MSPNetworks Blog

Nostalgia is a powerful force. It can drive us to look to the past for things we once loved, such as the music we listened to over the years. However, what if the music you loved was lost forever?

This could be the case for many, as older hard drives that archive this music have been discovered to have failed. Let’s examine the situation to see what lessons any small-to-medium-sized business can learn.

Your computer has a brain, of sorts, in its CPU… a tiny square that literally enables everything the device does, as it processes billions of instructions at a time. Of course, to support this on such a relatively tiny piece of hardware, most CPUs are packed with microscopic transistors—these transistors being small enough to fit hundreds on a single blood cell.

When taking stock of your business assets, technology is particularly critical to pay attention to. Let’s discuss why this is and what you must do to manage it properly.

It is important to keep modern computers clean, and laptops are no exception. However, a laptop's different form factor makes cleaning it much different from cleaning a traditional desktop computer.

Every organization, whether it’s a farm with a stable full of horses or an office with a stable filled with people, depends on its access to the Internet. Most people take for granted their ability to connect whether it be with their smartphone via Wi-Fi or their workstation, which is typically hardwired. There is a whole infrastructure behind the near ubiquitous Internet access you enjoy. Today, we will go through some of the essential hardware needed. 

Modem

A modem is used to convert digital data from a computer into analog signals for transmission over analog communication lines (such as cable or fiber) or vice versa. It’s the central device of your network as it allows for connection to the Internet. 

Router

Routers are a fundamental networking device that connects different networks together, such as your local network to the Internet. They route data packets between devices in your network and external networks.

Switch

Network switches are used to connect multiple devices within a local area network (LAN). They operate at the data link layer of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model and forward data only to the device it is intended for.

Access Point 

Wireless access points are used to create or extend wireless networks. They allow Wi-Fi enabled devices to connect to a wired network.

Firewall

Firewalls are security devices that filter and monitor network traffic, helping to protect a network from unauthorized access, malware, and other security threats. They need to be updated regularly to ensure that you have all the necessary threat definitions covered.

Hub

Hubs are basic network devices that connect multiple devices in a Local Area Network (LAN). However, they operate at the physical layer and simply broadcast data to all connected devices, which can result in network congestion.

Network Attached Storage

Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices are specialized storage systems designed to store and manage data accessible over a network, providing file sharing and backup capabilities.

Many times modern networking forgoes the physical connections, but many businesses still employ all types of network connections and cables to facilitate the needs of their staff. If you would like to learn more about modern networking and how we can help you build a secure and robust network for your business, regardless of your business, give the IT professionals at MSPNetworks a call today at (516) 403-9001.

Let’s face it; running a business can be expensive, and taking any measures possible to mitigate those costs can have huge benefits for your bottom line. One way companies are minimizing costs is by implementing a Bring Your Own Device policy, or BYOD, to allow employees to use their own personal devices for work purposes. We’re here to help you do so without putting security at risk.

But first, what does a Bring Your Own Device policy entail, and why is it so popular and effective for businesses?

BYOD is More Than Just an Employee Convenience

BYOD, when implemented properly, can give your employees the ability to use their personal devices for work purposes, opening up a whole range of benefits for both the employer and the employee. For the employee, they get to use a device they are familiar with, allowing them to be more productive. For the employer, they save capital by not having to provide employees with technology.

These benefits, however, are only effective when the devices are properly managed and secured. Let’s discuss some ways you can keep BYOD from becoming a liability for your company.

Issues Related to BYOD Strategy

Plan Ahead

Most business decisions cannot be made haphazardly, especially when it comes to technology implementation. You’ll want to take your time and consider the various elements involved with any change to your technology strategy. For example, you will want to consider that your business is working with data, and that data should not be accessed by anyone without the proper permissions; especially on a device that you don’t have much control over.

This is where classification comes in. Assign levels of classification to dictate who can access which data and on which devices. A good rule to follow is that you should work from the principle of least privilege. Provide the least amount of access possible for your staff to do their jobs, and nothing more until it becomes evident that they need further access. The fewer people who can access said data, the more secure it will be.

Be Prepared for Problems

The best way to prevent issues from escalating is to expect them to happen and be ready to address them. You might run into issues with your expectations for the policy differing from your team’s, which could lead to friction between management and your workforce. As such, you need to be ready to respond to situations where your authority and their privacy might clash.

We recommend that you always be transparent with your team about security and make sure their privacy is a priority whenever possible. We’ll cover this topic in greater detail in a moment, but for now, try to make security as easy as possible by providing them with easy-to-use tools like password managers and antivirus to reduce friction whenever possible.

Weigh Privacy and Security Appropriately

Ultimately, the trickiest part about BYOD is managing the balance between security and privacy in a way where your team feels respected and in control of their own technology, not the other way around. Your BYOD policy should maintain privacy without sacrificing security, something that a mobile device management tool can make much easier to manage. This will help to reduce friction whenever possible.

Let MSPNetworks Help

If you’re ready to implement BYOD, we can help make the process easier. To learn more, call us at (516) 403-9001 today.

Google’s Project Zero team has discovered 18 zero-day vulnerabilities impacting the Samsung Exynos modems—four of which enable remote code execution. Let’s talk about what this issue does, and what needs to be done to minimize risk.

These Threats are Severe and Need to Be Addressed

Without going too far into the weeds, some of these vulnerabilities—which, in addition to mobile devices, were also identified in wearables and vehicles—can be carried out with the attacker only knowing the target’s phone number and can give the attacker access to the device with no need for the target to provide access. In fact, a vulnerable device could be compromised without the target even being made aware.

Samsung’s list of impacted devices includes:

• Samsung mobile devices, including those in the S22, M33, M13, M12, A71, A53, A33, A21, A13, A12 and A04 series
• Vivo mobile devices, including those in the S16, S15, S6, X70, X60 and X30 series
• Google’s Pixel 6 and Pixel 7 series

Plus, any wearables that use the Exynos W920 chipset and vehicles with the Exynos Auto T5123 chipset are also impacted. It is also important to note that this is by no means an exhaustive list.

