7 ways to spot a Phishing Email

One of the most common ways to contract a virus or infection on your PC or Laptop is through phishing emails. Typically Phishing emails are designed to look like they are from a well-known and trusted company, usually banks, financial organisations or couriers, in order to trick you into providing sensitive information. 

Here's 7 ways to spot a Phishing Email:

1. Emails often contain links, phishing emails are likely to contain links with mismatched URLs. In Outlook if you hover your mouse over the top of any URLs this will display the actual hyperlinked address. If the hyperlinked address is different to the address displayed in the email, it is highly likely that the message is fraudulent or malicious.                    
2. Emails filled with spelling mistakes and poor grammar are likely to be fraudulent. Spelling mistakes are one of the most common signs that an email isn’t legitimate, as legitimate companies would normally have editors who review their marketing emails carefully before sending them out.                
3. A prompt for personal information should be a warning sign, no matter how legitimate the email may look! Regardless of who you bank with, your bank will never email you to ask for your personal details.                                                                 
4. A common type of phishing email is one that appears to be from a delivery company with attachments or links portrayed as tracking information. If you are not waiting for a delivery or don’t recognise the details in the email it is safest to just delete it.                                        
5. Phishing emails often try to trick you into clicking a link by claiming that your account is on hold or that there has been some fraudulent activity that requires your immediate attention. The best thing to do in this case is to delete the email and just log into the account in question, by visiting the appropriate website, and then checking your account status.                                                                                                                                                        
6. If you get an email saying you have won a contest that you didn’t enter, the chances are that this is a scam. No matter how inviting the prize may look avoid clicking the link and certainly don’t provide any of your personal details.                                                                                                                       
7. Emails from financial organisations such as; banks, PayPal, eBay etc. will address you by name and so watch out for emails addressed "Dear Valued Customer" as these are likely to be fraudulent.

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Phishing FAQ's

What is Phishing?

Phishing is a type of online identity theft, which typically uses emails and fraudulent websites, in order to steal information such as credit card details, passwords, account details and other personal information. Phishing emails and websites often falsely claim to be an established legitimate enterprise in an attempt to get you to share your private information.

How does phishing work?

Phishing works by pretending to be from a legitimate enterprise, such as banks, or other websites where you may have cash or credit card details stored, with the key aim of acquiring your private information. Criminals can then use the information provided for many types of fraud, such as steal money from your account, open new accounts in your name or to obtain official documents using your identity.

The most common form of phishing is fraudulent emails, prompting the recipient to “confirm your password”, “verify your account” or “confirm your identity”. Such emails are linked to fraudulent websites that are designed to look like those of legitimate enterprises or links that, once clicked, will download a virus or spyware onto your computer without your knowledge.

Can a phishing scam contain official company logos?

The simple answer is YES! Phishing scams almost always try to mimic established legitimate companies, the scam relies on people being tricked into thinking they are actually being contacted by the company. It is relatively simple make a website look like that of a legitimate organisation by mimicking the HTML code or to copy company logos.

How can you protect yourself against identity theft?

There are a number of precautions you can take to avoid becoming a victim of a phishing scam, and here they are:

• Avoid clicking links in email messages
• Type website addresses directly into your browser, to ensure you know you are on a legitimate website
• Avoid entering your personal or financial information in pop-up windows
• Keep your computer software current with the latest security updates
• Never give out sensitive information
• If you are worried about an account, call the company or organisation directly to inquire about it

What should you do if you receive a phishing email?

If you receive an email that you believe to be a phishing email, the best practice is not to respond and to simply delete the email. Alternatively you could report it to the company the email is mimicking in order for them to warn their customers.

What should you do if you think you are a victim of a phishing scam?

There are a number of steps you should take if you believe you have fallen victim to a phishing scam, such as:

•  Changing your passwords and secure answers for any potentially compromised accounts should be done immediately
• You may want to contact your bank or financial adviser to alert them to the fact that your accounts may be compromised, this will allow you to put a fraud alert on your accounts
• Regularly monitor your emails and financial statements so that you can identify any false charges or suspicious activity as soon as it appears
• Run a full virus scan on your computers, to ensure you don’t have any viruses or spyware that could potentially steal your personal data

Do phishing attacks only happen through email?

While email is the most common form of phishing attack, this is not the only way phishing is carried out.  Another form of phishing attacks is malware, some malware can track how you use your computer and send valuable information to identity thieves. Phishing attacks can also occur through phone calls, texts and instant messages. It is vital that you remain cautious when asked to provide your credentials and other personal information.

