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How To Make Hashtags Work For Social Media

March 3, 2014

tlfheadshot_web — Thomas Fox is president of Tech Experts, southeast Michigan’s leading small business computer support company.

On the list of the great rewards of social networking is its capability to reach a huge crowd while spending minimal costs. Making use of the famous hashtag notation (especially for Twitter and Instagram), you are able to spread your products and services across the globe, and reap the benefits of well-liked trends.

A hashtag must be short and simple to recall
Crafting a hashtag that is too unique or special could be risky. As much as possible, come up with a hashtag that is brief and straightforward so it can easily be remembered.

Long hashtags are at risk of getting misspelled and forgotten. Additionally, with the 140 character limit of every Twitter post, longer hashtags only consume needless space. Simple abbreviations frequently are very effective.

A hashtag must be unique and relevant at the same time
The primary goal of using a hashtag is to bring online users to your social media page.

Picking a general hashtag that may gain large numbers of results will lower the probability of getting your desired volume of traffic.

It may only just make your posts wander off in the search results. You must make sure that your hashtags are only sufficiently unique to be able to avoid too few results.

A hashtag must be searched first prior to using it
Even though you are confident that you have put together the ideal hashtag, it is still crucial to look for that hashtag prior to applying it.

This is the only way to make certain that you will not get classified with any messages that you are not related to. An example of a hashtag disaster was when a certain company used the hashtag “#notguilty” to express how their customers’ felt after eating their product.

However, this Twitter update was published during a popular person’s murder trial. The hashtag #notguilty became a trend, but for an entirely different cause.

Hashtags serve an excellent purpose which improves your chances of reaching a wider audience. Make sure that you know how to utilize them well.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

How To Prolong The Life Of Your Computer

March 3, 2014

by Jeremy Miller, Technician
One of the questions we get asked most often is, “What can I do to prolong the life of my computer?” We have been working on computers for years and have found that hardware protection and regular maintenance is the best answer.

What is regular maintenance?
Regular maintenance is the general up keep of your computer over time. There is a number of free software out there that offer this service with a stipulation.

They will partially clean up your system or some malicious software will state it will speed up your computer if you upgrade to the paid-for version. You should not trust this free software because it can damage some applications or even your operating system.

What can I do?
There are many things you can implement to prolong the life of your computer. You first want to think about your hardware because all software can be reloaded, but once your hardware fails your computer can crash like a house of cards.

Cooling is Key
The first thing I recommend is to regularly clean out your computer with compressed air. Nothing kills a computer better or faster than high internal temperatures. On average your computer is about 30 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the room it is in.

You can also increase your cooling by adding more fans. Many desktop cases have space for additional fans.
The better the air flow the longer your computer will last. For laptops, you must always ensure the fan vents are not being blocked, and you can increase cooling by using a cooling pad that has additional fans to increase the air flow around your laptop.

Make sure you have reliable power
You should always have your computer powered by a surge protector. If you live in a dwelling that has power fluctuations, you should consider an uninterruptable power supply (UPS) which are also known as a battery backup. Many also protect against brownouts.

Most UPS come with multiple outlets, some are protected by the battery as well as surge protection and some are just surge protected.

UPS will provide regular power to your computer even if your power fluctuates, and it can shut your computer down properly if you lose power.

Without reliable power you can short out just about any component in your computer.

If you shut your computer down incorrectly or if you just lose power you can damage your data and can cause your operating system to stop functioning.

Regular software maintenance
Your computer will accumulate a lot of temporary files from software that does not clean up after itself.

Your hard disk will become cluttered from constantly moving files around, and most computers have old unused software still running in the background.
All of this takes a toll on your computer hardware over time. The idea is to keep the software foot print as small as needed.

The less items you have launch at startup will lead to a much longer computer life. This is because most software needs your processor, Random Access Memory (RAM), and hard drive to run.

The more you have running at one time the higher the stress level on your hardware.

Virus infections may not cause noticeable issues right away but over time you will start to notice things not running properly.

Virus infections and other malicious software can take most of your hardware resources which makes your computer perform poorly. You can attempt to clean these infections out yourself, but without knowing how your computer works, you may end up doing more damage than good.

Is there an easy way to regularly maintain my computer?
We are constantly cleaning out computers and are very familiar with issues that arise in these processes.

We offer a solution to clean out your computer on a daily basis, so that you can continually use your computer without interruption. Our service runs in the background and will take care of most issues that arise.

We can help increase the longevity while you get the most out of your computer. If you are interested in learning more or have questions please feel free to call us.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

What Is Green Computing?

