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Why Your PCs are Infected
Ever wonder why there seems to always be a PC that’s slow, infected, issuing pop-ups, redirecting your Google searches, etc?
It’s because they’re infected! “But we have anti-virus installed on all our machines” is the usual self-denial cycle that sets in. Usually followed with “why can’t you keep this from happening? Your the expert here?”. Which is a valid question. And now, what we’ve been telling our customers for years has been documented.
An article in Forbes (click HERE) tells the tale. The people who publish software are often unaware of their own security weaknesses for months on end. Ten months is the average. This means that your anti-virus/malware software won’t even know about the threat from a “Zero Day” exploit when you click that dubious link that causes your system to become infected.
Or, as the article in Forbes put it… “…the value of the benevolent hackers who find and report bugs in software before they’re exploited. Without someone to dig them up and demand they be fixed, those hackable flaws are far more common, and remain secret far longer, than anyone may have realized.”
Which is exactly why you have PCs in your business that get “infected” with malware, adware, etc. And it’s exactly why every business needs to have a company like OPENRSM taking care of your critical business network and systems. Having people that understand the cold hard realities of protecting networks and pc’s and more importantly, being able to get rid of malware and viruses without your anti-virus protection even knowing that something is wrong.
Celebrating Liberty
Many of our Friends and Customers know that OPENRSM is a proud supporter of Scouting and Scouts. And on this Independence Day we’d like to pause and think not only of our own Freedom’s and Liberty. But also how it is also celebrated by the “Good Turn” done daily by Scouts. A case in point…. The many replica Statue of Liberty installations across America.
Freedom Corner, Cape Girardeau, MO Photo by Ken Steinhoff (Troop 8 Cape Girardeau Alumnus) http://www.capecentralhigh.com
The Boy Scouts of America celebrated their fortieth anniversary in 1950 with the theme of “Strengthen the Arm of Liberty”. Between 1949 and 1952, approximately two hundred 100-inch replicas of the statue, made of stamped copper, were purchased by Boy Scout troops and donated in 39 states in the U.S. and several of its possessions and territories. The project was the brainchild of Kansas City businessman J.P. Whitaker, who was then Scout Commissioner of the Kansas City Area Council (now known as the Heart of America Council).
Over the years many cities and towns have benefitted from the gift from their local Scout Troops. Some of which have been expanded into a mini-pavillion celebrating America’s Freedom, and the sacrifices made to preserve our freedom. One of note is located in Cape Girardeau, MO. The local VFW and American Legion have generously added to the monument with a listing of those from the area that have sacrificed all for their country.
With the same local Scouts, Scout Troops, and others pitching in to both maintain and improve a local symbol of the Liberties and Freedom’s we enjoy. The Scouts continuing to “Do a Good Turn Daily” for all of us.
Happy 4th of July!
Did You Know Your Facebook Email Address Is Now Your Primary Email Address?
And you didn’t even realize you had a @facebook.com email address.. did you?
Oh, but you do! And it was changed to be your primary email address contact on your timeline by Facebook.
And no, they didn’t tell anybody… Until the press decided to start calling Facebook on it. And (in a change for Facebook), they said they did it. And there are more changes coming too.
Far be it for the humble data engineers at OPENRSM to tell Facebook what to do… But actually informing your customers that you are changing fundamental things in your platform AHEAD OF TIME would seem to be the thing to do.
More information (and how to change your email contact back to your own email address) is on “The Talking Points Memo“…
Refuse Upgrades, Reduce IT Staff by 40%, And see what happens!
Jefferson County Alabama is finding out what happens when you fire 40% of your IT Staff and cancel routine hardware maintenance and upgrades.
A total meltdown of their key accounting system, likely to cost many times over what simple preventative maintenance and having a properly trained staff would have cost.
Details are at the All Alabama website.
I can imagine the sales call OPENRSM would have made on such an operation. In reality, I don’t know if I would have shown them how bad things were, and how much OPENRSM could save them in both daily operations and future costs, or told them that their commitment to taking care of “their own house” was so lacking that I wouldn’t want to do business with them without their making a serious commitment to bringing their systems back into the realm of reliability.
