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Your business’s cybersecurity needs an MSPWith the prevalence of cyberattacks on companies of all sizes these days, businesses cannot afford to relegate cybersecurity to the bottom of their budget priorities. When it comes to cybersecurity, even small businesses should partner with a managed IT services provider (MSP). Here’s why it's crucial to partner with an MSP that can implement robust […]

The post Your business’s cybersecurity needs an MSP appeared first on Complete Technology Resources, Inc..

Your business’s cybersecurity needs an MSP

With the prevalence of cyberattacks on companies of all sizes these days, businesses cannot afford to relegate cybersecurity to the bottom of their budget priorities. When it comes to cybersecurity, even small businesses should partner with a managed IT services provider (MSP). Here’s why it's crucial to partner with an MSP that can implement robust cybersecurity solutions for your business.

The numbers

According to the Ponemon Institute’s 2019 State of Cybersecurity in Small and Medium-Sized Businesses (SMBs) survey, cyberattacks have increased dramatically. Here in the United States, 76% of companies were attacked in 2019, a significant leap from 55% in 2016. Sixty-nine percent of US businesses reported data breaches in 2019, up from 50% in 2016.

The financial consequences have also increased considerably. The average cost spent by companies because of damage to or theft of IT assets and infrastructure increased from $1.03 million in 2017 to $1.2 million in 2019. Costs due to disruption to normal operations increased from an average of $1.21 million in 2017 to an average of $1.9 million in 2019.

The attacks

Globally, the most common forms of attack on SMBs are those that rely on deception: phishing (57%), stolen or compromised devices (33%), and credential theft (30%). Worse, cybercriminals are targeting SMBs more, with reported attacks having increased from 60% in 2017 to 69% in 2019.

Why managed services?

Partnering with MSPs is the most effective way to prevent attacks and protect your business from malicious threats. MSPs offer a full range of proactive IT support that focuses on advanced security, such as around-the-clock monitoring, data encryption and backup, real-time threat prevention and elimination, network and firewall protection, security awareness training, and more.

And because managed services are designed to identify and fix weak spots in your IT infrastructure, you’ll optimize the digital backbone of your business processes. You’ll have faster network performance, a solid business continuity and disaster recovery strategy, and minimal downtime. One of the best things about managed services is that you get a dedicated team of IT professionals ready to assist you for any technology problems you may encounter. This is much more effective and budget-friendly than having in-house personnel handling all your IT issues.

Being proactive when it comes to cybersecurity is the only way to protect what you’ve worked hard to build. If you’d like to know more about how managed services can benefit your business, just give us a call — we’re sure to help.

Published with permission from TechAdvisory.org. Source.

The post Your business’s cybersecurity needs an MSP appeared first on Complete Technology Resources, Inc..

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Exciting new features in the Windows 10 October 2020 UpdateIn the past few weeks, Microsoft has rolled out the Windows 10 October 2020 Update. Also known as Windows 10 version 20H2, the latest update to the popular operating system brings a wealth of useful new features designed to improve your PC’s functionality and performance, as well as your overall experience. Read on to learn […]

The post Exciting new features in the Windows 10 October 2020 Update appeared first on Complete Technology Resources, Inc..

Exciting new features in the Windows 10 October 2020 Update

In the past few weeks, Microsoft has rolled out the Windows 10 October 2020 Update. Also known as Windows 10 version 20H2, the latest update to the popular operating system brings a wealth of useful new features designed to improve your PC’s functionality and performance, as well as your overall experience. Read on to learn more about the new update.

Start menu’s new look

The Start menu gets a makeover with “theme-aware” tiles, or tiles that take on the dominant color of your theme. Microsoft has removed the accent color behind tiles in the apps list, replacing it with a uniform translucent background in light mode and a solid black background in dark mode. The theme-aware tiles give the Start menu a more modern, streamlined look.

However, you still have the option to use accent colors for the Start menu, taskbar, and action center when you enable dark mode. Just go to Settings > Personalization > Colors. From the dropdown menu, choose Dark to enable dark mode, then pick an accent color from the swatches below. To apply your chosen color to the Start menu, taskbar, and action center, tick the box next to the “Start, menu, and action center” option at the bottom of the Colors menu.

Alt + Tab changes

You can now switch seamlessly between open tabs in your browser with the new and improved Alt + Tab keyboard shortcut. Pressing Alt + Tab opens the task switcher, which will now show you all open tabs in Microsoft Edge, not just the active one. This way, you can go to the browser tab you want straight from the task switcher interface without first opening the browser window.

If you’d rather not see all open tabs at once, you can configure the task switcher’s settings by going to Settings > System > Multitasking. Then, choose from the following options:

  • Open windows and all tabs in Edge
  • Open windows and 5 most recent tabs in Edge
  • Open windows and 3 most recent tabs in Edge
  • Open windows only

Taskbar tweaks

If you’re like a lot of Windows users, you probably have your most visited or favorite websites pinned to the taskbar for ease of access and convenience. Having sites pinned to your taskbar lets you open a website or switch to the most recent app quickly.

With the Windows 10 October 2020 Update, you can now see all open tabs in your pinned websites by simply hovering over the website icons on the taskbar. This eliminates the need to search through open tabs and browser windows just to find and switch to the specific tab you need.

The taskbar also has a new layout, but this is limited to first logins to a new PC or new account creations. The taskbar will be personalized depending on the user’s preferences. For instance, if the user has an Android device, the Your Phone app will be automatically pinned to the taskbar.