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Veeam Availability Suite & Veeam Backup Essentials

What is Veeam Availability Suite?

Veeam Availability Suite provides availability for all applications, by combining the industry leading backup, restore and replication capabilities of Veeam Backup and Replication with the advanced monitoring, reporting and capacity planning functionality of Veeam ONE. Veeam Availability Suite delivers everything you need to reliably protect and manage your VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V environments.

Veeam Availability Suite Version 9:

Veeam have announced that version 9 of Veeam Availability Suite is to be released soon, offering a number of new features, such as:

·   Veeam Integration with EMC snapshots

·         Fast and secure cloud-based disaster recovery

·         Fast and low impact backups with EMC, NetApp, HP and more.

·         Enterprise-level enhancements for Veeam Explorers

·         Availability for the enterprise

·         Veeam integration with HP StoreOne Catalyst and other backup storage integration

·         Unlimited scale-out backup recovery

Veeam Backup Essentials

What is Veeam Backup Essentials?

Veeam Backup Essentials provides small businesses with a reliable, effortless and affordable enterprise-class backup solution, designed to help businesses remain always-on. Veeam Backup Essentials offers the same functionality as Veeam Availability Suite, but is priced for small businesses.

Veeam Backup Essentials Key Features include:

·       High-speed recovery

·         Data loss avoidance

·         Verified Protection

·         Leveraged Data

·         Complete Visibility

       For more information please contact Practical Networks a Veeam Partner on 01723 587240 or email info@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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Veeam ONE

What is Veeam ONE?

Veeam ONE is a virtual management and optimisation tool, offering monitoring, reporting and capacity planning for VMware vSphere, Microsoft Hyper-V and the Veeam backup infrastructure. It helps enable availability for the modern data center, by providing complete visibility of the IT infrastructure, in order to detect issues before they have an operational impact. Veeam ONE offers an automated, flexible and dynamic way to categorise and group your clusters, hosts, VMs and data stores by criteria such as business unit, department, purpose and SLA. With Veeam ONE business categorisation, you can view and manage your virtual infrastructure based on your organisation’s needs and priorities.

The features:

• 24x7 real-time performance monitoring and alerting
• Detailed dashboards with informative drill-downs
• Monitoring of failover clusters, CSVs and SMB shares
• Performance and infrastructure analysis
• Integration with vCloud Director
•  Documentation and management reporting
• Predefined and customisable dashboards
•  Infrastructure assessments
•  Multi-tenant reporting and monitoring for VMware
• Custom report builder
• Automated and on-demand reporting for Veeam Backup & Replication
• Complete visibility of your entire virtual environment
• Change tracking
• Advanced capacity planning

24x7 Real-time monitoring:

Veeam ONE boast real-time, agent free and unattended 24x7 monitoring of your backup and virtual infrastructures, providing you with notifications of backup and performance issues before they negatively impact applications and users.

Veeam ONE monitoring includes functionality such as:

•  Fast troubleshooting with detailed information designed to help you isolate the root cause and resolve issues quickly.
• An extensive knowledge base with 200+ preset alarms to ensure you are the first to know when issues are impacting availability.
• Graphs and charts with additional drill-down data to provide more information, when you need it.

Multi-tenant reporting and monitoring:

Multi-tenant reporting and monitoring for VMware is new to version 8, allowing IT managers to delegate reporting and monitoring to system admins over a limited scope of assigned VMs. Managers will have the ability to pre-build backup reports for the entire team, pre-populating individual dashboards with filtered results.

For more information about Veeam ONE please contact Practical Networks on 01723 587240

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Veeam Backup & Replication

What is Veeam Backup & Replication?

Veeam backup and replication is a backup software, providing VM backup for VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V virtual environments. Veeam leverages virtualisation, storage and cloud technologies to deliver a recovery time of less than 15minutes for all applications and data.
Veeam backup and replication brings backup and replication together in one single solution to both increase the value of backup and reinvent data protection for virtual environments.

The Features:

The key features of Veeam backup and replication are:
• High-Speed Recovery
• Data Loss Avoidance
• Verified Protection
• Leveraged Data
• Complete Visibility

High-Speed Recovery:
• Instant VM recovery provides recovery of a failed VM in as little as 2 minutes.
• Instant file-level recovery allows you to recover guest OS files and folders.
• Low recovery time objectives for Microsoft Exchange, SharePoint, SQL Server and Active Directory with Veeam Explorer.