March 3, 2014

by Michael Menor, Network Technician
Green computing is the environmentally responsible and eco-friendly use of computers and their resources. It is also known as Green Information Technology (Green IT).

Green IT aims to achieve economic viability and improve the way computing devices are used.
What can you do to make your business and home more energy efficient?

Shut Down & Switch Off
While putting a computer into a “standby” or “sleep” mode will save a lot of power, many people remain unaware that even shutting down a desktop computer completely does not turn it off.

This is because the computer’s power supply will remain physically switched on, with the motherboard partially powered and waiting for a signal from the switch on the front of the PC (which is not a main power switch) to boot up again.

To prevent a desktop computer from using power, after being shut down it must either be switched off at the wall outlet, or turned off using the small rocker switch on the back of the power supply.

A typical desktop computer uses about 8 watts of electricity an hour when shut down but not switched off.

That’s about 1 kilowatt of electricity being wasted a week for a PC turned off around 16 hours a day.

It therefore really is worth remembering that simply turning off a PC at the back or at the wall when not in use can have a major impact on energy consumption and its environmental impact.

Upgrade: Use Low Power Hardware
If you’re using an older computer, chances are that your energy costs are a lot higher than normal. With the improvement of technology, manufacturers have been able to produce more energy efficient components.

An older Dell OptiPlex desktop purchased in 2003 typically had an Intel Pentium 4 processor, a hard drive that you could hear as it accessed data, and a bulky, powerhogging Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) monitor.

At the time of its release it was state of the art and quick but by today’s standards it is an ancient dinosaur.

Technology is ever changing and these desktops can be easily replaced with faster, more energy efficient hardware. Using the Dell Optiplex as a base line, let’s compare it with today’s business desktops.

Today you will typically find an Intel Core-i3 processor, which runs faster and more efficient, saving you on average 35% on your energy costs.

That old noisy hard disk drive (HDD) can be replaced with a Solid-State Drive (SSD). Since it has no moving parts it is virtually silent, faster and draws less power (2 to 3 watts vs. 6 to 7 watts in a HDD).

And last but not least that 50 pound CRT monitor you have on your desk can be thrown out the window and replaced with a flat-screen (or LCD) monitor.

Your typical 20 inch CRT monitor will consume about 90 to 100 watts; a 20 inch LCD monitor on the other hand only consumes a fraction of that, between 24 to 26 watts.

On average you will spend $3.29/month or $39.42/year to power one CRT monitor. Or you can opt to power an LCD monitor for $0.88/month or $10.50/year.

Average computer users can employ the following general tactics to make their computing usage greener:

• Use “hibernate” or “sleep” modes when away from a computer for extended periods.
• Use flat-screen or LCD monitors, instead of conventional Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) monitors.
• Buy energy efficient notebook computers, instead of desktop computers.
• Activate the power management features for controlling energy consumption.
• Turn off computers at the end of each day.
• Refill printer cartridges, rather than buying new ones.
• Instead of purchasing a new computer, consider upgrading your hardware components.

With all these factors in mind, doing these simple upgrades and having a “Green IT” policy in place can save you money over the long run. If you are interested in making these changes or for more information, please contact us.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

What Is The Real Cost Of IT Downtime?

March 3, 2014

People working with technology understand that downtime happens, whether it is planned (as during upgrades and maintenance) or as an unplanned emergency. Unnecessary downtime often costs an organization significant amounts of money.

Not being able to process sales is perhaps the most direct way in which your company will lose revenue during downtime.

If your sales team uses your company’s online resources in their daily tasks, they won’t be ringing up the sales numbers. Add to this the costs of resolving the issues that caused the downtime, including both labor and materials, you’re left with the direct monetary impact to your organization.

There’s no doubt about it – downtime can damage your company’s reputation. Your customers don’t like to be kept waiting. Downtime may cause late deliveries, interfere with your customers’ ability to place an order or even to contact your customer service.

Efficient business owners understand that employee productivity has a direct impact on the company’s bottom line. It’s crucial that everyone has the tools they need in order to remain productive. Downtime causes loss of productivity, and, therefore, profits.

The only way to maximize uptime is to monitor your systems on an ongoing basis. This will provide you with specific details regarding any issues affecting your organization. If you are experiencing anything less than 99.9 percent uptime, you need to start looking into solutions to resolve the problem. Give us a call today.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

Windows XP: High Risk For Your Business

January 17, 2014

Microsoft will end all support for Windows XP on April 8, 2014. This means that everyone using XP beyond this date will no longer be able to receive security updates from Microsoft, which will turn Windows XP into a liability.

