by Felicien | Feb 16, 2018 | Education
Microsoft SharePoint and Office 365 – What’s New?
Newly integrated features between Microsoft SharePoint and Office 365 make collaboration easier than ever.
Collaboration tools like Microsoft SharePoint and Office 365 have become an increasingly integral way for work teams to stay organized and complete projects in a unified and timely fashion. SharePoint is available in Microsoft Office 365, a platform that integrates with the applications like Microsoft Office, like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, so that you and your employees can share, retrieve, search, track, manage, report and archive digitized documents. You can customize SharePoint for your company’s needs, and with SharePoint Online you can access your files from any device by using a browser.
Now SharePoint Online subscribers can benefit from the integration of SharePoint Team Sites with Office 365 Groups. This will further streamline and improve the way your teams communicate and collaborate.
A SharePoint Team Site helps you and your team connect to and share the information and applications you need to efficiently complete a project. You can manage lists, collaborate on files, and keep up with your team’s activities from a Team Site home page.
Office 365 Groups works in conjunction with the tools in Office 365 to help you collaborate with teammates when creating documents, spreadsheets, and presentations, or for sending emails and scheduling meetings.
If you’re saying to yourself that these solutions seem similar to you, well, they are. The question is, why did Microsoft develop Office Groups when they already had the similar SharePoint Team Sites? The Integration of Team Sites and Office 365 Groups addresses this.
This integration has been a long time coming and much awaited by Office 365 and SharePoint users. This new integration will simplify users’ experience without impacting either platforms’ functionality. Now, you won’t have to choose one over the other because they integrate seamlessly. When you create a Group in Office 365, it will automatically create a Team Site in SharePoint as well. Your new Team Site will be optimized for your Microsoft Mobile Apps so that you and your team can take your work on the road.
When you set up a Group in Office 365 you’ll have access to a shared:
Inbox,
Calendar,
OneNote Notebook,
Planner, and
A SharePoint Team Site.
By default, SharePoint team sites are connected to Office 365 Groups for consistent membership and access to related applications. It’s easy to refine how Office 365 Group applications and controls are brought into SharePoint teams. Existing Office 365 Groups can also create their own Team Sites with a home page, activity web, and a new feature to highlight important content for the team.
The shared inbox and calendar, a common OneNote notebook application, and access to the shared Planner app for task management activities make SharePoint Online more user-friendly and accessible for Microsoft Office 365 fans everywhere.
How It Works
When you connect a Team Site to Office 365 Groups, a new group is created. The members (and owner) are based on your existing SharePoint Team Site. However, you can add or remove people at any time; the Site will retain its original URL, settings, and permissions. Although existing pages won’t be automatically updated, you can create new pages and make one of the new pages the home page of your site.
You can quickly edit the Team Site’s left-hand navigation to include links to the Office 365 Group’s Conversations Calendar, Notebook, and Planner. Now you can embed your Office 365 group calendar on your SharePoint team site, showcase plans within your SharePoint Team and Communications Sites, and add a window into your groups’ document library from the homepage of your Team Site.
With this integration, you’ll be able to improve your team’s productivity and efficiency with a shared:
Outlook Mailbox for your team’s conversations,
Calendar so you can collectively keep track of events, deadlines, and meetings,
and Planner, so that you can manage and update action items and tasks.
Through the Team Site Usage Page site owners can gain insight into how users are interacting with their site. They can see the number of people who have visited the home page, the most viewed files, and how many new items were added.
Your Teams and Groups can now work together seamlessly with SharePoint Team Sites Office 365 App Integrations.
Now every SharePoint team and Office 365 group member can streamline their efforts and stay on the same page with this innovative integration. The SharePoint Team Sites provide a central location where they can connect and share important data and happenings in a timely and easy-to-manage fashion. Plus, with the ability to gain insight into your teams’ usage, you as a team manager can adjust course and work to optimize collaboration for the greatest impact.
Microsoft is working to continue simplifying SharePoint and making content uploads easier, as well as improving how Publishing Sites and Web Parts are created. Furthermore, they’ll continue working to empower everyone on your team to achieve their best with easy-to-use, effective collaboration tools.
by Felicien | Feb 16, 2018 | Education
How Businesses Are Accidentally Exposing Cloud Services – Don’t Make The Same Mistakes
There are countless hackers out there just waiting for your business to leave your data vulnerable. With the introduction of the cloud, you felt a bit more secure and slept slightly better at night – but now, it seems that was precisely what hackers wanted us to do.