Data Loss Avoidance:
• Ultra-fast backup from storage snapshots with leverages storage snapshot capabilities for HP and NetApp.
• 50% faster backups and 10x faster synthetic full backup file creation and transformation with EMC Data Domain Boost integration.
• Veeam Cloud Connect helps you avoid the risk of catastrophic data loss.
• End-to-end encryption to secure your data.
• Improve your offsite recovery with WAN-accelerated replication, replication from backup and 1-click site failover with support for planned failover.
• 2-in-1 Backup and replication, providing near-continuous data protection for any virtualised application.
• Store entire VM backups or individual files on tape, and restore from tape whenever needed.

Verified Protection:
• SureBackup and SureReplica automatically verify the recoverability of every backup and every replica, every time.

Leveraged Data:
• Virtual lab helps you avoid deployment problems by testing and troubleshooting your applications in an isolated, production-like environment without creating any impact on your production infrastructure.

Complete Visibility:
• Veeam Enterprise Manager Web Client allows you to federate multiple backup servers from multiple locations in a single pane of glass without having to log in to the company network, providing centralised management.
•Monitor your backups infrastructure directly from the vSphere Web Client.

For more information about Veeam Backup and Replication or other Veeam products, please contact Practical Networks on 01723 587240 or email: info@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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VMware Horizon 6 and how it can benefit you..

What is Horizon 6?

VMware Horizon 6 leverages the best of Horizon View and extends these benefits beyond VDI, providing end users with on place to securely access all their desktops, applications and online services, from any device. Horizon 6 allows organisations to deliver virtualised or remote desktops and applications through a single virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) platform and support end users with access to all their desktops and applications through a single unified workspace.

With Horizon 6, VMware have introduced six new key capabilities to help organisations deliver unlimited access to desktops and applications, at lower costs and with better performance. These enhancements help maximize operational efficiency and consolidate control.

The Key Features are:

Applications:

• Supports end users with robust access to SaaS apps, Web apps, packaged VMware ThinApp apps, RDSG-Hosted apps and Citrix XenApps, through a single unified workspace.
• Enhanced support for USB drives with RDSH-hosted apps and session-bases desktops for file storage, sharing and collaboration.
• Support for scanning and imaging devices with virtual desktops and RDSH-hosted applications.
• Client drive redirection to ensure simple drive mapping to a virtual desktop.
• Google Chrome client support.
• Client-free, HTML access to legacy Windows apps across more devices, including Google Chromebooks.

Virtual Networking:

• VMware NSX with Horizon 6 brings push-button simplicity to VDI Networking. IT administrators can create and change policies for end users within seconds.
• Policies dynamically follow the end user across devices and locations, without the need for time-consuming network provisioning or security rules. 
• Organisations can easily scale up or down, and each end user's network security policy will remain intact.
• Horizon 6 provides a highly extensible platform that integrates with industry leaders in antivirus, malware, intrusion prevention services and next-generation security policies, by extending security policies from the data center to the device.

Graphics:

• Immersive 3D graphics delivered from the cloud.
• VMware provides full support for the industry's leading ISV applications, including Siemens, ESRI and Autodesk.

Storage:

• Horizon 6 leverages optimised VMware Virtual SAN 6.0, ensuring that customers can easily scale out and support up to 4,000 Horizon 6 virtual desktops per cluster.
• Support for all-flash Virtual SAN ensures end users can enjoy great experience with the best possible TCO.
• Horizon 6 now supports Virtual Volumes VM-aware storage systems to simplify storage management and policy settings for VDI.

Scalable and Available:

• Horizon 6 allows organisations to design virtual desktops around a wide range of validated technology partners or leverage hyper-converged infrastructure with VMware EVO:RAIL, to linearly scale out desktops and apps on demand.
• Applications can be delivered in real time with VMware App Volumes, now integrated with Horizon 6.
• Organisations can ensure that end users enjoy high availability with continuous access to services, by leveraging the Cloud Pod Architecture available with Horizon 6.

Fed-Ready:

• Horizon 6 is designed and certified to meet the most demanding compliance regulations, including those of the U.S. Federal Government.
• Horizon 6 now provides Common Access Card support for simple and secure access to apps and desktops for agencies that require it.
• Horizon 6 also provides end-to-end support for IPv6 networks for simplified packet processing and address assignments.