Patches Aren’t All Available as Of Yet, But There is a Fix

Because this issue impacts devices from so many vendors and manufacturers, patches aren’t necessarily available for everything that is going to be impacted. However, you should disable Wi-Fi calling and Voice-over-LTE to prevent the threat, and update your devices when patches are released.

For most of the common smartphones, like the recent Google Pixel phones and Samsung Galaxy phones, these updates were pushed out in the March security patch. If you own these devices, you need to make sure you apply these updates because not doing so will leave your device extremely vulnerable to attack.

We’re Here to Help You Manage the Complicated IT Businesses Require

Reach out to us for any assistance needed with implementing these fixes, or any of the rest of your IT. Call us at (516) 403-9001 today for help.

Magnets are often portrayed as the bane of technology’s existence, especially in media where data must be scrubbed from devices through the use of a magnet. How true is this representation of the relationship between magnets and technology? We’ll examine this in today’s blog article.

Science Says Magnets Aren’t Necessarily the Problem

Scientifically speaking, magnets are not great for your computer or your smartphone. That much is indisputable. However, there are a lot of other factors in play, especially the duration of the exposure and the strength of the magnet.

Think about the weak magnets you use to pin your kids’ drawings up on the refrigerator. They are magnets, but they are nowhere near strong enough to cause measurable or permanent damage to any of your devices. Magnets in this context are generally designed to be as strong as they need to be, and no more, specifically so they don’t cause unforeseen issues.

If you want to cause some real damage to a device, you need the heavy-duty, industrial-sized magnets. They are the ones you need to watch out for.

How Dangerous Are Magnets to Your Technology?

If you aren’t working in an industry where you are constantly exposed to such technology, then you should have little to fear from magnets actually causing damage to your technology. Such magnets are often turned off when not in use, as well, as there is no need for them to be functional all the time.

Here’s a fun fact: magnets are actually a crucial part of your current workplace, as they are used in hard drives to read and write data. To put this into context, the aforementioned fridge magnets are nowhere near as powerful as the ones found in a hard drive, and solid state drives don’t utilize magnets at all. There is no chance that such weak magnets could ever damage your average business technology solutions unless you are trying VERY hard to mess things up.

Smartphones, though, are a different story. Smartphones are made with magnetic materials, and as such, are somewhat susceptible to issues from magnets, but problems should disappear after the exposure ceases. Smartphones don’t store data on magnetic disks like with hard drives, so if these devices are exposed to magnets, certain functionality could be disabled temporarily, but it’s not a permanent problem or even a remotely serious one. On the same token, so many smartphone accessories like smart keyboards, cases, and other peripherals use magnets, and don’t affect the longevity of the device at all. 

Ultimately, You Shouldn’t Really Worry That Much

All in all, the big thing to keep in mind regarding magnets is that you shouldn’t bring your technology around heavy-duty, powerful magnets. The average user has virtually no chance of suffering serious or permanent damage from your everyday magnet. Still, we will caution you against testing this yourself.

We hope you found today’s article interesting! Be sure to let us know what other topics you’d like covered in future blog articles.

For millions of people, the rubber ducky is a benign reminder of childhood. Depending on when you were a child, the rendition of Sesame Street’s Ernie singing “Rubber Duckie, you’re the one,” is ingrained in your mind every time you hear the term. Unfortunately, the Rubber Ducky we are going to tell you about today has only fond recollection for people who are looking to breach networks they aren’t authorized to access or deliver malware payloads that are designed to cause havoc. 

What is the Rubber Ducky?

The Rubber Ducky is a device that looks like a regular flash drive that you would use to transfer files from one PC to another. We’ve all used them, and with most of us moving to cloud-based platforms, they don’t seem to be as popular as they once were. Well, despite that notion, the USB flash drive industry is growing at a pretty impressive 7% year-over-year, and is currently a $7+ billion industry. That means there are a lot of USB flash drives being created every year and that means that there are millions of them just floating around. 

The Rubber Ducky is more than your average USB flash drive, however. It looks like one, but when it is plugged into a computer, it is read as a simple accessory like a keyboard. This means that any defensive measure that is set up to thwart potentially dangerous data transmission is already worked around when the device gets plugged in, making it much easier for the device to work for the hacker’s end goals, whatever they are. Any keystroke taken while the device is open, is trusted, making the sky the proverbial limit when it comes to device access. 

What Kind of Threat Is the Modern Rubber Ducky?

Any USB dongle needs to be carefully considered before inserting it into your computer, but the Rubber Ducky is designed to overcome the limitations of previous versions of the hardware. The new version makes a major upgrade in that it runs on the “DuckyScript” programming language that the device will use to create demands on any target machine. Other iterations of the Rubber Ducky were limited to writing what are known as “keystroke sequences”, the new DuckyScript is a feature-rich language, which lets users write functions, store variables, and use logic to make it possible to carry out complex computations. 

Now the Rubber Ducky can determine which operating system is running a machine and deploy code that allows for hackers to get into the appropriate software. It can also mask automated executions by adding a delay between keystrokes to make the computing system think that it is human. Most intrusively, it can steal data from any target by encoding it in binary, giving users the ability to extract critical information (such as saved authentication) with ease.

What You Can Do

The best practice here is to not allow strange USB dongles to be placed in your device’s USB drives. Unless you know exactly where the device has come from and what is on it, avoiding interactions with it is the best way to keep away anything unsavory that happens to be on the device to interact with your computer’s OS, and by extension, your network.

Being wary of hardware is just one part of keeping your business and personal information secure. MSPNetworks can help build a cybersecurity strategy that takes into account all types of malware deployment methodology, keeping you from any problematic experiences with your IT. Give us a call today at (516) 403-9001 to learn more. 