It’s reported that 53% of businesses using cloud storage accidentally expose their data to the public. This is like securing your whole house, locking all doors and windows, and then going to sleep with the garage wide open.
This doesn’t just point the finger at small businesses either. The study showed that even big-name companies such as Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) had inadvertently exposed one or more of these services to the public. The scary thing is that the previous survey showed this was occurring only 40% of the time. Now, this number has grown to 53%.
This study was conducted in 2017 between the months of June to September. Within those two months, they found that businesses are not only exposing their own data but they are also neglecting vulnerabilities in their cloud. When you ignore these things, you put not only your customers at risk but also the livelihood of your company as well.
What Are You Exposing?
The report shows that businesses weren’t solely leaking data such as customer information, but incredibly dangerous information such as access keys and other private data as well. These cyber-attacks commonly expose data such as personal health information, financial information, passwords and usernames, trade secrets, and intellectual property. With two million new malware attacks launching every day, it’s more important than ever to stay in a constant state of vigilance.
Example Through Viacom
This is similar to the Viacom breach in 2017, which was discovered and exposed by UpGuard, a security firm. Viacom’s vital information — from their subsidiaries such as Paramount, Comedy Central, and MTV — was exposed including not only passwords and manifests for Viacom’s servers, but also data pertinent to maintaining and expanding their IT infrastructure was as well. Of the data exposed, the most significant was Viacom’s access key and secret key for the corporation’s AWS account. With this information, a hacker could have gained control of Viacom’s servers, storage, or databases. Viacom is an $18 billion multinational corporation, yet it apparently still had massive security weaknesses.
How Are You Exposing Your Cloud Data?
There are a few ways that users are accidentally exposing the data they store in the cloud. The main four reported are:
Ignoring vulnerabilities
Abusing or misusing employee access
Accepting inbound connections
Complex attacks
Understanding each of these is pertinent to combating them, and securing your business and your cloud data.
Ignoring Vulnerabilities
A common misconception is that it’s the service provider’s responsibility to keep cloud data safe – this is not true. Most of the damage caused by ignoring vulnerabilities can be prevented by training. If your staff is trained to recognize weaknesses, then they can be more proactive in fighting against them. More than 80% of businesses are not managing host vulnerabilities in the cloud. Vulnerabilities include insufficient or suspicious credentials, application weaknesses, and inadequate employee security training.
Abusing Or Misusing Employee Access
CloudPassage’s Cloud Security Spotlight Report found that “53% of organizations see unauthorized access through misuse of employee credentials and improper access controls as the single biggest threat to cloud security”. Employees abusing or misusing their credentials happens mainly in two ways: the first is by using unsecured devices on a secure network or connected to the corporate cloud. Mobile devices make up for 51% of all cybersecurity breaches. Often, users rely on mobile devices to continue working, while on lunch break or even on the weekend. Accessing your cloud from these mobile devices poses a new threat. While computers and other on-premise devices have high-security protection, often personal phones and devices are not as safeguarded. The second is by using different employee’s credentials to access items that their credentials aren’t authorized for.
Accepting Inbound Connections
37% of databases accept inbound connection requisitions from the internet, with 7% of these being from suspicious IP addresses. When you accept incoming connections with insufficient or dubious credentials, you allow access to all of your critical data, without resistance. Once the hackers have access, they are able to not only view and read data, but they can additionally modify or delete data. Having stronger policies specifically addressing inbound connections can prevent this from happening to your business.
Complex Attacks
Not all the attacks and vulnerabilities are the fault of the business. Some of these attacks are far more complex than most businesses are prepared for, including big-name companies. These sophisticated attacks not only know and bypass the company’s vulnerabilities but also various application weaknesses. For example, a computer software program could have a minor flaw in its security, which can lead to the total collapse of the entire system.
What Can You Do About It?
The first action you can take against attacks like this is recognizing suspicious IP addresses. Have a policy in place for identifying, flagging, and isolating suspicious IP addresses. Spending a few extra minutes of your time could save months of recovery and downtime.