Horizon 6 offers improved security, simplified operations and accelerated time-to-value, and is available in three editions, Standard, Advanced and Enterprise. For more information about VMware Horizon 6 or other VMware products please contact Practical Networks, a VMware Partner on 01723 587240.

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What is Desktop Virtualisation?

What is Desktop Virtualisation?

Desktop Virtualisation is a virtualisation technology used to separate a computer desktop environment from the physical computer. Similarly to Server Virtualisation, Desktop Virtualisation relies on a thin layer of software known as a hypervisor, which is run on bare-metal server hardware and provides a platform on which administrators can deploy and manage virtual machines.

Virtualised desktops are stored on centralised or remote servers and not on the physical machine being virtualised. The virtual desktop environments are "server" to users on the network, allowing them to remotely log in to access their desktop from any location.

Why Virtualise your Desktops?

Desktop Virtualisation offers numerous benefits to businesses, including; reducing costs, increasing efficiency, enabling flexible working and centralising management of user desktops.

Desktop Virtualisation offers numerous features to organisations of all shapes and sizes, ultimately resulting in a range of benefits. For more information about Desktop Virtualisation contact Practical Networks, a VMware partner on 01723 587240.

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What does Business Continuity actually mean?

What is Business Continuity?
While disaster recovery plans cover the steps businesses take to recover, in the aftermath of a disaster, business continuity describes the procedures that businesses operate in order to ensure their business essential functions can continue during and after a disaster. Business continuity plans allow organisations to enhance their ability to continue business as usual during or after significant disruptions.

3 Key Elements of Business Continuity:

Resilience:

• Redundancy
• High Availability
• Spare Capacity

It is important that business critical functions and the supporting infrastructure are engineered in such a way that they are materially unaffected by most disruptions. 

Recovery:

• Disaster Recovery

Arrangements need to be made to recover or restore business functions that fail for any reason, this is usually where you Disaster Recovery plan comes in!

Contingency:

• Protect against the unforeseen
• Multisite capability (Workplace Recovery)

As a business you need to establish the ability to cope effectively with whatever major incident or disaster that occurs, including the unexpected. Contingency preparations act as a last-resort response for if the resilience and recovery arrangements are not enough. 

What to include in a Business Continuity Plan?

A Business Continuity plan is essentially a document that contains all the critical information your business needs to stay up and running, especially in the case of adverse events. It is vital that you tailor the business continuity plan to the specific needs of your business. A good place to start is by clearly identifying and prioritising which systems and processes must be sustained and provide all the necessary information for maintaining them.

A business continuity plan should also include the following information:

• Employee contact list
• Key Supplier/Vendor information
• Key contacts/Critical telephone numbers
• Recovery Locations
• Copies of essential records
• Inventory of the company’s equipment/machinery/vehicles
• Inventory of the company’s computer equipment and software
• Disaster response plan

Plan for the Unexpected!

Businesses that do not have some form of Business Continuity or Disaster Recovery plan in place are less likely to recover from an event which causes major disruption to business. In fact over 70% of businesses involved in a major disaster either never reopen or subsequently fail shortly after reopening, often due to a lack of client confidence or customers taking their business to a competitor. 

For help creating a comprehensive business continuity plan for your business call Practical Networks on 01723 587240 or email recovery@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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What is Disaster Recovery and Why does your business need it?

What is Disaster Recovery?
Disaster Recovery is the area of security planning that refers to the specific steps that a business takes to resume normal working business in the aftermath of a disruptive event. Generally, disaster recovery plans involve a set of policies and procedures to enable the recovery of vital technology infrastructure and systems, in the aftermath of a natural or human-induced disaster. A disruptive event can be anything that hinders a business' ability to continue its normal operations, such as: a fire, power cut, crippling cyber-attacks, equipment failure, as well as other natural or physical disasters.

5 Reasons Why your Business Needs a Disaster Recovery Plan:

1. No business can continue to function without its critical data, applications and operations. Disaster recovery plans are put in place to protect against this.
2. Hardware can fail, causing service interruptions or data loss. Hardware failure can't be prevented, but you can have a plan in place to minimise the effect it will have on business operations. 
   
3. People make mistakes, human error is one of the hardest things to prevent. It is easy to accidentally delete or change important data, however it is just as easy to back up your data.
4. Nature is unpredictable, severe weather can cause unexpected disruption to business. While you can't change the weather, you can protect your business from the aftermath. 
   