In efforts to curb the semiconductor shortage and jumpstart the technology industry, the United States Congress passed legislation that includes funding for manufacturing semiconductors. Partially in response to China’s increasing economic influence and partially in response to the semiconductor shortage, the CHIPS Act could be just what industry leaders need to kickstart the manufacturing of these important devices.

The “CHIPS and Science Act”

Many industry leaders have lobbied for Congress to take action, industry leaders like Intel’s CEO, Pat Gelsinger, as it has been predicted that the chip shortage could go well into 2024 if nothing is done about it. Intel was in the process of building its third semiconductor factory in the state of Ohio, but its progress has stalled due to delays in the legislation of the CHIPS act. The initial price tag associated with this factory is about $20 billion with costs exceeding $100 billion over the next decade.

The CHIPS Act is an acronym that stands for Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors. It contains $280 billion, of which $52 billion will be allocated to support the domestic production of semiconductors. It is suspected that this investment in manufacturing could potentially lower the costs of devices that depend on them.

Semiconductors are used to power many of the business-critical technologies used by both enterprises and small businesses alike. They are used in workstations, server units, appliances, and even cars. It’s safe to say that this funding is a necessary step toward resolving the ongoing supply chain issues that have plagued businesses since the start of the pandemic.

The Supply Chain Doesn’t Have to Be Your Problem

If you have tried to purchase technology for your business, you know that right now it can be particularly difficult to get the technology you need, when you need it. The issues with the semiconductor shortage have had profound impacts on the way companies acquire important hardware, but this doesn’t mean that you have to suffer the consequences of it. If you’re sick and tired of searching for the right tools for the job, then MSPNetworks can help you out.

With our technicians on your side, you can get the most value out of your current solutions while also focusing on your needs in both the near and distant future. We can build a technology roadmap that accounts for issues like the current supply chain challenges so you can move forward with a sense of direction.

To learn more about what we can do for your business, contact us at (516) 403-9001.

For modern organizations that depend highly on their technology, nothing is quite so scary as an event that can completely marginalize its ability to operate. This doesn’t need to be a fire, flood, or some other major cataclysm; it could be something as simple as some of your old IT fails and you’re not ready for it. This week, we thought we’d briefly go through what a catastrophic failure looks like and some steps you can take to keep your business from experiencing one.

What Does a Catastrophic Failure Entail?

Since all of our lives are increasingly digital, it stands to reason that our businesses and organizations are. This means that your business absolutely depends on the technology you’ve chosen and when it fails, your endeavors tied to it likely do too. Today’s business uses digital systems for all of their productivity and storage needs, but also their communications, collaboration, customer interaction, and even their administrative management. This is why, when situations arise that put these systems in peril, your whole organization is as well. 

You do so much to combat downtime; so when a situation comes along that threatens the very integrity of the systems your business depends on, it can be really frightening. But today we aren’t talking about threats, we are talking about catastrophe. Honestly, failures happen in the best-designed, expertly-implemented, and constantly-supported IT infrastructures. How your business is able to rebound after that failure, and what you do to help avoid others, are controllable. 

When you have a catastrophic failure of your IT infrastructure, it means that the systems are not working and are inaccessible to the people who use them every day to make your business run. This typically means that they have been taken offline by some event that is bigger than the risk mitigation efforts you’ve put in place. Some events like a housing failure only happen in the case of major weather disasters, power surges that destroy internal components, and utilities that aren’t available to run the underlying infrastructure. There are steps you can take to help mitigate the long-term effects these types of failures have on your business. They include:

• Deploying two separate sources of power
• Deploying uninterruptible power supplies 
• Choosing vendors with high availability systems in place
• Undertaking routine building maintenance

These are basically common sense variables that can help your business in innumerable ways. The problem becomes when you do all these things and your business is presented with a situation where nothing you could have done to protect these systems happens. You’d think that this makes a compelling argument to virtualize your whole business computing infrastructure, but in many of the situations where you wouldn’t be able to run onsite hardware, you won’t have access to electricity or the bandwidth you need to access these servers anyway. That’s not to say that cloud computing isn’t a good contingency for catastrophic hardware failure, especially if your team can work remotely.

Hardware aside, catastrophic failure can be brought on by other means as well. Hacking, malware, and user error can bring productivity to a grinding halt and present your business with major challenges. That is why it is important to make sure to do all the right things to protect these systems from breach. You will need a comprehensive training regimen for your staff to ensure they understand how to spot phishing attacks, how to protect your business through the use of password best practices, and what to do if they come across situations that can ruin your business’ continuity. 

Unfortunately, the most exposed part of your business may be your most important. Your data can be corrupted from hardware or software failure, interception in transit, and several other means. Since it is such a big part of your business’ success, it stands to reason that it would be a big part of your business’ failure if it were corrupted, lost, or stolen. 

At MSPNetworks, we like to see businesses thriving because of their technology, not ruined because it doesn’t work. Our knowledgeable technicians can do a lot for a business: We can monitor and manage network-attached resources and infrastructure. We can help you put in policies and procedures, train your staff, and consult you on new purchases. We can also help you put together a comprehensive business continuity plan that will get your business back on its feet fast no matter what happens to the underlying infrastructure and resources. Give us a call today for more information at (516) 403-9001.  

Businesses that depend on their technology try to stick with it as long as they can so as to not incur large unnecessary costs. Ironically, that may be the thing that is causing a lot of those costs. Today, we thought we would take a look at a couple of variables that can let you know it’s time to upgrade away from your current technology. 

Deciding when to upgrade your business’ technology isn’t always cut and dry. You have to consider the pricing and deployment models you want, and probably most importantly, whether or not the new technology strategy will be disruptive to your team’s productivity. Additionally, you need to know that when you do look to upgrade new technology that it will be compatible with your business’ needs.

Why Upgrade at All?

If you’ve been using the same technology for several years without many problems, you may ask, “why even upgrade at all?” Outdated technology can cost you in several ways, let’s briefly go through a few.