Secondly, limiting the way that the hackers gain access is key to protecting your company. One of the easiest ways for a hacker to gain access to your cloud is through your email. Protecting your email provides a strong defense against these breaches. Having an email policy such as using strong passwords, changing passwords frequently, avoiding opening phishing emails, or clicking on suspicious links provides another layer of defense. Additionally, it is essential to also have policies in place that protect against misuse of credentials such as connecting unsecured devices to the cloud.
Another way that organizations can better secure their cloud is to train their IT staff. The Cloud Security Spotlight Report states that “61% of organizations plan to train and certify existing IT staff, while 45% of other organizations plan to partner with a managed security services provider or deploy additional security software to combat these issues”.
It’s important to pay attention to mistakes that others have made so that you don’t suffer the same consequences. It also helps to be diligent in looking for suspicious IP addresses or emails. Remember that this allows hackers to quickly gain access to your cloud data. Be sure t,o train and certify the IT staff you already have – cyber attacks are all but guaranteed. What isn’t guaranteed is how prepared your business is to thwart off those attacks.
by Felicien | Feb 16, 2018 | Education
Looking for quick tips to optimize your Microsoft Outlook experience? Check out this article that includes all you need to know to get the most out of Microsoft Outlook.
With over a billion users worldwide, Microsoft Outlook is the preferred email program for business owners. Though other email programs have some of the same features, no single one of them addresses the everyday needs of business professionals better than Outlook.
In spite of its popularity and its versatility, many users are not getting the full range of benefits Microsoft Outlook has to offer.
This program provides a rich array of valuable features. It allows users to sort, filter and categorize all emails. In addition, there are numerous other email shortcuts that can save users time and reduce their daily frustration. Below, we discuss some of the biggest time-savers. Please note that these shortcuts are based on Outlook 2010, but most will work on later versions, as well as earlier ones.
Learn the Keyboard Shortcuts
It may not seem like it to some people, but having to move your mouse around and click on something takes a lot longer than just pressing two keys. For people whose world revolves around email, the wasted time can really add up. Therefore, it’s expedient to learn a half dozen of the most commonly used shortcuts:
Ctrl+R: reply to email
Alt+S: send email
Alt+R: reply to all in email or switch to work week calendar view
Ctrl+M: or F9 to Send/Receive all
Alt+W: forward email or switch to weekly calendar view
Ctrl+G: open the “Go to date” dialog and jump to any date in the calendar
New to Outlook?
You won’t be a newbie for long once you learn these tricks. Below are a few great tips for newcomers that will have you working like a pro in no time.
Switching Tasks
This tip lets you easily switch between your calendar, contacts, email and other items by pressing Ctrl + [the place number of the item]. This can eliminate lots of clumsy maneuvering in the navigation pane.
Quick Steps
This feature, first introduced in Microsoft Outlook 2010, is the fast, painless way to create your own shortcut when performing any multi-step action (it’s also available for modifying default Quick Steps). For instance, let’s say you want to create a Quick Step for marking emails as read, then forward them to a specific group of people.
Go to the Home tab and click Mail, then in the Quick Steps section, click the More arrow. Next, click on Manage Quick Steps. Select the Quick Step you would like to change, and then choose Modify. Look for Actions, then change or add the actions you want this Quick Step to perform. In the Shortcut key box, assign this Quick Step a name. You can also change the icon next to the Name box by clicking on it, then click OK.
Create a New Item from the Clipboard
This one is a real time-saver. Instead of going to Outlook, opening a new item and then copying and pasting content into it, you can do all this in one smooth step. Simply copy text to your clipboard and press Ctrl-V to create a new message that contains the selected text.
Using Outlook for A Short Time?
Sometimes we all must work on a specific project or with a team that’s already using Microsoft Outlook. For those people, it can be a hassle to get up to speed on how to carry out common tasks. The tips below will have you whizzing through your emails.
How to Create a Calendar Event
Most new users think you have to scroll through the calendar to find a date that works for your upcoming meeting or appointment. Outlook allows you to simply type phrases like “three weeks from now” or “next Wednesday”. Your calendar automatically sets up the appointment. Of course, you can always change these dates if you need to.