5. Customers want reliable, uninterrupted service! If you can't get back up and running after a disaster customers are likely to look elsewhere for a more reliable service.

Plan for the Unexpected!

No business expects that a disaster will affect them, until it does!

Natural disasters are unpreventable and can cause a great deal of property damage and often leave some economic damage in their wake. Likewise disasters such as data loss, theft and hardware failure can have a lasting impact on your business.  However a comprehensive disaster recovery plan, tailored to your business, can protect against the loss of revenue that they leave in their wake.

For help creating a comprehensive disaster recovery plan for your business call Practical Networks on 01723 587240 or email recovery@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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Cisco Jabber Business Communications

What is Cisco Jabber?
Cisco Jabber is a Unified Communications application for PC, Mac, tablets and smartphones, and can be used with either on premise or cloud-based unified communications services. While adhering to industry standards such as XMPP, SIP and H.264, Cisco Jabber also provides a consistent experience across platforms and devices, alongside deployment alternatives that allow you to choose your preferred options without sacrificing user capabilities.

Cisco Jabber is made up of a number of features that work together to simplify communications and enhance business productivity. The Cisco Jabber Software Development Kit (SDK) offers voice, video, instant messaging, presence and Cisco WebEx conferencing capabilities.

The Features:

Instant Messaging and Real-time Presence information - Helps reduce delays by allowing you to view users' availability and chat with individuals or groups, within and outside your organisation.

Business-Class IP Voice and Video Telephony - Cisco Jabber has HD video and desktop sharing capabilities and with Cisco UC Manager call-control, it delivers secure and reliable communications.

Communicate from Microsoft Office - Cisco Jabber is integrated with Microsoft Office, allowing you to see a user's availability and click to initiate communications such as chat, voice or video calls, or multiparty conferences from within Outlook.

Get Mobile Collaboration Anywhere, on Any Device - Communicate from across the office or on the go with mobile voice, IM and web conferencing. Cisco Jabber allows you to use your preferred device. while getting the same experiences as at your desktop.

Communicate from within Web Applications - The Cisco Jabber Software Development Kit lets you experience communications, including HD video, from within web-based business, simplifying workflows and increasing productivity.

For more information about Cisco Jabber contact one of the team on 01723 587240 or email: info@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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Cisco BE 6000 IP Telephony System

The Cisco Business Edition 6000 is a purpose built, affordable and simple collaboration system, designed to strengthen your business relationships through improved interactions and experiences. The BE 6000 delivers end-to-end collaboration capabilities for up to 1000 users, 2500 devices, 50 sites and 100 contact center agents.

Cisco BE 6000 Features: 

• Solves complex communications challenges with one purpose-built, simple-to-use and centrally-managed platform.
• Complete service, offering end-to-end collaboration capabilities, including; voice, video, conferencing, messaging, instant messaging and presence, mobility and more, for every user.
• Differentiated communications capabilities, offering cost-effective, high-quality multiparty video conferencing, bringing employees, customers and partners closely together. 
• Simplified deployment and management, with a preconfigured virtualised server with ready-to-run virtualisation software and ready-to-activate collaboration applications. 
• Open and inter-operable architecture and innovative system transparently supports third party applications, telepresence and video endpoints.
• Scalable and highly-available platform, with the ability to grow and change with the pace of your business.

Business Benefits: 

• Improved business processes and collaboration.
• Efficient working environment that supports users on any device, from any location, at any time.
• Customisable collaboration with the flexibility to change and adapt with growth.
• Reduced operations complexity and costs with one simple solution to manage.
• Lower TCO with hardware consolidation, reduced power and cooling costs, and easy to use provisioning and administration tools.

For more information about the Cisco BE 6000 system call Practical Networks on 01723 587240 or email: info@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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Panasonic NS 1000 Business Communications Server

The NS 1000 business communications server by Panasonic is designed to deliver solutions to business challenges, while flexibly adapting to the way each organisation works. The NS 1000 provides solutions such as:

• Simplifying & improving communications

• Lowering costs

• Diversifying the workplace

• Improving productivity

These solutions are provided by integrating hardware and software in a modular way, allowing for businesses to tailor their communications system to fit their own specific needs. This system works for a wide range of businesses, regardless of whether it is used in a small office with two people or in a large company with several locations.