Despite the fact that Windows XP is a dozen years old and sunsets in under five months, it is still widely used by millions of users and claims a 21% market share. Rest assured, the hackers are gearing up for an all-out assault on XP users this spring.

Security reports from the Malicious Software Removal Tool and Microsoft’s free Security Essential program (which scans 400 million Outlook.com accounts and millions of Office 365 accounts), reveals that XP is by far the most infection-prone operating system.

Here are the latest infection rates (the number of infected computers for every 1,000 systems scanned) broken down by OS that contained malware.

Windows XP SP3:
9.1 per 1000 scanned.
Windows Vista SP2:
5.5 per 1000 scanned.
Windows 7 SP1:
4.9 per 1000 scanned.
Windows 8:
1.6 per 1000 scanned.

The data show that Windows XP is almost twice as likely to get an infection compared to Windows 7, and it is six times more likely to be hit with malware than Windows 8. Those figures should prompt even the most ardent XP user to start planning for an upgrade.

It is important to remember that malware is written to attack any system it encounters, and we can see that, by looking at the malware encounter rate from these same security reports, the percentages of computers having encounters with malware is fairly even across the different operating systems.

Windows XP SP3: 16.3%
Windows Vista SP2: 16.5%
Windows 7 SP1: 19.1%
Windows 8 RIM: 12.4%

This report shows that using the latest operating system, such as Windows 7 or Windows 8, is the safest.

Researchers provide a technical explanation as to why newer Windows operating systems have better security: “Microsoft has steadily incorporated defensive technologies into Windows with each new version. The only major technology XP had was Data Execution Prevention (DEP), and even the implementation of that has improved greatly in subsequent versions.”

It is human nature to put off a large upgrade project, especially for a small business where budgets are tight.

Part of our service includes a comprehensive evaluation of your systems and network, with the goal of providing you a report showing which machines on your network are vulnerable, which can be upgraded, and which should be replaced.

We use automated tools for much of this process, so we’re able to offer this service to clients, and prospective clients, at a markedly reduced consulting fee. Please call the office at (734) 457-5000 to schedule your appointment.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

Online Banking: Safety And Security Precautions

January 17, 2014

by Jeremy Miller, Technician
There are many avenues of attack when banking online safely. Many people simply use a computer that is attached to the Internet with little to no precautions at all. Some bank online even if they know there are issues with their computer or virus infections on their computer.

I will cover three levels of precaution that you can take to ensure your online banking information stays secure: simple, advanced, and paranoid. As the level of precaution increases, it will be more time consuming and difficult but worth it if you want to keep your online banking experience safe and secure.

Simple Precautions
To keep your information secure you must make sure that your computer is fully up-to-date with all Windows Updates and other software patches. Software vendors like Microsoft release security patches regularly to close exposed security holes in their software. Without patching hackers can use known-vulnerabilities to attack your computer.

Next you must make sure that you have anti-virus software installed and it is up-to-date with the latest virus definitions. You must also have your anti-virus run scans regularly to make sure the computer is clean of any known infections.

You should always look in the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) bar to make sure the web address you are accessing is the correct one. Also make sure that the first five characters are HTTPS.

This will ensure that your traffic is encrypted, which will make your entire web traffic look like gibberish. If your first characters are only HTTP and not HTTPS then hackers would be able to read your password in plain text.

Lastly, you must only do online banking from trusted-networks like your home network or in some cases your work network. Anyone else attached to your network has the possibility to access your bank information if they have the know-how.

To be sure you are on a secure network, you should not use online banking from public or free networks that anyone can access. When you do this you ensure that only you and your Internet Service Provider (ISP) can view your online traffic.

This will also protect you from man-in-the-middle attacks (MITM).These attacks are when a hacker is in between you and your target destination usually a router. Hackers using MITM attacks will be able to see all unencrypted traffic.

Advanced Precautions
You must ensure you are implementing all simple precautions, including a few more steps you can take to up your protection level.

Run a full virus scan before accessing your online bank account each time. Your system will be clear of known infections, plus it gives you significantly less risk of an infection since your last scan. A full scan looks at every file on your computer and checks it against a known virus database.

You can also configure Windows Firewall to prompt you before allowing traffic in or out of the computer, or you can install a software-firewall to scan your active Internet traffic.

The firewall will prompt you with pop-ups to ask if specific connections are allowed. This will allow you to approve or deny all traffic on your computer. Usually firewalls have different settings to allow you to choose the level of security this firewall will provide.