Less intrusive notifications

Microsoft also made minor tweaks to the notification panel. Now, all notifications have an X icon at the top right corner so you can quickly dismiss them with a click. All notifications will also show the app logo so you can easily tell which app has sent which notification.

Additionally, by default, Focus Assist will no longer show you a summary of any notifications you missed while the feature was enabled. To change this setting, go to Settings > System > Focus assist, then tick the box next to “Show me a summary of what I missed while focus assist was on.”

Enhanced Edge

If you haven’t gotten around to installing the new version of Microsoft Edge, you’ll be glad to know that the Windows 10 October 2020 Update comes with the browser preinstalled.

The new version of Microsoft Edge is based on Chromium, the same technology on which Google Chrome runs. As such, it offers a range of features designed to maximize performance and thus improve your browsing experience. What’s more, Edge affords users more control over their data, ensuring that their privacy online will always be protected.

Microsoft is constantly developing new features designed to keep Windows 10 devices running smoothly and securely. Drop us a line today to learn more about the latest Windows 10 features and how they can benefit your business.

Published with permission from TechAdvisory.org. Source.

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What an MSP can do for healthcare providersMore and more healthcare organizations are turning to managed services providers (MSPs) for their IT needs. The outsourced technology support model lets hospitals and clinics focus on being healthcare providers rather than IT professionals learning on the fly. Here's why partnering with MSPs is beneficial for healthcare providers: MSPs guarantee response times When it comes […]

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What an MSP can do for healthcare providers

More and more healthcare organizations are turning to managed services providers (MSPs) for their IT needs. The outsourced technology support model lets hospitals and clinics focus on being healthcare providers rather than IT professionals learning on the fly.

Here's why partnering with MSPs is beneficial for healthcare providers:

MSPs guarantee response times

When it comes to providing healthcare services, constant uptime and availability can be a matter of life and death. Your IT support team shouldn’t be any different. Most MSPs guarantee maximum response times and support lines that are open 24 hours a day.

If something breaks or you come across technical issues in the dead of night, you shouldn’t have to worry about whether an in-house technician takes too long to pick up the phone or can’t make it in.

MSPs help with business continuity plans

You risk putting your practice in jeopardy if your IT team can’t help you recover from an outage or natural disaster. A business continuity plan is an absolute necessity in your healthcare organization — you simply can’t afford to lose all your valuable medical data in the event of a disaster.

MSPs maintain HIPAA-compliant off-site backups and failover systems so you can prevent any sudden regulatory or customer retention issues.

MSPs provide proactive security

In the world of healthcare data security, complying with HIPAA mandates is essential. Failing to meet regulations may result in huge fines, serious penalties, and even the withdrawal of your license to operate.

MSPs offer security services that include identity-based security and encryption, authorized privileges and access control, and data accountability and integrity.

MSPs boost practice efficiency

Healthcare staffing is often a hassle. But thankfully, MSPs can help set up, secure, and support high-tech solutions that reduce your HR concerns. Practices can take advantage of automation, enterprise resource planning software, and database management to reduce human errors and increase operational efficiency.

If you want to learn more about how great technology and support can benefit your healthcare practice, get in touch with us today — we provide the perfect set of IT solutions and outstanding support to drive your organization forward.

Published with permission from TechAdvisory.org. Source.

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How to disable Android location settingsWhen using an Android smartphone for the first time, users receive a prompt from apps like Google to enable location services. Users may decide to accept it because it’s convenient — no need to enable it every time you open an app. But that also means letting Google track all your activities. If you don’t […]

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How to disable Android location settings

When using an Android smartphone for the first time, users receive a prompt from apps like Google to enable location services. Users may decide to accept it because it’s convenient — no need to enable it every time you open an app. But that also means letting Google track all your activities. If you don’t want that, you need to know how to tweak location tracking settings.

Photos and GPS tagging

Your Android smartphone’s geolocating or GPS tagging function lets you attach GPS coordinates to the pictures you take. This allows you to arrange pictures in albums by location. Geolocating images in itself isn’t a bad thing, but you can get into trouble when you broadcast sensitive locations to the world. For instance, a picture of your expensive watch with a GPS tag of your house could attract wrongdoers.

Here are four ways to control geotagging photos:

  1. Go to your camera settings and you’ll find an on/off toggle.
  2. Go to Settings > Location and from there, you can decide if you want the location saved along with your images.
  3. Download an EXIF editor and manually remove the location information from specific images.
  4. You can also turn off location services altogether by going to Settings > Location.

Discrete location settings

Apart from location settings in photos and GPS tagging, Android has three discrete location settings that allow you to set the level of accuracy of your location reporting. You can find these in Settings > Location. Note that this affects your smartphone’s battery life immensely.

  • High accuracy – This uses the GPS radio in your phone to pinpoint its exact location using data from satellites while making use of nearby Wi-Fi and cellular networks too.
  • Battery saving – This mode only uses Wi-Fi networks and mobile networks to identify locations, and while it might not be as accurate as the high accuracy setting, it will help your battery last longer.
  • Device sensors only – This only uses the GPS radio to find you. It may take a little more time to find your location since it doesn't use nearby Wi-Fi and mobile networks to get your general location first. This also uses more battery.

Turning off your location settings will not only help keep your smartphone’s security intact, but it will also help preserve your battery life.

Interested in learning more about Android phones and their functions? We have solutions for you and your business. Call our experts today.

Published with permission from TechAdvisory.org. Source.

The post How to disable Android location settings appeared first on Complete Technology Resources, Inc..

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