  

Key Features include:

• IP & SIP network communication server

• Integrated unified messaging

• Reliable backup system, designed to survive system failures

• Call center solution with voice guidance for customers

• High-performance applications

• Seamless integration for smart phones & tablets, allowing for BYOD

• Innovative unified collaboration & communication environment, including desktop tools & an interactive voice response system

With its fully transparent network features, first-class voice quality in HD wideband audio and swift capacity expansions, the NS 1000 is the most complete Panasonic solution to date.

More information can be found here >>http://bit.ly/1NkfeY6

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What are Unified Communications?

What are Unified Communications?

Unified communications (UC) is the term used to describe communications which integrate to optimize business processes and increase user productivity. UC’s optimize business processes and increase user productivity by eliminating device and media dependencies and managing flows. UC systems typically include the means to integrate real-time or near-real time unified messaging, collaboration and interactive systems; however such integration takes on numerous forms. 

Unified communications are not a single product, but a collection of components, including but not limited to the following:

• Call control & Multi-modal communications
• Presence information
• Instant messaging
• Unified messaging
• Speech access & Personal assistant
• Conferencing (audio, web & video)
• Collaboration tools
• Mobility
• Business process integration

Unified communications are purpose built to grow and change with the pace of your business, providing numerous benefits along the way. These benefits include:

We are now suppliers of both Cisco and Panasonic systems, which provide benefits such as; reducing costs, increasing productivity, diversifying the workplace and allowing for quick and effective call response.  For more information about UC’s call Practical Networks on 01723 587240.

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Windows Server 2003 Migration Planning

Windows Server 2003 end of life is the perfect excuse for business innovation, so why not take advantage of the opportunity. Migrating away from Windows Server 2003 allows you to update your system and take full advantage of the updated features available with newer software. The migration solutions available offer new data center automation and a flexible infrastructure that breaks through the traditional boundaries of storage, virtualisation and identity, while providing an application platform to support the growing demands of today’s businesses.

As you may have read in our Windows Server 2003 End of Life post, there are a number of other reasons why it is ideal for businesses to migrate before the end of life date of July 14, 2015. Migration is a lengthy process and will take a lot of planning and preparation; however it is worth the time and effort. Migrating will help you achieve concrete benefits such as; improved performance, reduced maintenance requirements and increased agility and speed of response. 

Migrating – Where to start:

As a Microsoft Partner we recommend using the following four stages to plan your migration:     

      ü  Discover
      ü  Assess
      ü  Target
      ü  Migrate

A document detailing these stages in full can be found here >> http://bit.ly/1zk7Rgx

Stage 1 – Discover

In order to plan what application need to be upgraded or migrated you need to establish what applications and workloads you have running on Windows Server 2003. When making a note of all of your applications it is also important to make a note of the versions, licensing agreements and what hardware they run on. 

Stage 2 – Assess

Now you need to categorise and analyse all of your listed workloads and applications based on type, criticality, complexity and risk.  This can help you to evaluate whether to re-host, refactor, revise, rebuild or replace applications and also help you to prioritise workloads and applications for migration by identifying issues or opportunities such as:

      û  Vital business-critical applications and workloads that need immediate attention and additional                                    capacity

      û  Redundancies in your environment and mismatched service levels

      û  Applications without the right level of IT control

      û  Misallocated resources for underutilised or unneeded business-critical projects

Stage 3 – Target

This is the phase where you need to determine the migration target destination for each application and workload. In this phase you have the opportunity to transform your business by embracing newer, more efficient and cost effective ways of delivering IT solutions to your users. Different workloads and applications will logically lead to certain targets, while others may offer the possibility of migration to multiple target destinations. The choice will ultimately be driven by factors such as; speed, ease of migration, cost and desired functionality.

 Stage 4 – Migrate

The migration itself will require smart planning and focused execution, in order to make sure goals are met. Choosing the right migration plan for your organisation may require additional analysis and assistance.

As a Microsoft Partner, Practical Networks are readily on hand to provide any guidance or assistance that you need with your migration. For help starting your migration plan call Andy on 01723 587240 or email migrate@practicalnetworks.co.uk

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Windows Server 2012 R2 - Upgrade Now!

As cybersecurity is set to be a major focus for businesses this year, we feel it fitting that our software pick this quarter is the Windows Server 2012 R2. Windows Server 2012 R2 is the most recent version of Microsoft’s Windows Server Platform and so is the most logical choice when migrating from Windows Server 2003, which retires in June.