• Downtime - Older technology is prone to failure. Computers are extraordinarily complex machines and after some time their components can fail. Failing technology is one of the most recognized causes of downtime. Since there is so much operational capital tied up in your employees, technology failures can cause a lot of time where your staff is not actively working on revenue-generating or business-building tasks.
• Turnover - One situation that many businesses find themselves in over the past couple of years is a significant employee turnover. One of the main reasons cited by people leaving organizations is that their technology isn’t kept up to date. Employees, especially the younger ones just entering the workforce, demand suitable technology to work on, otherwise they will find an organization that has it. 
• Lack of Support - If your business has been using the same technology for a while, you may run into a situation where the software is no longer supported by the developer. This can be a major problem as unsupported and unpatched software has a significantly larger chance to have vulnerabilities. More vulnerabilities mean that it has a better chance of being hacked. 

What is the Average Refresh Timeline?

For the average business, you should consider refreshing your technology every three-to-five years. This is largely because of the factors listed above as well as the propensity for new technologies that are developed that can better help your processes. You can often get away with keeping your technology past five years, but remember, it may be more unreliable the longer you use it. 

What Types of Technology Need to be Upgraded?

Sure, your physical infrastructure needs to be constantly maintained and refreshed regularly, but most of that is due to the need to run the applications (with corresponding storage) that you need to run your business. Today, there are many more options available than just purchasing new servers. You can choose to utilize cloud-based servers, effectively offshoring your computing infrastructure to service providers that maintain the infrastructure you host your applications on. This can provide substantial cost savings insofar as you will be paying service fees rather than having to come up with large amounts of capital to purchase new infrastructure or pay a hefty amount of interest on a lease. 

It’s just not your central infrastructure that needs to be updated, either. You need to replace routers, switches, workstations, and accessories on top of implementing new technologies that may help automate parts of your business. All-in-all, it is important to consider the return each part of your computing infrastructure will have on your day-to-day operations and set up a refresh schedule that prioritizes them. Then you can piecemeal the rest of it as you go.

How We Can Help

At MSPNetworks, we can not only help you plan out your refresh schedule, we can use our vendor relationships to procure your new technology fast. Our team of technicians can design, deploy, and support your entire business’ computing infrastructure to ensure that your new technology investments are working for your business. Give us a call at (516) 403-9001 to have a discussion about how you plan to move your company’s computing refresh forward today. 

Try as we might, we can’t prevent all computer issues from occurring—for instance, there’s not much that we can do if a stick of RAM dies, at least, not remotely. However, if you’re stuck with a broken computer and need to bring it in for repair work, there are a few things we recommend you do.

Pick a Provider You Trust

The hard truth of the matter is that some places are just a better option than others when it comes to your hardware repair needs. There are, of course, differences in the quality of services rendered, but also in how these services are rendered. For instance, it is important that you take the provider’s privacy policies into consideration. Just consider how much data you’re handing over to your provider in the hopes that they’ll keep it secure.

Before you entrust your technology to just any repair service or maintenance provider, do a bit of research and ask a few questions. For instance, what kind of privacy policy do they have? What—in detail—do they do to ensure your data remains secure, and if your data happens to be leaked, what measures will be implemented to mitigate the damage? You need to be confident that your provider is going to provide their services responsibly.

Maintain a Data Backup (Just in Case)

Okay, just to be clear: there is generally a very, very small chance that a repair shop will cause data loss. Saying this, very, very small isn’t zero. This is just one more reason that a data backup is so crucial. Disasters can come in all shapes and sizes, and accidental or unavoidable data loss during maintenance would qualify as such. Abiding by a BDR (backup and disaster recovery) strategy can mitigate the negative effects of these circumstances.

If Possible, Remove or Protect Your Personal Data

Without questioning the overall trustworthiness of any business or organization you choose to work with, there’s once again a non-zero chance that there’s a less-than-scrupulous employee there who might be tempted to take advantage of the data on the device being repaired. If you can, it is always better to remove this data before handing the device over, although storing the data in an encrypted state is also advisable. That way, even if your data is accessed, it won’t do the person responsible any good.

Retain Your Software Keys

Software is critically important for your productivity, so you’ll want to also have the ability to—just in case the repair process removes it—reinstall the software you rely on. To do so, you’ll need to have the software keys to activate it. Keeping these keys will therefore be a form of insurance for everything, from your productivity software down to the operating system itself.

Just in This Case, Make Your Device Easily Accessible

This is the one exception to our typical rule, as you don’t want the support professional to have any more difficulty than they already will have in dealing with the issue. To do this, they’ll need access. Removing the password requirement to log in will help.

On a related note, you might consider writing up a brief description of what the user is experiencing and providing it along with the device. If your device is in a condition that allows it, you can have a file containing this information display upon startup by saving a copy ro the Startup folder (found here: %appdata%\\microsoft\\windows\\start menu\\programs\\startup\\)

Things Break, So It Pays Off to Be Prepared to Fix Them

With what amounts to a guarantee that things are going to break at some point, it only makes sense to be fully prepared to deal with this outcome. The above list is a great starting point. Working with an MSP can make all of this (and more) far easier to manage.

An MSP (or managed service provider) like us can not only assist you in obtaining hardware maintenance services, we can remotely monitor it to detect software and hardware issues and resolve any issues we can preemptively. Working with us could be the difference between an extended downtime incident and a slight hiccup.

Interested in learning more about the benefits to be had from a managed service agreement? Give us a call at (516) 403-9001 today!

Laptops are pretty great, I think we can all agree, simply due to their portability. Having said that, the one-screen situation that laptops bring with them can certainly get in the way of productivity—particularly for those who are used to using more than one. Let’s discuss why an additional display is so helpful, and what your options may be for hooking one up to your laptop.

