Technology should be an asset—not an obstacle. That’s why more SMBs are outsourcing their IT to boost performance and start saving.

Small-to-medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are constantly searching for ways to lower costs and at the same time boost productivity and performance. Unfortunately, that often means the first area of their business they turn to when looking to cut costs is information technology. It may not seem like it to the average business owner not well-versed in the ways of all things IT, but IT operations are actually what can make or break today’s organizations. Without fast, agile, flexible, and salable IT or the security and backup services that come along with it, businesses cannot expect to survive or beat the competition in the long term, let alone stabilize growth and success in the short term.

ccording to the National Center for Middle Market, 43% of cyber-attacks are against small businesses. Every month, multiple incidents evade traditional security measures, and customer data is stolen. 53% of businesses have experienced a cyber-attack in the last year.[1] On average, it takes over 206 days to find out. Our customers are under attack, and most are frankly unaware.As technology providers, customers may turn to us for help and guidance and it’s often after it is too late. Still, there are some things we can do to leverage our position as technology subject matter experts (SMEs) to help protect our customers.

Ransomware attacks have been in the headlines a lot of late. Did you know that 65% of all ransomware attacks happen through phishing emails? Therefore, email security needs to be a major focus when delivering security awareness training. It is likely that future variants of the recent WannaCry ransomware attack will be delivered via phishing emails.
As reported earlier this month, some Gmail users fell victim to a massive phishing attack that frightened many… a phishing attack that targets all your contacts. Now let us look at how gmail users were susceptible to the phishing attack.

Like many business owners, you probably spend your time on sales and marketing, operations, and ensuring that your technology infrastructure is running smoothly. To do this, you make sure you’re using the latest firmware and patches, check the hardware for errors and ensure that your data backups are run properly in case of a ransomware infection or data breach that could ruin your business.