What is Windows Server 2012 R2?
Windows Server 2012 is an enterprise-grade, open application and web platform that forms a foundation for businesses, by helping build, deploy, and scale modern applications and high-density websites for the datacentre and the cloud. Windows Server 2012 R2 also enables IT to empower users by providing them with flexible, policy-based resources while protecting corporate information.


The Benefits:
• Simplified deployment of IT services

• High service uptime

• Secures corporate data

• Easily scales to continuously run the largest workloads

• User Centric

• Application focused

• Simple & Cost effective

• Disaster recovery & Business continuity

Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity:
Windows Server 2012 allows you to achieve affordable, multi-node business continuity scenarios with high service uptime and at-scale disaster recovery. Windows Server 2012 has powerful availability features to protect against service outages, along with automated protection and recovery for cost-effective business continuity. These features allow for improved workload SLA’s and a reduced downtime risk.

User Centric:
Business technology has become increasingly mobile and user centric and with Windows Server 2012 end users will have access to information and data regardless of the infrastructure, network, device or application. Windows Server 2012 also makes it possible for you to provide consistent access to corporate resources by managing and federating user identities and credentials across the organisation, while providing secure access to your corporate network. Additionally Windows Server 2012 helps you better protect information and manage risk, by validating user identities, verifying their devices and taking advantage of data classification.


So if you’re looking to migrate away from Windows Server 2003 or just want to update your system, look no further. For more information or for assistance in migrating call Andy on 01723 587240.

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Cybersecurity & Mobile Security Tip for Businesses!

Cybersecurity is becoming more and more of an issue for businesses, as security attacks are evolving at an alarming rate. Last year in particular saw a number of high profile security breaches, such as; Heartbleed and Shellshock, positioning cybersecurity as a major concern for businesses and individuals alike. So here are 10 tips on how to protect your business against cyber-attacks:

1.       Establish basic security practices and educate all of your employees in these practices. This will help ensure all of your employees understand how to handle and protect vital business and customer information.

2.       Make sure all computers and networks are protected, by making sure that anti-virus, anti-spyware and firewall software is installed and kept up to date on all corporate PCs. It is also in good practice to schedule regular anti-virus scans on all PCs.

3.       Protect your internet connection with firewall security and make sure that firewalls are maintained. It is also important to make sure that employees who work from home have a secure internet connection.

4.       It is vital to keep your operating system and all your software up to date, by installing the latest updates and security patches. Updates can be set to install automatically, saving time and ensuring they are installed as soon as they are available. (Cyber criminals will take advantage of vulnerabilities found in out of date or unpatched software)

5.       Employ some form of disaster recovery and backup strategy, to regularly backup all of your data. In the case that your computer does become infected, you will be able to restore all your files once the malware has been deleted.

6.       Don’t allow unauthorised individuals to use business computers and secure your Wi-Fi network with passwords (preferably not the password that the device came with).

7.       Ensure all employees use a strong password, one that uses a mix of numbers, upper and lower case letters and symbols. Also make sure passwords are changed regularly.

8.       Limit employee’s access and authority according to their roles. Only provide access to the specific data systems that are needed to carry out their roles.

9.       Make sure all employees know to avoid opening emails or email attachments from unknown sources or that don’t appear to be legit. It is often the case that email attachments carry malware so be cautious and one infected PC could put the whole network at risk.

10.   Enforce strict rules about installing new software and only install software from trusted sites. 

       The number of businesses allowing for BYOD is increasing, and so it is important for them to keep their data secure on all devices. Malware is not just a problem for PC’s, as cybercriminals have taken to hiding their malicious codes inside mobile apps. So we have some Security Tips to protect your Mobile Workforce.

7 Tips for a Secure Mobile Network:

1.       Don’t let mobile security be your blind spot; mobile devices need the same protection as your corporate PC’s, so implement security precautions on all mobile devices.

2.       Add security measures to your wireless network - a password or security key can keep unauthorised devices from accessing your wireless connection. Encryption technology can also help, by protecting the information transmitted through your network.

3.       Encourage employees who use mobile devices for business purposes, to password protect their devices and set them to lock within five minutes. Passwords act as a first line of defence should the device fall into the wrong hands.

4.       Educate your users about carefully examining app permissions before granting access. Most apps ask for access to many unnecessary features on your device.