Why an Additional Screen is Worth It

First off, if you haven’t used a second monitor to work yet, it’s time to get on board. The average business workstation really should have two displays, simply because it has shown to provide a significant boost to productivity. Instead of rearranging tabs and windows each time you need something else in focus, double the working area gives you considerably more options. Need to check your email pretty consistently throughout the day? Have it up on one of your monitors, while your current task is up on the other. Need to check data? Have a historical record on one side, with the new version on the other.

Honestly, once you start using multiple monitors, just having access to one feels restrictive.

Plus, adding an additional monitor doesn’t have to be a bank-breaking investment—provided the monitor you’re choosing isn’t too expensive (which, for business purposes, it usually doesn’t need to be). The other hardware you have has probably already been configured to add an additional monitor by adding at least one additional port.

How to Check That Your Laptop Supports Multiple Monitors

In terms of hardware, there are a few questions you need to ask yourself:

• Does my device’s graphics card support multiple monitors? Nowadays, this is simple enough to determine. All you need to do is visit the manufacturer of the graphics card’s website, find your particular model of graphics card, and check the specifications to see if multiple monitors are supported. Of course, IT can help you with this.
• Does your laptop have the right port available? Naturally, you’ll need a way to plug your additional display(s) into your device. We’ll cover this in deeper detail in a moment.

Once you’ve confirmed that your laptop can support more than one monitor input, all you really need to do is plug in your additional display and—once Windows either prompts you to set it as an additional screen or just does it itself—you’re off to the races.

Otherwise, you can access your Settings, and from there, navigate through System, Display, and scrolling down to Multiple displays, adjust the provided drop-down menu so that Extend these displays is selected.

Which of These Ports Can Be Used?

When it comes to attaching an additional monitor, there are a few different ports to choose from.

VGA Ports

While this is an older option, some devices still have a VGA port (the blue trapezoid with all the little pinholes in it, with two attachments on either side for connecting the cable). Not all monitors will have this option anymore, but VGA to HDMI adapters are also an option. Speaking of which…

HDMI/microHDMI Ports

HDMI (short for High-Definition Multimedia Interface) is more or less the standard, and so can be found on most devices. Similar in size to a USB port, these connections have a unique shape that most modern monitors and even televisions support. What’s more, these cables are quite easy to come by—there’s a good chance your display came with one—and are commonly used by various professional and consumer devices.

Some devices, like the smaller laptops that have become common for business use, might have a microHDMI port available for your use. While cables with a micro HDMI end may be a little harder to come by, this still should not be too challenging. If you can’t find a micro HDMI cable, adapters to standard HDMI are plentiful.

DVI

DVI—or Digital Visual Interface—connectors are very versatile, enabling many different screens to still work with modern devices. This allows a level of backwards compatibility that could potentially save your company a bit of money if you happen to have some older displays in working order. DVI cables come with one of a variety of connector types, so make sure you check with IT to ensure you have a cable that will work with your laptop and chosen display.

DisplayPort Ports

Similar in appearance to the familiar HDMI, DisplayPort ports are the ones with only one beveled corner. These ports will require you to use a DisplayPort cable.

Adding a Dock Could Contribute More Options

Some of the more modern ports that are found on different laptops—namely USB-C and Thunderbolt—also allow you to connect a type of additional hardware to your computer to further expand how many monitors you can use. Plus, a dock makes it far easier to extricate your laptop from all the connections it has when you need to take advantage of the laptop’s inherent mobility.

Of course, this will require you to procure the right dock that has compatible ports with your particular model of laptop. That, along with all the other considerations we referenced in this blog, is how MSPNetworks can help.

Part of our many responsibilities is to ensure that your team has the tools they need to be as productive as possible—and yes, using multiple monitors has been shown to have legitimate benefits to productivity due to the uses we covered at the very beginning of this blog. Of course, there are a lot of ways that we can help you make the most of your technology beyond helping you set up multiple monitors.

For more information about the scope of our managed services, check out the rest of our website, or give us a call at (516) 403-9001.

For the past two weeks we have looked at some of the best phones and some that bring the most value. This week, we turned our gaze to a form factor that is only a couple of years old, but seems to be the future of mobile technology, foldable screens. The different form factors made possible by foldable OLED technology make the future of mobile devices more exciting. Let’s take a look at three of the top foldable devices right now.

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold3 5G

A couple of years ago Samsung came out with their first foldable device, the Galaxy Z Fold, and while the device itself wasn’t anything to really write home about, it did usher in a whole new era of mobile computing. The Galaxy Z Fold3, the third iteration of the line, is by far the most notable of the foldable devices.

The Z Fold3 is built on an aluminum frame with Gorilla Glass Victus front and back. When the phone is folded, it has a 6.2-inch, Dynamic AMOLED 2X, 832 x 2268px display that has a booming 120 hertz refresh rate. Basically they put a high-end, mid-size smartphone screen on the outside cover of the phone. This means that it can ostensibly be used folded up most of the time, but unfolded it gives you a nice tablet-like experience. The larger screen is made from plastic, but it’s remarkable how it doesn’t lose any effectiveness.

The rest of the phone has flagship specs. It runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G chip, and comes with a whopping 12 GB of RAM and 256 or 512 GB of onboard storage. The device runs Android 11, but is able to be upgraded to Android 12 and Samsung’s One UI OS. More and more applications are being designed to take advantage of the foldable screen and the flexibility it gives users.

The Z Fold3 features a 12 MP wide-angle lens with Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), a 12 MP telephoto lens with 2x zoom and OIS, and a 12 MP ultra wide-angle lens. The front-facing camera on the large display is a 4 MP in-display wide-angle lens, while the cover camera is 10 MP wide-angle lens. Overall, the Z Fold3 presents a pretty impressive cache of cameras to do most anything you would need a smartphone to do.

The battery is pretty small at 4,400 mAh, but comes with 25 Watt fast charging to offset the lowly 75 hour endurance rating. For security, there is a side-mounted fingerprint sensor. Other features include a iPX8 water resistance rating, Samsung’s DeX capability and 5G capability.