Many organizations and companies are scrimping on their IT budgets these days. And who can blame them? Times are tough for everyone. But, when you don’t commit to keeping your IT Infrastructure reliable, flexible, and scalable… Your simply planning to fail. And that doesn’t mean throwing wads of money at your problems either. What it does mean is that an organized professional look at your systems, methods, practices, and how your IT could work for you needs to be done.
At OPENRSM we specialize in becoming the IT Department for small and mid-sized businesses. Helping our customers squeeze every penny while keeping their critical systems up to the challenges of todays business needs.
Call us.. 816-200-2220, email us [email protected], let OPENRSM show you how you can save money and not end up like Jefferson County Alabama.
Thailand Floods Endanger Kansas City I.T. Budgets
Floods in Thailand have caused a significant portion of the world’s hard drive and other computer component manufacturing facilities to be temporarily shut down. ASUS Reports they are nearly out of Hard Disks, Lenovo, HP, Dell, and Others are expected to have similar announcements soon.
This will lead to shortages of computers and peripheral products over the next Quarter. Kansas City (being a very high adopter of advanced I.T. systems) will be affected negatively and short term implementation of systems, servers, and peripherals will cost more.
There are, however, creative ways to deal with short term market “blips” such as this that can actually help you increase your bottom line without affecting your business in radical ways. OPENRSM has long been known for it’s ability to effectively manage business IT investments for the maximum positive effect. Now that critical computer component parts are in short supply it is wise to assess your own I.T. Infrastructure and plan effectively to maximize the returns from your I.T. Investments.
More to the point, “I.T. is a Process, Not a Project”. And by employing OPENRSM to help you transform your own I.T. infrastructure to a process (rather than a number of disparate “black boxes” that cost money) you can weather this storm.
Here are a few articles that provide more detailed information about this situation:
Thai Floods Devastate Supply Chain
EBN: The Premier Online Community for Supply Chain Professionals
Ready for a Shortage of Hard Drives?
All Things Digital/Wall Street Journal
Steve Jobs Has Passed, Along With A Part of My Past
It was just announced that Steve Jobs has died. And with his passing, a part of my own personal past.
Steve Wozniac and Steve Jobs, 1976
It’s funny how when someone “Rich and Famous” dies affects you. A favorite actor, sports figure, etc. This is different. I havn’t told many people about my own personal encounters with Steven P Jobs. And now the “Kansas City IT Guy” is going to tell you “The Rest of the Story”.
When the Apple II was first rumored I had just purchased an Apple I. The funny computer board with no case, keyboard, or video output (you had to build all that yourself) was assembled and mounted inside a Heathkit Ascii Terminal kit. Pretty fancy stuff that stretched my own personal abilities in electronics assembly at the time. And shortly thereafter I purchased an Apple II right when they came out from a dealer in Columbia MO who happened to actually have one available. It was $1,380.00 (which was more than my Chevy Luv Pickup truck cost).
Which is how I had the opportunity to have some discussions with a young man only a couple years older than myself, in a garage, in California. All from my parents house in Cape Girardeau, MO.
The Apple I had issues. I called the number on the hand written invoice and a guy named “Steve” answered the phone. Elated that I was happy with the Apple I but thoroughly incapable of helping me with mine. He waxed poetic about the new Apple II coming out. Told me it was “insane” how great it was, etc. And then I was passed (literally, the phone was passed, no hold or anything) to another guy named Steve who was so technically beyond me that it took some effort to figure out just what he was talking about. Til it dawned on me he was discussing replacing an IC Chip that I could get from Radio Shack. A $5.00 fix.
And yes, that was Steve Wozniac that told me to go to Radio Shack for that $5.00 part.
But the phone was passed again to “The Real Steve”… I was drilled, pinned, unable to just let the call go. “You should become an Apple Dealer”, he said. “This is gonna change everything for everybody”, he said. The pure enthusiasm was not lost on me. I like it when people believe in what they’re doing and in what they’re selling. Which is the primary reason I bought the Apple II which served faithfully and well through four jobs and three moves over the course of time I had it.
