Professional IT Services that Andromeda Provides for Riverside, IL Businesses:

Managed IT Services
Riverside,IL

Andromeda offers a range of IT support plans—anything from month-to-month "time & materials"-based assistance to fixed IT service contracts that permit "no-brainer" conformance to an annual budget. Beyond the functions you would expect from a full-service MSP, you'll have a dedicated C‑CATs team that includes an Account Coordinator directing the same field and remote technicians day-to-day, month-to-month, and even year-to-year to manage your IT network needs.
This isn't simply a glorified Virtual CIO offering. Imagine the cost of hiring your own CIO AND tech team for this same level of customized service and knowledge of your particular (and evolving) network setup!

Cloud Services & Migrations

Typically, the biggest issue you'll face when initiating Cloud IT services is not the services themselves, but rather the proper migration of your existing IT services to the Cloud without loss of functionality, downtime, and scores of other details that could undermine the whole process. Andromeda has a long history of expertise in physical on-premises systems. Don't make the mistake of turning all your current systems over to a "Cloud expert"; we'll save you from a lot of heartache and pain with a virtually seamless Cloud migration from your current setup— whatever it is.

Data Backup & Recovery
Riverside,IL

It's a crazy world. Literally thousands of people you don't even know attempt to break or steal from systems like yours every day. Good 24/7 monitoring is a first line of defense, of course. But no matter how great and state-of-the-art your defenses are, you'll almost certainly succomb to a successful attack in time. That's why advanced data backup and data recovery need to be tools that you and your IT partner have at the ready from Day 1. Don't be tempted to "shortcut" this element of your network in the name of expediency or to save a few dollars. Ultimately, you'll lose out on both counts with that thinking. You need a complete and integrated solution that addresses every contingency as well as IT professionals who know how to make that happen.

Cyber Security

Not only do we provide multi-tier approaches to your network security, but Andromeda also provides built-for-you solutions for disaster recovery and business continuity devices. We provide, manage and monitor a variety of devices including physical hardware, Cloud-based and hybrid options. Our team actively monitors over 403 servers and 101 physical backup devices in the field. All with 100% local engineers and technicians.

Onsite/Remote Support
Riverside,IL

Andromeda's team is completely staffed by local technicians near Riverside,IL. No matter the hour, your issue is resolved quickly and professionally. In fact, 68% of incoming calls are connected to a live technician for immediate response. When a technician isn't available, our average response time is less than 30 minutes. And if that isn't impressive enough, emergency after-hours support response times average less than 10 minutes!

IT Network Management

IT networks are our bread-and-butter. We have provided these services to clients since 1994. Some have continued to rely on us for their evolving network needs since the very beginning. We stand behind our work day to day and year to year because we foster relationships with our client-partners that absolutely demand that of us. It's in our DNA and how we prefer to do business.

AndroPedia Tech Library

As part of our service, it is important to keep our client-partners well informed on IT developments, news, and best practices. Here is just a sampling of typical items from our AndroPedia^SM library archive:

New cybersecurity stories hit the news every day. You’ve surely heard about large companies getting hacked or ‘breached’, passwords stolen, identities compromised and more.

The topic of cybersecurity gets brought up so much, it’s no surprise that it has become a kind of background noise in the business world. Warnings about security protocols, new viruses and ransomware scams are just the tip of the iceberg when you look into what is happening in the IT security world.

While the news stories keep coming and businesses continue falling victim, there is at least one thing that remains the same . . . the need for cybersecurity training and awareness is here to stay. If you are in business, you have data that cybercriminals want to steal. Simple as that.

Cybersecurity conversations and solutions don’t have to be daunting though. In fact, there are some quick, common-sense tips you can put into place that will make you and your business a harder target for those looking to do you harm.

Top 4 Cybersecurity Tips For Professionals

1. Use Unique and Strong Passwords For All Online Accounts

This tip is one you’ve surely heard many times before but over 85% of all adults reuse their passwords online. On top of that, most people don’t know how to create a truly strong password. Some characteristics of a strong password are:

• Minimum of 8 characters
• A mixture of uppercase and lowercase letters
• At least one number
• At least one special character (!@#$%^&)
• No personal details (pet names, family member names, birth dates, address info etc.)