This ingenious device is available in Phantom Black, Phantom Silver, Phantom Green, Thom Browne Edition, and an exclusive Wooyoungmi Edition, the Galaxy Z Fold3 costs nearly $2,000 from Samsung and most major cell carriers.

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold3 5G

Body: Aluminum Frame, Gorilla Glass Victus front and back, plastic large display

Display: Closed - 6.2-inch Super AMOLED 2X, 120 Hz, 832 x 2,268 (~374 ppi); Open - 7.6-inch Super AMOLED 2X, 120 Hz, 1768 x 2208

OS: Android 11; upgradable to Android 12, One UI 4.0

Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 888

Memory: 12 GB RAM; 256-to-512 GB onboard storage

Expandable Memory: No

Cameras: Rear - 12 MP, 26mm, OIS; 12 MP 52mm 2x optical zoom OIS; 12 MP 123º ultrawide. Front of device - 10 MP 26mm; Front of folded display - 4 MP under-display

Sounds: Stereo Sound

Battery (battery endurance rating): 4,400 mAh (75 hours)

Security: Side-mounted fingerprint sensor

Miscellaneous: Samsung DeX, IPX8 water resistant, 24W fast charging

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip3

Samsung is definitely the leader in foldable devices. As the Z Fold3 is an engineering marvel, the Z Flip3 brings back one of the most popular form factors in smartphone history. The Z Flip3 is Samsung’s best folding phone for people who want both a compact device and a large smartphone experience. The Z Flip3 is effectively a flagship smartphone that folds in half for safekeeping.

The device is made on an aluminum frame, it has a plastic front and a back made from Gorilla Glass Victus. The screen is made from plastic and houses a 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X display that comes in at 1,080 x 2,640 pixels and sports a 120 Hz refresh rate. Not bad for a phone that folds in half. When folded there is a 1.9-inch Super AMOLED screen for quick view of time and notifications.

The device runs Android 11 (upgradable to Android 12 with Samsung’s One UI 4.0) on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 FG chip. It comes with 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB or 258 GB of onboard storage. For security it has a side-mounted fingerprint sensor.

The camera on the Z Flip3 has a 12 MP wide-angle lens and a 12 MP ultrawide angle lens, while the selfie camera is a 10 MP wide-angle lens. The battery is a paltry 3,300 mAh offering that allows for 15W fast charging. At a 69-hour endurance rating, the device is at the low end of the premium smartphone market…but it folds in half.

Available in a litany of colors including Phantom Black, Green, Cream, Pink, Dream White and more, the Z Flip3 runs about $1,000 from your friendly neighborhood cell carrier or from Samsung directly.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip3

Body: Aluminum frame, plastic front, Gorilla Glass Victus back

Display: 6.7-inch Foldable Dynamic AMOLED 2X, 120 Hz, 1,080 x 2,640px

OS: Android 11; Upgradable to Android 12, Samsung One UI 4.0

Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G

Memory: 8 GB RAM; 128 GB-to- 256 GB of onboard storage

Expandable Memory: No

Cameras: Rear - 12 MP 27mm OIS; 12 MP 123º; Front - 10 MP 26mm

Sounds: Stereo sound

Battery (battery endurance rating): 3,300 (69 hours)

Security: Side-mounted fingerprint sensor

Miscellaneous: IPX8 water resistant, 15 W fast charging

Microsoft Surface Duo 2

Samsung might have superiority over the foldable device space, but other manufacturers are creating some pretty useful devices, too. Microsoft is one of them and their newest folding smartphone is a big upgrade over the first Surface Duo. Well, it has cameras this time at least.

The Surface Duo 2 has great build quality, what you would expect from a Surface line product. There is no outside display like you would find on the Samsung devices, but when closed there is enough of the wrap-around screen to show the time, notifications, and other information. When the device is open there are effectively two 5.8-inch AMOLED panels that add up to a total of an 8.3-inch screen when it’s completely folded out as it functions with large bezels.

The Surface Duo 2 runs Android 11 on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G chip and has 8 GB of RAM and can go up to 512 GB of onboard storage. It comes with a side-mounted fingerprint sensor for security. The battery of the Duo 2 is a 4,449 mAh power cell with available 23W fast charging.

Microsoft decided to put a full suite of cameras on this year's model, a feature that was suspiciously left off of last year’s. The rear mounted cameras have a 12 MP wide-angle lens with OIS, a 12 MP telephoto lens with 2x optical zoom and OIS and a 16 MP ultra wide-angle lens. The front-facing camera is a 12 MP wide-angle lens.

Available in Glacier and Obsidian, the Microsoft Duo 2 is currently being sold for $1,500 online and at microsoft.com.

Microsoft Surface Duo 2

Body: Plastic frame, Gorilla Glass Victus front and back

Display: 8.3-inch AMOLED, 90 hz, 1,832 x2,688 (~401 ppi)

OS: Android 11

Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 888

Memory: 8 GB RAM; 128-to-512 GB onboard storage

Expandable Memory: No

Cameras: Rear - 12 MP 27mm OIS; 12 MP 51mm telephoto 2x optical zoom OIS; 16 MP 13 mm; Front - 12 MP 24mm

Sounds: Stereo sound

Battery (battery endurance rating): 4,449 mAh

Security: Side-mounted fingerprint reader

Miscellaneous: Stylus support

The foldable phone, or some other form factor using the incredible OLED foldable panels, is definitely not a fad. Once manufacturers can roll out these devices for less, you will see more people snatching them up.

Of the three devices we went through, what was your favorite? Are there any other devices that you would recommend to other users? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below and check back to our blog for more great technology content.

How often over the past year or two have you gone to replace a device on your infrastructure, only to find that the price has increased or the device simply isn’t available? This is an issue with the current hardware shortage, particularly for business electronics. Since businesses depend on technology, it becomes critical that you understand how this shortage impacts your day-to-day operations.