Modify Desktop Notifications
If you get lots of emails each day, you understand how distracting it can be to constantly be notified of a new email. Many of the emails we all get aren’t that important anyway. Outlook allows you to set your desktop notifications so that you are only notified of messages from people that you specify.
You can set up a VIP email folder by going to Rules > New Rules, then select “Advanced Options”. The “Rules Wizard” allows you to specify which emails should be sent directly into the VIP folder. That way, you’ll have your important messages all in one place. Using the Rules Wizard, you can set up all your Mail Options so that they work for you, not against you.
Creating Email Templates
During an ordinary workday, we often send out similar messages to people. Why not create an email template for those? Open the email, then select File > Save As > Outlook template. Now when you want to send the message out to someone, go to New Items > Choose Form. Browse through your “User Templates in File System” to find the template and click on it.
Seasoned Outlook Vet?
Maybe you’ve been using Outlook for years and are ready to learn some new tricks. Below are a few amazing time-savers.
Schedule Email Delivery
Whether you’re running off to a meeting or rushing to the airport, you may want to send emails to special people later that day or even weeks in the future. First, write the email, then go to Options > Delay Delivery > Do not deliver before. and then simply type in the date and time you want the message sent out.
Make Folders for Emails
Organizing emails into specific folders is a great way to streamline your Inbox. A good folder system can save you time and prevent important messages from getting lost. Once you have your folders set up, simply drag emails into the right folder. Go to Folder > New Folder and enter a name for it. In the pull-down menu called “Folder Contains”, select “Mail and Post Items”, which formats the folder for email messages. Next, choose “Select where to place the folder” to assign a location for it, and click OK.
You can use this to create folders for people or businesses that you get regular emails from. You probably get daily emails from your boss, so it’s a good idea to set up a folder with his name on it. You may get emails from important clients, each one of which can have their own individual folder.
Once you get all your folders set up, be sure to create Rules so you can easily route mail to the correct folders. The easiest way to do this is to open the email message, go to the Move group on the Home tab and click on Rules. A list of suggested rules will appear.
Let’s say you wanted to set up all emails from your boss, Jay Jones, to go into a folder with his name on it. Click on “Always Move Messages From: Jay Jones”. Click on the “Jay Jones” folder to select it, and click OK. From now on, every message from Jay Jones will go directly into a folder with his name on it. No more searching endlessly for important messages from the boss.
Create Sticky Notes for Quick Reminders
Have a fun luncheon coming up with friends? There’s no need to create a calendar event for tasks like this. With Outlook open, you can create a new sticky note by pressing Ctrl + Shift + N. Your note can be dragged anywhere on the screen. Now you’ll have that little reminder so you don’t miss important events.
A Few More Quick Tips
Microsoft Outlook has many more fast, convenient ways to streamline your daily email experience. For example, it’s easy to group long email threads into one message. Simply click on the message, then click View > Show as Conversation.
Block emails from specific people by going to Home > Junk email options. A new window will open, in which you can select which senders you wish to block.
You can quickly Flag a message for further inquiry. Simply press the Insert key to toggle the flag off and on. In newer versions of Outlook, a small flag appears in the upper right corner. You can click on this flag to specify follow-up options.
Cloud Advantages
With everything moving to the cloud, newer versions of Outlook will have more features that are web-based, which users will be able to access from any device or location. This is the future of all Internet programs. Today’s savvy business people need to work on airplanes, in hotel lobbies and from phones, as well as laptops. With the cloud, you can take your work home or even on vacation with you. This can be a good thing and a bad thing. We all do need some time away from work each week.
The Future of Outlook
With millions of faithful users, Microsoft Outlook should remain the go-to email program for business owners. Microsoft has tweaked the program over the years to make it more intuitive and less intrusive. Their use of helpful built-in features appeals to business professionals.
As the program continues to expand, users can save time and get the drudgery of daily emailing completed much quicker. It’s a good idea to check the Microsoft website for new updates each year and become a true Outlook guru.
by Felicien | Feb 15, 2018 | Education
Are you a potential target for one of the most popular scams in Canada today?
One of the most successful scams in recent history is now affecting Canadian business owners. It goes something like this: a business owner receives a phone call, letter or email saying that there are overdue taxes or something is wrong with their tax return. The caller or email will use very strong language, saying that if you don’t take care of the matter at once, you could be placed in jail. They mention that you might have to pay court charges or face deportation.