And I wouldn’t have learned as much, as fast, if I hadn’t gotten it. All thanks to a young entreprenuer and his partner that took the time to talk with an even younger guy from Cape Girardeau Missouri.
Godspeed, Steve…Â As much as I didn’t care for some of the things Apple has done, I do appreciate the time we talked and the Apples I bought.
Facebook Denies, Then Changes Logout Cookie Behavior
This is interesting. Yesterday, Facebook Denied tracking you based on their cookie behavior (From our KC IT News post yesterday).
And today Nic comes back and analyzed the entire process of how Facebook is using Cookies again and shows in detail what Facebook has changed.
Which is to say, Facebook was cought with their hands in your cookie jar, said they didn’t do it, and changed how Facebook works so they couldn’t be accused of it down the road. Which is okay. An awful lot of these occurances are due to developers just not thinking through what they’re doing and why. Especially an organization that is more marketing than technology driven.
Even After You’ve Logged Off, Facebook Tracks Your Every Move
The new Facebook Changes do more than alter how you use Facebook. It seems that your now being “watched” whever you go on the Web.. By Facebook, even if you’ve logged out.
In a blogpost today by Nic Cubrilovic (a highly technical and thorough post I might add). Nic shows you the exact mechanisms Facebook is using to track every page you visit on the Internet. And if you thought logging off would prevent that, well, no it doesn’t. There are a range of various “cookies” being set when your on Facebook and these don’t go away when you log off. And the mechanism is there for every website you visit, every page you read, every Google Search you do to be logged and tracked.
Does Facebook actually log all of this data? It’s sure to happen if you click a “Like” button on a news website, share button on an article, etc. Beyond that, only the people at Facebook know for sure. And it looks like they are, Nic conducted an experiment where he created a couple of facebook accounts. Then he discovered.. As Nic puts it, “Somehow Facebook knew that we were all coming from the same browser, even though I had logged out.“.
His suggestions? Use a different browser for Facebook, and only Facebook.
Microsoft Wants a Piece of Your Software
Windows8 has been released to developers and so has the “Metro” interface. And the Metro interface is both the same, and different than what your used to. To put it simply, Metro is like your Android or iPhone screen, and the regular Windows interface is more like Windows LiveMail. The old Windows interface is gone.
Along with that is a general “disdain” for the Windows interface in Microsoft documentation itself. Perhaps giving a clue that Metro is where Microsoft wants all your Desktop computers to run with all your applications running under it. And no wonder. All Microsoft Metro Applications will be exclusively delivered by… The Windows Online Store!
To directly quote Microsoft documentation… “Speaking of discoverability, all roads, as the saying goes, lead to the Windows Store.”, and “For Metro style apps, that is, the Windows Store is the only means of general distribution”. And finally, “As such, your relationship with the Store really defines your business, whether you’re in it for fame, fortune, fun, or philanthropy.”.
Which means Microsoft wants money for every application installed on Windows even if (especially if) that application comes from a company other than Microsoft.
And that’s okay. The model works well for the iPhone, iPad and other devices. And Microsoft stands to make a ton of money doing it. But this will drive your IT costs higher. Your a couple years from full out deployment of Windows8 and Metro, so you have time to plan accordingly.
Samsung Restricts Windows Reinstallation.. for itself.
Woe is the person who has a laptop problem. Like Joseph reports to Consumerist... His (out of warranty) laptop started having hard disk issues. He promptly backed everything up (backups are good) and proceeded to replace his disk. Only it isn’t so easy. And Samsung tells him his only option is to return the laptop to them (for a fee).
Which isn’t all that unusual anymore. We’ve seen this from prospective customers that call with laptop issues frequently. Manufacturers designing the packaging of their systems so that you cannot repair or reinstall software yourself, or even locally.. Of course, with payments to the manufacturers required.
Now we don’t begrudge the PC manufacturers from making a profit. Far from it. But some manufacturers are way worse than Samsung in this regard. Which ones? Well, it’s a moving target. Policies change, products change, special deals and offers/promotions change. But OPENRSM does keep track and knows the score for it’s Kansas City IT customers.
Before you chuck out old systems, or purchase new ones for your Kansas City Business.. Call OPENRSM.