As you are surely well aware, there is a hardware shortage out there for computing devices due to a component shortage. This shortage stems from semiconductors, and it’s bleeding into every facet of device creation, from manufacturing to acquisition. Naturally, this creates issues for businesses that need to invest in new hardware for their employees. Here are just a few of the ways this shortage has impacted businesses like yours.

Price Point

As the costs of components increase, so too do the costs of the devices they are a part of. This is an unfortunate side-effect of the costs of manufacturing increasing, and the consumers ultimately pay more for devices. This can also impact the costs associated with services offered by providers, as they need to purchase and maintain equipment to manage these services.

Timeline for Acquisition

With hardware being in short supply, you can expect the acquisition of any new devices to take a bit longer than usual—particularly if you are looking for something very specific. We recommend that you build out a hardware acquisition timeline so that you know when and how often you need to perform hardware refreshes on your infrastructure.

It Makes Upkeep Even More Important

Finally, since devices are more expensive and harder to come by, you should understand that upkeep of your current hardware infrastructure is even more important than before. If something critical fails within your infrastructure and you are unable to immediately replace it due to shortages, what happens? Be sure to take care of what you currently have so that you can get as much value out of it as possible before it kicks the bucket.

What We Recommend

MSPNetworks recommends that you work with us to ensure that your hardware needs are met within a reasonable time and at a reasonable cost. Due to our connections and our working relationships with vendors, we know the most reliable ways to get the technology you need to succeed. Plus, it’s always better to have someone else do the legwork for you so you can avoid the frustrations that come from devices simply not being available when you need them most.

To get started, reach out to us at (516) 403-9001.

Businesses go through a lot of technology, but how does your organization dispose of electronics that are no longer in use? Let’s discuss this incredibly important topic, as the improper disposal of devices could not only put your organization at risk, but also the environment.

Why Shouldn’t I Just Throw Out My Old Technology?

There are several reasons why you don’t want to just throw your technology in the trash.

• First, there is no real accountability if you just throw your technology out. If you don’t take care to remove data from the device, it could be accessible to anyone who finds it.
• Second, modern computer components have a ton of hazardous materials in them, meaning that it’s just bad for the environment for them to sit in a landfill.
• Third, it’s wasteful and unnecessary. Many of the components found in these devices can be repurposed or reused, so making sure the device is processed and recycled is a great choice.

It doesn’t matter what the processes or policies of your recycling facility are; you should always go out of your way to make sure that your devices have been appropriately wiped so that any data found on them is inaccessible moving forward—especially if you are recycling the device. It’s also worth asking whoever is disposing of your device if they plan to erase this data and destroy the hard drives so that nothing can be recovered. Chances are this isn’t the case, and if so, we’re happy to assist.

How Electronics are Recycled

Once a computer has been delivered to a reputable recycling center,it will be broken down. Recycling companies will disassemble the device and process the various components and parts. Each of these parts will then be recycled according to best practice. This is also the process for removing hazardous materials from these devices.

These disassembled components are then processed and renewed. These materials are used to create new devices, cutting out waste that would otherwise sit unused in a landfill elsewhere.

Technology is an incredibly important part of running any business, and we want to make sure that you are getting the most out of yours. For help with this, reach out to MSPNetworks at (516) 403-9001.

Historically there have been several methods to transfer data from one system to the next, and while the cloud has rendered many of them irrelevant and unnecessary, that doesn’t mean they aren’t used by people looking to move data quickly. Many professionals still opt to use USB flash drives to keep certain data close at hand, but how at risk does this put the data on these drives?

Quite a bit, actually. Let’s discuss some of the many challenges that businesses face when dealing with USB flash storage and how it pertains to network and information security.

Device Size

Consider how small many of these flash drives are. This makes them compact and easy to carry around, and they can store a surprisingly large amount of data for their size. Unfortunately, when a business owner heavily uses a USB flash drive for any reason, they are constantly putting that data at risk of being lost or stolen. What would happen if the user accidentally dropped it while out and about? While some USB flash drives allow for encryption and passcodes to lock access as needed, this is not always the case. For this reason, many users prefer alternative methods of data transfer.

Information Security

When USB devices are used to transfer data and take it away from the workplace or off of the company network, tracking where, why, and how it is used can become quite problematic, especially when it comes to sensitive data that is governed by the various data privacy guidelines in specific industries. In particular, you should be wary of employees taking information such as customer data, financial information, intellectual property, source code, and other important assets out of the office; just imagine the fallout that could happen if employees were to lose their drive, or worse, sell the information themselves to make a quick buck. It’s just one other reason to not use USB flash drives, or at least partitioning off data based on user roles within your organization.

Threat Vulnerability

Just because USB drives are pretty low-tech compared to more modern solutions does not mean that they are any less immune to security threats. In fact, infected USB flash drives can become vehicles for security threats to access networks. Consider the fact that these devices are used to transfer or copy files from one location to another. The more endpoints a flash drive connects to, the more likely it is to become infected. The possibility of these types of threats becoming problematic has been detailed in the past through tactics such as the BadUSB firmware hack, so they must be taken seriously.

 Ultimately, it is much easier to secure a cloud-based data storage system and the devices used to access it, but you know what they say: old habits die hard. Do you still use a USB storage device, and if so, did you learn a thing or two about how to keep them secure? If you don’t want to worry about USB technology being used in such a controversial way, we recommend that you implement a cloud-based data storage system that eliminates the need to use physical hardware that could be corrupted or damaged in transit.

Do you routinely use USBs to transfer data from one place to another? If so, the knowledgeable professionals at MSPNetworks can help you move past antiquated hardware and provide the means to keep your data safe. Give our consultants a call today at (516) 403-9001. 

Most of us take streaming media for granted. Whether you are streaming a movie on Netflix, binge-watching a show on Hulu, or using one of the growing number of streaming television networks to stream sports, shows, and news, there is quite a bit of interesting technology fueling your entertainment. Today, we thought we’d briefly go through some of the tech that makes these streaming services, and their millions of simultaneous streaming feeds, possible. 