This scam –designed to get business owners to pay money they do not owe — has affected thousands of business owners across Canada and the U.S. These callers are also interested in getting financial information from business owners. They may ask for the owner’s social insurance number (SIN), bank account information or credit card information. These callers use very aggressive language and threaten business owners in such a way that many go ahead and send the money to the scammers.
Below, are a few of the tactics that these scammers use to entrap people:
They will say the issue needs your serious attention.
They will threaten that all your assets may be frozen.
They will tell you that you could go to jail or be deported.
They will emphasize how important it is that you take action immediately.
Fear is their greatest weapon.
Fraudulent Tax Returns
With these types of scams becoming so successful, thieves all over the world are now using numerous methods to cheat people out of their money. One scam that the CRA is seeing more often involves fraudulent tax returns. Using the most devious methods, scammers will get your SIN or tax ID number, then file a tax return in your name, changing the address so that the thieves get the tax refund. It can take years to get this type of issue straightened out. Sometimes people don’t even realize that scammers have filed a fraudulent return using their name and personal information. It can be expensive and highly stressful to resolve the matter.
Email Scams
Thieves can make an email look exactly like it has come from your bank or credit card company. The email always asks you to click on a link. The appearance and wording can seem so legitimate that it fools even professionals. Usually, once you click on the link, some type of virus or malware will be downloaded into your computer. In some cases, a ransomware virus is downloaded. This virus locks up all your files and holds them hostage until you pay the ransom. These crooks always want to be paid with Bitcoins, pre-paid credit cards or gift cards.
Thieves Are After Your Money!
The bottom line in each scam is money. In fact, one conman who was caught trying to cheat a CBC news reporter confessed that he was indeed employed by scammers. He boldly told the reporter that this company he worked for earned over $10,000 per day by scaring taxpayers into making payments they didn’t owe.
Scams in Ontario
Police in Ontario have reported that these scams have been so successful that their agency has been overwhelmed with calls from individuals and business owners. Both the police and the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) recommend never giving out personal information over the phone to strangers. Instead, business owners should hang up and call the CRA directly or visit the website, so that you can be certain that you’re speaking with an authentic CRA representative.
Calgary and Toronto police have joined forces to try and stop the scammers from bilking any new victims. Kristie Verheul, staff sergeant at a Calgary police department told news reporters that the police are stepping up efforts to catch the thieves and stop them. Sergeant Verheul said that the average victim loses between $900 and $2,000. In most cases, these amounts are higher when they involve business owners.
The Refund Scam
In this scam, the individual or business owner receives a fraudulent email from the CRA, which, at first, will seem like good news – you’re getting a refund. All you have to do is click on the link they provide. Once you get to the website, you’ll be asked to type in your personal information, including your SIN and banking info. The goal of this scam is to obtain your personal financial information. The bad news is that you aren’t really going to get a refund. Instead, your personal information will be used to set up bogus credit card accounts. Thieves can charge thousands of dollars to accounts in your name and even ruin your credit. Perpetrators of this type of scam are often never caught.
The CRA has this advice for Canadian business owners:
Never give out personal or business financial information over the phone.
Do not click on links in suspicious emails.
If you aren’t sure about the status of your taxes, call the CRA directly. Never call a number listed in an email or phone message. You can check the authenticity of a phone number by calling 1-800-959-5525 for businesses and 1-800-959-8281 for individuals.
Do not give out personal information to strangers on the phone including your passport number, SIN, your driver’s license number, banking information or credit card info.
General Tips for Safety
The CRA recommends that consumers should be wary of anyone asking you to pay them using gift cards or prepaid credit cards. Payment types like this are often utilized by scammers because they are readily available and completely untraceable. Once you use this type of payment option, there’s no way to track thieves down and get your money back – it’s gone for good.
They also say that real CRA officers will not leave messages either by email or phone that contain your personal information. They never share your taxpayer info with anyone unless you have given them prior authorization to do so. They point out something that should be obvious to everyone: before your tax situation would go so far that you were being threatened with jail time, you most likely would have received numerous letters in the mail.