Paranoid Precautions
This is the most secure of the three and implements the previous precautions. It would be best to boot to a new operating system every time you need to access your online bank account. You need to know how to change your computers boot order and how to create a bootable USB drive or disk.

There are a number of free operating systems that you can load onto a disk or USB drive. WinPE will allow you to boot into a portable version of Windows. This will be a clean installation with no additional software installed.

You can also use the more widely available bootable Linux distributions as a clean bootable operating system to access your bank information. Ensure you are getting your distribution from a reputable vendor.

Most Linux distributions are free. Downloading a reputable vendor will ensure that there isn’t malicious software pre-loaded into the operating system.

If you are interested in enjoying a safer browser experience you can contact us and we can answer any questions or concerns as well as help you implement any of these precautions.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

HIPAA Risk Analysis And Assessment

January 17, 2014

by Michael Menor, Network Technician
The phrases “risk analysis” and “risk assessment” are becoming incredibly commonplace today. They’re littering the blogosphere, popping up in advertisements by newly-announced, so-called experts and being “webinar-ed” to death.

In reality, most people promoting these phrases don’t know what they’re talking about. They don’t know what they’re talking about, I’ve come to discover, because most people don’t understand what risk itself means.

Understand Risk To Conduct Analysis
In today’s increasingly more privacy- and security-minded world, and especially in healthcare, the state of risk management of information is a mess!

This problem comes about for many reasons, including but not limited to the following:

There is little agreement on standard terminology, approach and tools. Key risk-related terms such as assets, threats, vulnerabilities, controls, likelihood and impact are misused and sometimes used interchangeably. One does not find these terms in many other professions. All physicists know what velocity, acceleration, mass, energy, etc. mean. All accountants agree to definitions of basic terms such as debits, credits, balance sheets, assets, liabilities, etc.

Many so-called “experts,” some recently-minted and/or self-proclaimed as such, don’t understand basic risk fundamentals.

Most individuals do not understand that you simply can’t observe risk and that risk is a derived value.

You simply cannot begin to conduct a bona fide risk analysis if you don’t understand what risk is and what risk is not.

There is huge inefficiency and ineffectiveness in protecting the privacy and security of Protected Health Information (PHI) and electronic PHI (ePHI).
As of October 24, 2013 the PHI/ePHI of 26.9 million fellow Americans have been disclosed according to the HHS/OCR “Wall of Shame.” For example, laptops with unencrypted hard drives being stolen from Advocate Medical Group.

Actions To Take
First and foremost, organizations must understand some key, fundamental points about risk before they embark on completing a risk analysis. For example, I present you with five images and ask you to indicate the level of risk (high, medium, low, no risk) you observe in each image.

The images include a bald tire, the same bald tire turned into a tire swing in a backyard, a frayed rope tied to a beam, the tire swing in a tree perched over the edge of a cliff and, finally, a child swinging in the tire swing in a backyard.

What was the greatest amount of risk you observed? I would guess you “saw” high risk in more than one of the images! Some “saw” risk in all the images. 1) You cannot “see” risk; it must be evaluated; and, 2) In reality, there is no risk in any of these images.

Here’s what happens over and over again:

People make assumptions and make things up in risk analysis.

People don’t understand this fundamental truth about risk – you can’t have significant risk without the potential for significant loss or harm.

People tend to relate potential vulnerabilities (e.g., frayed rope, bald tire) with risk.

People forget that one must consider likelihood or probabilities of bad things happening and of impact or harm.

The most important actions organizations must take if they don’t understand risk are to “train up” and/or farm out the work to experts.

And they must remember these truths:

Risk can only possibly exist if three conditions are met: an asset like a laptop with ePHI, a threat to that asset (e.g., a thief may steal it) and a vulnerability (e.g., it is not encrypted) that may be exploited by that threat.

For any single asset (e.g., a laptop with PHI), there may be many different threats and many different vulnerabilities; therefore, there may be many risks to be identified, assigned a value and prioritized.

Controls may already have been implemented or may be implemented to mitigate the likelihood of a certain threat exploiting a certain vulnerability. Controls come in several forms, often categorized as administrative, physical or technical.

Risk has an impact or harm component.

When it comes to health information risk, the adverse impact or harm may come about if the confidentiality and/or the integrity and/or the availability of that information is compromised.

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

How Much Power Are Your Devices Hogging?

January 17, 2014

by David Stone, Technician
Do you find yourself looking high and low for an outlet, a cord or a charger for one of your many electronic devices?

Today’s world finds most people switching back and forth between a mobile device, car infotainment system, workplace computers, home computers and multimedia devices.