Often, Streaming Media is Not Pushed Through the Internet

If you asked the average streaming service subscriber how they are able to get their entertainment on demand, they would answer that the companies that do it simply push it over the Internet. You have to be connected to the Internet to get the content so it stands to reason that they just beam it over the network connection, right? 

As it turns out, about 85 percent of internet bandwidth is streaming video. That’s a lot of data to send across the internet, to the point where it would be wildly expensive to host these services in the traditional sense and expect it to work effectively for millions of users every day.

So how do they do it? The streaming services have spent a lot of time and money building out streaming infrastructure. Think about how you use your streaming services. You file through a catalog and then select something to play. Nearly instantaneously, the title you’ve chosen plays; on any device you want to view/hear it on. The process used to make this possible is called over-the-top (OTT) streaming.

OTT streaming is the act of delivering content to the user on a particular device. It has five steps. They are:

• Video ingestion - This is the process of adding content to the streaming platform. Streaming services are always updating their content to provide users with new entertainment. 
• Transcoding - With so many different types of devices being supported by streaming services, they need to alter the content’s code to play on the device you are looking to stream content on. Video files are wrapped differently for every platform. 
• Management - This process is simply managing the content for users. Some users pay more for 4K video streaming and other options. This process ensures that the users get the content they are eligible for.
• Delivery - Content Delivery Networks (CDN) is the hardware and software behind the service. Typically, the content is delivered through regional data centers to give users the speed and reliability that they demand. Netflix has their own CDN, as does Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon. Most streaming platforms utilize third-party CDNs due to the cost to build and maintain. In fact, in some cases, Netflix actually sends an entire server with their content library on it to local ISPs so the video content can be delivered to users as effectively as possible.
• Playback - The end result, the playback of the content. Amazingly, all this happens extremely fast and users typically only wait seconds to get the entertainment they want.

Security is Not Cut and Dry

For streaming services—just like your business—keeping their customers’ personal and financial information secure is undeniably important. In fact, nearly 70 percent of businesses are now investing in some sort of video and audio streaming. As a result, finding vulnerabilities in the video dissemination process can be fruitful for the modern hacker. Moreover, for large-scale streaming services they also run into the issue of people frequently sharing their passwords, which is always a red-flag for cybersecurity professionals looking to keep networks secure.

These companies, like many others, also deal with your standard hacks, but when you consider how many people are lackadaisical about their Netflix or Hulu security, it can be much harder for these organizations. Let’s take a look at some of the hacks these organizations frequently deal with:

• Phishing attacks - Phishing attacks are a major problem for everyone, and with so much demand for streaming media, hundreds of lookalike websites have been established on the Internet looking to take advantage of people who are tempted with free subscriptions.
• Credential Stuffing - As mentioned above, it may not be too difficult to get ahold of people’s streaming media access credentials, this can cause major problems for the service itself.
• Brute Force attack - For those hackers who don’t have access, sophisticated software is used to attempt to login through simple trial and error. 
• Man-in-the-Middle - This is just the interception of account credentials and other information by getting between two communicating parties. This is why it is a sound strategy to utilize VPNs and always utilize the multi-factor authentication feature offered by a company.

Streaming media is one of the most utilized services and the number of people using it is growing rapidly. What are your thoughts on the technology used by streaming media? Do you utilize it regularly? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below and return to our blog for more great technology information. 

With such a heavy focus on remote work over the past year or so, if you have tried to procure equipment or technology solutions during this period, you may have noticed that it is much harder than usual to do so. The global chip shortage has led to many challenges for organizations, chief among them getting the parts needed to put together critical technology solutions. This opens up a whole other set of issues, though, particularly in regards to disruption of the supply chain.

First, a little bit of background regarding this issue. With the COVID-19 pandemic disrupting the world so profoundly, the increase in demand for remote technology triggered a massive shortage in the global semiconductor market. So many companies and organizations rushed to purchase new technology to keep their own operations from sinking that the companies responsible for manufacturing semiconductors simply could not keep up with the demand. This demand for semiconductors has had significant impacts on manufacturers of just about all electronics, including the appliance and automobile industries.

Gartner predicts that this shortage will likely last well into 2022, a notion that has turned many organizations and businesses toward finding alternative solutions to their semiconductor shortage woes, lest they suffer from an inability to continue operations. Industry professionals, however, worry that this shortage of parts might open up opportunities for scammers to manufacture and sell fraudulent components.

According to ZDNet, the possibility for fraudsters to take advantage of this opportunity by producing counterfeit products is a very real issue that cannot be avoided. ZDNet reports that there is a precedent for this happening, like with the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan; this triggered a shortage of capacitors for medical devices, a shortage that fraudsters took advantage of by producing counterfeit products.

As for whether or not these counterfeit products are problematic, the answer is a resounding “yes,” but probably not for the reasons that you might suspect. In most cases, the counterfeit semiconductors themselves are either manufactured to appear legitimate or to imitate the real deal, or they are components that have been stripped of all branding and repackaged for resale. In both cases, according to ZDNet, these fraudulent components are not subject to the rigorous quality control procedures that large manufacturers have in place, meaning that they might pass basic quality control checks, but are simply not sustainable long-term.

Now, consider what might happen to businesses or manufacturers who procure these counterfeit products and integrate them into their supply chain and processes. Suddenly these components are actively being used in the same way that real components that have been tested are. What happens when these components fail and lead to disaster? It’s a position that no business wants to find itself in.

When it comes to procuring equipment for your business, you can trust that MSPNetworks will help you get the best deals and the best components for your business. We work with trusted vendors to ensure that you are not shortchanged by unfortunate trends in the market, and since we only work with vendors we trust, you can know with confidence that you are getting devices and components that are legitimate.

To learn more about what we can do for your business, reach out to us at (516) 403-9001.