The average adult has over 100 different accounts online (bank accounts, credit cards, social media, email, apps etc.). It’s understandably difficult to create and remember a different password for everything you do though.

What to do about it? Look into a password manager tool for yourself and your staff. A password manager will store and organize all of your unique passwords securely. Here at Andromeda, we recommend LastPass. It has some great features and is a trustworthy password management tool. If you have questions about that, feel free to reach our team.

2. Run A Network Security Audit At Least Once A Year

You can’t address things if you don’t know they are broken. An annual network security audit done by a third party IT support partner will give you visibility into the small cracks hiding in your network security.

This type of audit should check things like open ports on your firewall, password protocols, your backups, your disaster recovery plan, the status of your warranties, your antivirus and spam protocols and more.

You can engage your current IT services provider for this audit or look for a third party vendor to come in and take a fresh look at your setup.

It never hurts to get a new set of eyes on your setup. Andromeda provides these types of assessments to our clients with our professional 35 point network security assessment. If you’d like to speak with our team about this service, give us a call at (815) 836-0030 or send an email to Contact@WeNetwork.com

3. Regularly Test Your Backups and Disaster Recovery Plan

One of the top methods a cybercriminal uses to make money is ransomware. Ransomware is classified as a cyberattack where a criminal gains access to your network (through brute force or stolen employee email/passwords). After accessing the network, the criminal then encrypts all or a portion of your business data and locks you out of it. The only way to recover the data is to pay a ransom (often in the form of bitcoin or other cryptocurrency). If you don’t pay up – they destroy your data.

These types of attacks cause serious damage. Businesses lose big money due to down time, reputational damage and in some cases, even government fines (in worst cases where evidence that a business intentionally ignored or neglected their data security, victims of ransomware/cybercrime can even face jail time).

Imagine that, you’re the victim of a cyberattack and you have to pay the government fines on top of it all?!

Ransomware and cyberattacks happen, there is almost no way to avoid them 100% of the time. But, with a proper disaster recovery plan including regular data backups (on site, in the cloud and off site) you can quickly and calmly restore your business data and win against cybercrime.

Don’t just accept anyone’s word when it comes to verifying your backups though. You should be sure that whoever is maintaining your backups and disaster recovery is running regular tests and providing you proof of valid backups. You should also run a demo scenario at least twice a year to test how long it would take you to be back up and running in the event of a breach or equipment failure.

4. Employee Cybersecurity Training Is Key To Your Defense

Cyber security is constantly changing and new attack strategies show up regularly. The one thing that shouldn’t change for you though, is your commitment to ongoing employee training.

After all, the #1 threat to your office network security is actually your employees! The staff are the people who will accidentally visit an infected site, click a bad link, download a file with a virus etc. and the only way to help stop those behaviors/accidents is through education and proper training.

A good employee training program will offer ongoing training and support. It may also score and rank your employees/office based on performance etc.

At Andromeda, we offer our clients an employee cyber security training in an online program. This allows employees to go at their own pace and complete training in the office or on the go. This solution provides weekly tech tips, training videos, micro quizzes, individual employee risk scores and more.

Make sure to look into training if your organization isn’t already offering this to employees. This really is a must have solution to protect your office.

These are only 4 tips you can use to improve security at the office. There are many more but if you cover these bases you have a great start.

If you have any questions related to cybersecurity or IT at the office, give our team a call at (815) 836-0030 or send a message to Contact@WeNetwork.com. We are always here to help you!

The post 4 Cybersecurity Tips For Business Owners & Managers appeared first on Andromeda Technology Solutions.

It’s another Tuesday in the airport, and you just cleared the TSA line and went to the pretzel shop for a quick bite before you catch your plane. You sit your laptop down to get a straw, and the next second…your laptop is gone. It’s not in sight, nor is the thief who stole it.

At first you’re confused, then the confusion starts to fade away and you realize that this wasn’t just a personal laptop. It was your work computer and had company files, sensitive information and access to company data that definitely doesn’t belong in anyone else’s hands.

But what do you do?

What To Do When You Can’t Find Your Stolen Laptop

Stolen Laptop Step 1: Get in touch with your IT team

Whether you outsource, have internal IT staff or a mixture of both, your first step is to alert your IT support teams of the incident. Time is critical on this.