If you aren’t sure about the status of your latest tax return, visit the CRA website or give them a call at the numbers listed above. Although the lines are often jammed because of the high number of scam-related calls, it’s still better to wait on the phone than pay taxes you don’t owe.
by Felicien | Feb 15, 2018 | Education
Keep hackers from turning you and your business into a victim with these cybersecurity best practices.
Cyberattacks come in many forms, and no part of your business seems to be safe from them. You work for months to prepare your website. You go into painstaking detail over each section and prepare for your go-live date. You are so proud to show your corporate baby to the world. Then a few months later, you go to log into your website to find it has been hacked. Not only does this affect your business data and reputation, but also your position in Search engines. How do you keep this hypothetical from becoming your reality?
What type of website you have can determine what kind of attacker targets you – for example, WordPress website customers are targeted by hackers using one of three options: a single bot, a person, or botnets. A single bot is an automated program that is used to search for vulnerabilities; once it finds vulnerabilities, it exploits them. A person will be manually searching for weaknesses. While this seems old-fashioned or slow, it is usually the method of choice for high-value websites. Lastly, Botnets are groups of machines that run numerous programs that collaborate. Similar to how a single bot works, botnets work as a high functioning team to carry out a vast number of attacks simultaneously. With so many different types of attackers, how does one protect themselves and their website?
Stay Up-to-date With Cyberattack News
The best offense is a good defense. To prepare for, respond to, and recover from an attack, you need to know what you are up against. You can prepare for Cyberattack by keeping up to date on current cyber threats to your company. Over 2 million new malware attacks are launched every day, with recent examples including the Meltdown and Spectre bugs. Both Spectre and Meltdown could allow potential attackers to access to data, but these aren’t your only threats. You need to also prepare for other Cyberattacks such as Ransomware, crypto, and malware attacks. Forbes magazine reports these are the top cybersecurity threats to look out for in 2018.
Update Security On Your Login Page
Similarly to your email password, you should take great care in protecting your website admin access. You should use strong passwords so they can’t be easily guessed or forged. Secondly, you should memorize your website passwords, rather than write them down, as this poses another security risk. Thirdly, remember to change the password frequently – it is recommended that you do so every two months.
Update Software
Updates always seem to come when we are at our busiest. Whenever there’s an opportunity to update, it’s essential to do so. Updating is like having a secret security group continually working to keep your business safe. Updates provide protective patches that safeguard your data from the latest cyberattacks, such as Meltdown or Spectre. Plus, they keep your computers and systems running optimally.
Security Plugins
Security plugins offer your website features that range from protection against malware attacks to an added firewall and database security. Each plugin comes with own cost and features – for example, one of the highest-ranking WordPress plugins is WordFence. This plugin continually scans your folders and files on your website for signs of malware infection. Once it finds an infection, it can rapidly notify you as it blocks the malware. Another WordPress plugin that packs a lot of features into a small package is Sucuri Security. Through this plugin, you can have security activity auditing, file integrity monitoring, malware scanning, blacklist monitoring, as well as a website firewall.
HTTPS Instead Of HTTP
How much difference can one letter make? Between an HTTPS and HTTP, surprisingly it makes a massive difference for security. Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure is the version of HTTP which transfers data from your browser and your website. The difference is that one letter “S” – secure. This means that any and all communication between your browser and your site is protected with encryption.
Secure Webhosting
Another way to strengthen the security of your website is by using a secure web hosting company. There are lots of big and small names to choose from when deciding on a web hosting provider. This is where it is essential to use your list of non-negotiable features that you want from your host to narrow down your choices. For example, you could look for a host that offers a Virtual Private Server, which conceals the identity of your service and improves privacy. Another important feature to look for when deciding is how many users it can support.
Lock Files/Folders
One of the simplest ways to improve the security of your website is by locking or hiding files. You can place passwords on files or folder, that way they cannot be opened without your key. Additionally, you can also encrypt them so that they are unreadable without your password. You can do this by using a password-protection system or using file permissions that are already in place. Check to see what features your web host offers.
With all the ways that a hacker can gain access to your business’s data, it is crucial to stay one step ahead. Remember the importance of securing your website as well. Something as simple as a secure password for your admin page or locking specific files can make a huge difference for you and your business.