5.       Develop a policy item to determine which apps can be downloaded or accessed via the corporate network. If an app has a weakness it is easier to hack, posing a threat to your corporate security.

6.       Lose it, Lock it, Wipe it - download an app on your mobile devices that allows you and your employees to lock and wipe the device in the event of theft or loss. Should your device be gone for good such apps will enable you to wipe all of your data including text messages, contacts, photos, email, browser history and user accounts.

7.      Update apps as soon as you are prompted to, as updates can include fixes to new vulnerabilities and exploited security gaps.

For any more information on how to keep your corporate date secure, contact one of the team on 01723 587240

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Mobile Security - A Business Must Have!

Mobile security is becoming increasingly more important for businesses; due to the significant increase in bring your own device (BYOD) workforces. Companies put a lot of effort into building up their network defences for PCs, however most seem to overlook smartphone security, but there are now a great deal more mobile devices than PCs.

The BYOD policy has completely changed the way in which organisations need to approach their network security. Mobile devices have the ability of working inside and outside of the corporate network and can automatically connect to the corporate system, accessing sensitive data and then connect to other networks outside of the organisation. This is all done while bypassing the intense security measures built for PCs, potentially exposing your company data. 

Symantec’s 2013 Norton Report showed that nearly half of smartphone and tablet users don’t use basic precautions such as passwords and security software and that 57% were unaware that security solutions are available for mobile devices. Also according to a study from BT, 41% of UK organisations were hit by mobile security breaches. These are worrying statistics for organisations which allow for BYOD, and so it is important to make sure everyone in your organisation is aware of the importance of mobile security.

Loss and theft both pose a big threat to mobile security, as mobile devices are more vulnerable to loss and theft than PCs. Once lost or stolen any corporate data is at risk without proper security in place, such as passwords, encryption, multi-factor authentication app or apps that allow you to remotely wipe your device in the event that it is lost or stolen. 

Applications also pose one of the biggest threats to mobile security as the number of organisations building their own apps to fit their business needs is growing, with 48 % of businesses expecting to increase their mobile app budgets. Purpose built apps are useful for businesses, however they are also the weakest point of entry for cyber-criminals. Applications have to ask for access to many features on your device, however very few users examine these permissions, making it easier for malicious app developers to gain unnecessary permissions.

While applications, loss and theft pose some of the biggest threats to mobile security there are other threats that you need to protect yourself from. Lookout have suggested that mobile security threats usually fall into one of the following four key categories; application-based, web-based, network-based and physical. Each of these categories can be broken down into further threats, details of which can be found here.

Keep watching our blog for tips on how to keep your business protected from mobile and cybersecurity threats.

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Cybersecurity set to be big issue for Businesses...

Last year saw a number of highly evolved cyber-attacks and data breaches across the globe, with server vulnerabilities such as Heartbleed and Shellshock taking center stage. As a result of the number of high profile security breaches and cyber-attacks, Cybersecurity has been positioned as a key priority for organisations in 2015.

Cyber-security attacks are evolving at an alarming rate, and so the cyber-security products available to businesses are rapidly evolving to keep ahead of cyber criminals.  Therefore it is more important than ever for businesses to keep up to date with the latest versions and updates of their firewalls, antivirus software, intrusion detection/protection systems, VPNs or any other security they may have in place. On top of this it is a good idea for businesses to reassess their cybersecurity practices periodically to ensure they have the best protection available to them.

Cyber security threats come in a wide range of shapes and sizes, such as; malware injection, phishing, social engineering, internal stealing of data among others. However ransomware has been one of the most common forms of malware used over the past few years, and Symantec’s 2014 Internet Security Threat Report noted that ransomware attacks grew by 500 percent in the latter part of 2013. Scammers also continued to run profitable ransomware scams last year, with Cryptolocker making up 55 percent of all ransomware in October 2014 alone.

With the wide range of security products available for businesses, such as; anti-viruses, firewalls, encryption software, intrusion detection/protection systems, it is easy to overlook the need for secure passwords. Passwords still provide the first level of defence against hackers and so it is still important to make your passwords as secure as possible. So why not make sure your password isn’t on SplashData’s worst passwords of 2014 list:

1. 123456
2. password
3. 12345
4. 12345678
5. qwerty
6. 123456789
7. 1234
8. baseball
9. dragon
10. football

The full list can be found here… “Worst Passwords of 2014”

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