Even if you have a password on your laptop, which will likely prevent the thief from immediately having access to your private documents. It won’t stop someone removing the hard drive from your laptop and connecting it to another computer. Suddenly your hard drive is sitting there, ready to browse – just like any other folder or drive letter.

Your IT Staff/Vendor should be installing encryption and remote management software on all remote devices. With proper encryption, your data is secure AND with remote management, your IT staff can wipe the stolen laptop before any damage is done.

Without this encryption software and remote management, you’d be forced to report any theft like this as a data breach. That means the government knows about it, your employees need to be made aware and worst of all – you have to alert clients.

This is why in this instance, you call your tech staff first.

Stolen Laptop Step 2: Contact the Police and file a report

The next best thing to do in situations like this is to immediately file a police report for the stolen laptop. Having a police case number can help with any insurance and/or recovery endeavors that come up. Plus, having a police report can help catch the criminal who stole your sensitive devices.

Stolen Laptop Step 3: Change Your Passwords

If you don’t have encryption and even if you do – it is smart to change passwords to all personal, professional and financial accounts. Additionally if you used this computer to pay bills, check banking information or for any type of financial transactions, you’ll want to make sure to check those accounts.

Stolen Laptop Step 4: Recover Your data on another device

This step also involves your IT staff/company. Hopefully you’re IT pros have all of your company data backed up and readily available. It is important that you synch your portable devices regularly so that in ANY incident of failure or theft, you can be restored quickly without too much interruption.

To make sure that you’re covered on this front, we’d suggest requesting regular tests of your backups anyway. That way, no matter the issue, you know your data is secured, backed up AND ready to deploy in an emergency or urgent situation.

In Summary

There are many steps you’ll want to take after a theft occurs but with proactive IT support you won’t have nearly as many headaches to deal with.

These things happen more often than you’d think too.

On average a laptop is stolen every 53 seconds!

So – take the following actions and get ahead of the issue before a stolen laptop happens.

1. Find out if your company’s remote devices are encrypted with the ability to wipe all data on command
2. Make sure that you train employees with remote devices not to leave them unattended and to lock them in the trunk of their cars instead of leaving them in a front or backseat.
3. When travelling put your laptop on the TSA conveyer belt last – that way it is less likely to remain unattended.
4. Look into your company backups and business continuity protocols.
   1. How often are they tested?
   2. How often are remote users synching and backing up data?
   3. How long will it take to restore a PC when you need it?

Our team is here to help you set up and manage any of the technical details listed above.

In fact, fill out the form below or call the office to receive 10% off of your initial setup fees for our remote encryption software!

Just mention the code “Encrypt4Me” when you call (815) 836-0030 or fill out the form below.

The post Your Company Laptop Was Stolen – Now What? appeared first on Andromeda Technology Solutions.

Users of Windows XP, Windows 2003, Windows 7 and Server 2008 got an unexpected benefit from Microsoft recently.

All of the OS's mentioned above have reached the end of their support lives and the company hasn't been issuing new security updates for them. However, they made a rare exception in the case of patching CVE-2019-0708.

CVE-2019-0708 is a critical security flaw that allows hackers to exploit the Remote Desktop Service and gain access to a target system without any authentication.

Windows 8 and later versions are unaffected by this flaw, but there are millions of vulnerable users still on the older operating systems we named above who are vulnerable.� Microsoft threw them a lifeline releasing the patch that addressed this issue, along with 79 other security flaws.

Last year, the malware strain known as Wannacry swept across the globe, infecting hundreds of thousands of systems, most of which were running older OS's.� Fearing that something similar could happen this year, the company took the extraordinary step of issuing an unexpected security patch.

While the smart money says that you should already be well into making plans to migrate away from these older operating systems with little to no support, that may not be possible for everyone.� At the very least then, be sure you grab the latest security patch from Microsoft, which will undoubtedly buy you at least a bit more time.

Honestly though, at this point, the only safe move is to migrate to a more modern OS with all possible speed, even if it means some short-term discomfort.� Wannacry devastated thousands of businesses of all shapes and sizes. Microsoft isn't going to continue making heroic efforts to save a user base unwilling to migrate forever.

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