It would be wonderful if all of these electronics used the same power adapter and charge time. Unfortunately for you, the consumer, it does not work that way.

Most electronic manufacturers have their own proprietary cords, batteries and charger adapters. You can blame costly patents, industry rivalries, or just the desire to be different as the culprit behind all these seemingly trivial decisions.

Regardless of the reasons, knowing how much power each device draws or requires for charging quickly will empower you as well as save you some money on your electric bill.

Belkin has created the Conserve Insight to provide you with the data needed to monitor the watts you’re using, how your carbon footprint is affected and how much money you’re giving to the power company.

Setting up the Insight is pretty simple and straight forward. Simply plug the Insight into your outlet, then plug in your device and start to monitor your device power usage.

Hit the $ button, and it will switch back between how many watts your currently using as well as how much it will cost you on a monthly basis.

It will even keep track of the carbon dioxide produced in order to power that device.

Another cool feature is the averaging mode option that activates after 45 minutes and projects the carbon dioxide and dollar amount cost for the entire year.

This does not work in watt display mode that only shows you real time usage updates.

The five foot cord that connects the display unit to the outlet adapter is a great improvement over similar products, as you no longer have to crawl around under desks and tables in order to see the read-out.

A bit of form-factor goes the extra mile and makes the Insight look stylish and at home on your desk or workspace.

The best feature by far is the conserve option that allows you to set a time limit for how long the device will draw power.

There’s a switch on the side that allows you to choose from one of three time increments, 30 minutes, 3 hours or 6 hours are your only choices, but most devices today will never take more than six hours to charge.

The Insight will power itself off after the time has elapsed, saving you the hassle of unplugging each device after they’re fully charged.

Belkin has taken the steps to innovate a product that has plenty of market share, and will most likely win over consumers for its ease of use and reliability.

Using technology to better manage your high tech devices and power usage, plus you can use it to manage your Christmas lights!

(Image Source: iCLIPART)

One Last Time… How Important Are Small Business Backups?

December 30, 2013

Last month, I shared with you my personal experience with local search and how it impacted the surgery my dog Daisy needed. This month, I’m going to share with you my personal experience with the importance of offsite backups.

Earlier this month, we had a pretty bad fire at the house. Everyone got out ok, including Daisy and Bailey, but the damage is incredible. We’re living in a condo for the next six to nine months while the house is repaired.

The fire started in the center of the house, where all of my networking equipment is located, including my Fortinet router and my Western Digital network attached storage (NAS) device.

I use the NAS primarily to store old tax information, backups of my Quickbooks files, backups of my extremely important pictures from Michigan Football games, and other personal information.

The Fortinet, NAS and everything else that was in that room are completely destroyed – all that remains is a charred mess of plastic connected together by the thin copper wire that used to be Ethernet cable.

As is always the case, the fire was completely unexpected. And, it happened so fast that we had just enough time to get ourselves and the dogs out. There was no time to save network equipment, much less anything else.

And that’s the important thing to take from this. No matter how convinced we are that “it could never happen to me,” it’s our responsibility as business owners to be prepared for any eventuality.

Fortunately, all of my personal data is protected by the same industrial strength backup solution we use for our business clients – our Experts Total Backup service.

All of my files and documents were backed up to the Tech Experts cloud servers, and nothing was lost. Our Experts Total Backup service works quietly in the background, compressing and encrypting your files before sending a copy of them to the backup server in the cloud.

A few days after the fire, once things settled down, it took just a few hours to copy everything down from the cloud and onto a new NAS unit.

So, what’s the take away from all of this? Expect and prepare for the unexpected. If I didn’t have an offsite backup for my data, I would have lost a ton of information, but none of it mission critical (except, perhaps, my U of M football pictures).

A similar disaster at a small business would be catastrophic in the best instance, and deadly if the company didn’t have offsite backups.

And as I’ve written many times before, your business’s backup is only as good as the last time you tested it.

Whether your backup is onsite using tape or other removable media, or offsite using a service like Experts Total Backup, you must routinely test and verify your backups.

Thanks!
Everyone around me has pitched in to help, but a few folks have gone above and beyond.

Leski Insurance Agency and MEEMIC Insurance Company (734-242-6759) have been incredible.

The Frenchtown Fire Department was on-scene in minutes.

Annette Perna-Taormina from Gerweck Real Estate took literally one day to find us a temporary place to live. Call her for your real estate needs at (734) 243-4200.

Finally, friends Michele Paled, Marlene Messina, Tammi VanAken, Candie Mulligan, Kim Harper, and my mother Carol have been incredibly helpful and supportive.

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