Directive Blogs

If you use Facebook, you likely have a lot of personal information stored there. If you use it for your business, then your professional reputation also partially relies on what you put into the social network. If you aren’t protecting your Facebook account, you could be at risk for identity theft or worse. That’s why using two-factor authentication on your social media accounts is becoming more important than ever.

A new email scam is making its rounds and it has a lot of people concerned with just how much a hacker can peer into one’s private life. How would you react if a stranger emailed you saying they had inappropriate webcam footage of you?

Dealing with other people, whether in the office or a home environment, can often be troublesome. There is always a case of someone trying to be better than someone else, or trying to take advantage of their naiveté. There are solutions out there that make it easier than ever to help keep your home and business safe. Here are some of the best out there.

As you may expect, the average Internet scammer isn’t above resorting to dirty tricks to claim their ill-gotten prize from their victims. A recent scam demonstrates just how dirty these tricks can truly be, and unfortunately, how ill-prepared many are to handle them.

It doesn’t matter how much of a technology novice someone is, chances are, they’ve heard the term “hacker” before. A favorite character trope of Hollywood films and television dramas, these cybercriminals have appeared in productions like Die Hard and Mr. Robot with varying degrees of accuracy. Below, we explore what makes a hacker, and the kinds that exist in reality.

Are your employees putting your organization’s security at risk due to poor email practices? This is a question that all business owners need to consider--especially if you deal in sensitive information. We recommend that all businesses utilize a two-pronged approach to email security, including both technology measures to secure communications on the technical side and training to secure on the human side.

Printers, along with every other piece of equipment that is on your network, require careful configuration and regular upkeep to ensure that they aren’t putting your data and users at risk. Security researchers recently discovered two massive vulnerabilities in HP Officejet All-in-One printers that make it incredibly easy for hackers to spread malware and gain access to a company’s network.

Let’s be honest - not all of us have the best memories. This makes the ability for many browsers to remember our passwords seem like a godsend. However, is this capability actually a good thing for your cybersecurity? The answer may not surprise you.

It’s October, and time again for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to bring extra attention to the issue of security. This year there is a focus on the personal and professional interactions that intersect in the virtual space. The more these two worlds become connected, the more likely the possibility of a hacker gaining access to one or both worlds, using access they acquired from one or the other.

Windows 10 is the most utilized operating system on PCs today. As a result, Microsoft has made it a priority to take on some of today’s most prevalent threats. We’ll go through these security features based on the state of the computer’s usage to get a better idea of how much is done to improve your security.

Spam is a major hindrance when running a business that relies on email, but it’s easy to protect your employee’s time from the average spam messages with the right technological support. Unfortunately, hackers have adapted to this change and made it more difficult to identify scam emails. More specifically, they have turned to customizing their spam messages to hit specific individuals within organizations.

Each year there are changes that need to be made in the way that organizations manage their IT security. In 2017, ransomware burst on the scene in full force, and cyber security strategies reacted, coming up with fully managed security platform that remediate issues better, and cost organizations far more than they would have spent on IT security just a short time ago. In 2018, the same problems persist, while other developing technologies threaten the natural order of things. Today, we will look at how cybersecurity is being approached in 2018.

The purpose of a solid business network is to iron out the chaos of running multiple computers whose users need to access and share files and documents. With sharing comes the need to restrict some users from certain files, all while protecting your IT infrastructure from the inside and out.

Last time we wrote about the importance of having a social media policy for your business.  Let's go over some of the things you'll want to cover in your social media policy.

Everyone who uses e-mail has become accustomed to finding the occasional Spam e-mail. No matter how careful you are, it's only a matter of time before you receive a Viagra testing e-mail, the South African Inheritance Tied Up in Legal Battles, or the Winning of a Sweepstakes that you never signed up for. Where do those e-mails come from?

This has been a pretty common topic for us on the Directive blog. We've seen a lot of Upstate New York clients and customers suffer the consequences when online retailers and other account providers experience a security breach. It is equally vital for consumers to know what to do in the event of a security breach as it is the company that is actually breached.

Global Payments, a credit card processing firm, announced that as many as 1.5 million credit card numbers were stolen due to a security breach last month. Issues like this seem more and more common place in the news and it is important to know what to do if you suspect that your credit card has been hacked.

Your identity has quite a lot of value, especially in the wrong hands. Security firm ZoneAlarm put together some numbers in 2011 concerning identity fraud, and it even shocked us. Let's talk about a few of these statistics and what it means.

Protecting your business network from the threats lurking on the Internet is crucial for a small business. Threats of all shapes, sizes, and severities are out there and if they get into your network you could be looking at some serious issues ranging from data theft to extended downtime. Fortunately, there is a single solution available that can deliver a total security package to protect your business from virtually any outside threat.

We've been blogging a bit about ways to prepare for laptop theft and what to do if a company laptop is actually stolen.  Laptop and mobile device theft is a widespread issue for businesses and can lead to data theft which can be extremely costly; much more than the mere price of the hardware. This issue is all too familiar with NASA, which admits that thousands of mobile device theft incidents have occurred over the past few years.