internet back to your office. This places your computer securely on the company network just like it was plugged into the wall at the office. This works well for company owned computers like laptops, but is frowned upon for personal home computers. When you make a VPN connection, your computer has access to all resources you are authorized for and if the computer you are making this connection from is not secure itself, in other words, could a family member have downloaded spyware to it, this could pose a significant security risk.

One way to mitigate this risk is to securely publish applications your remote users need access to from a centralized server that exists to support remote use. This model lets remote workers use software they need, without necessarily introducing the security exposure I just described. People who need to work remotely will have the icons they need for their software and when they open those applications, they will be securely connected to the server and actually be running the programs from that server, as opposed to the computer they are working on. It's a great way to address security concerns, access control and integrity of your company data.

So, if your company does not have a policy to allow remote work when things like weekly snowstorms roll through, now may be a great time to bring this up and get a plan in place, not just for the rest of this winter, but for the future.

This article was published in the February 3 edition of The Portsmouth Herald.

Press Release: MJ Shoer Elected to CompTIA Board of Directors

Jenaly Technology's MJ Shoer Elected to CompTIA Board of Directors

Portsmouth, N.H.,  January 27, 2011 – MJ Shoer, President and Virtual Chief Technology Officer of Jenaly Technology Group, has been elected to the Computing Technology Industry Association's (CompTIA) Board of Directors for the 2011 term.  This is MJ's second term on the CompTIA Board, having previously served from 2005 to 2008.

CompTIA is the voice of the world's information technology (IT) industry.  Its members are the companies at the forefront of innovation; and the professionals responsible for maximizing the benefits organizations receive from their investments in technology.

“CompTIA is extremely fortunate to have a board of directors that represents the full spectrum of the IT channel, and the unique perspectives they have on the issues facing our industry,” said Todd Thibodeaux, president and chief executive officer, CompTIA.

“MJ Shoer brings real-world experience and expertise in several key technology areas, including cybersecurity, managed IT services, document management, storage and disaster recovery," Thibodeaux continued. "He also offers the perspective of the small technology business owner, an essential element in the broader IT industry. We're pleased to welcome MJ back to the CompTIA Board of Directors."

Since founding Jenaly in 1997, Shoer has been a vocal advocate for the IT interests of small and mid-size businesses.  During his more than 23 years in the IT industry, he has gained a reputation for consistently helping clients leverage existing and emerging technologies to further their business goals. 

“I am thrilled and honored to have the opportunity to serve the IT industry as a member of the CompTIA Board of Directors,” said MJ Shoer, president and virtual chief technology officer of Jenaly.  “To have the opportunity to work with such respected leaders in the IT industry not once, but twice, is truly humbling.  I look forward to helping CompTIA achieve its goals as well as providing significant value to our clients through my involvement with CompTIA and the global IT industry.”

About Jenaly Technology Group, Inc.

Founded in 1997, Jenaly Technology Group provides outsourced IT services to its clients, small and mid-size businesses, from its headquarters in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.  Jenaly's vision is to provide a more client centric approach to delivering IT services and support, helping clients to stay focused on their business objectives without having to worry about the day to day health of their IT infrastructure.  For more information, please visit www.jenaly.com. 

Contact:

MJ Shoer

Jenaly Technology Group, Inc.

(603) 431-7864 x391

mshoer@jenaly.com

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