fbpx
April 2017  |  In this issue…

• What is the Cloud and How Can it Benefit You?
Teceriology: What You Need to Know About Voice and Conferencing
Wanted: Smart Humans
• How to Create an Effective Cyber Hygiene Program
Six Imperatives to Future Proof Your Digital Business
Azure Backup Protects Against Ransomware
Employee Highlight of the Month
• Letter From the President
• Upcoming Events

What is the Cloud and How Can it Benefit You?
As a kid, I used to make a tin can telephone by tying a string
to each of two soup cans. When two tin cans are connected, you can send and receive sound waves. Imagine, for a moment, that this tin can string spans the width of your office. Two of your employees need to communicate through the tin cans, so they build the connection. A third employee is invited to “join the call”, so he ties his tin can to the string of the first two cans. Then a fourth employee ties his string, then a fifth, and so on. This concept is the very foundation on which the Internet works: sending and receiving information over a wire (in the tin can example, sound waves).Read more →

What You Need to Know About Voice and Conferencing
Used with permission from Cisco

Combining your company’s voice and data systems makes it easier to keep in touch and share information. By unifying your business’ phone and computer network, team members can easily find each other, wherever they are, and customers and prospects can be quickly routed to the best resources.

As your business grows, IP based communications technology lets you add new employees, remote offices and teleworkers with minimal effort and expense. At each step, your team has the communications tools it needs to help your business succeed.

Read more →

Wanted: Smart Humans
used  with permission from IBM Big Data & Analytics Hub
by Greg Council

If you canvas what is being covered by the media and statements made by technology vendors, you might come away with the notion that we’re all just years—or even months—away from being able to have our own personal artificial intelligence (AI) assistants, and businesses will be able to enjoy off-the-shelf AIs that they can train to perform various complex functions.

It is seductive to imagine downloading open source AI software like Google’s Tensorflow or Microsoft’s CNTK and training it to perform trend analysis on sales over the last 2 years to identify your best customers. Or, use it to pore over customer service interactions and online forums to understand customer satisfaction.

Read more →

How to Create an Effective Cyber Hygiene Program
used with permission from the Microsoft Secure Blog
by Ann Johnson, Vice-President, Enterprise Cybersecurity Group

As noted in the 2016
Verizon Data Breach Incident Report
, 63% of confirmed breaches
involved leveraging weak, default or stolen passwords, 30% of
phishing messages were opened in 2015, and 12% of targets clicked on the malicious attachment or link. Given this, organizations
of all types can make significant gains in their security posture by educating their user base on best practices for digital engagement and cyber hygiene.

Read more →

Six Imperatives to Future Proof Your Digital Business
used with the permission of  http://thenetwork.cisco.com
by Ruba Borno

Technology is driving business strategy as never before, and the competitive landscape is changing with each innovation.  Companies need a new approach to IT that can keep pace with
the evolution of IoT, automation, augmented reality, virtual reality, massively distributed computing, software analytics — and the vast increases in complexity brought about by these shifts.

Read more →

 

Azure Backup Protects Against Ransomware
used with permission from Microsoft Secure Blog

According to the most recent CRN Quarterly Ransomware Report, malicious infrastructure attacks increased 3500% in 2016 and the percentage is expected to increase in 2017. One important way that organizations can help protect against losses in a ransomware attack is to have a backup of business critical information in case other defenses fail. Since ransomware attackers have invested heavily into neutralizing backup applications and operating system features like volume shadow copy, it is critical to have backups that are inaccessible to a malicious attacker.

Read more →

Networking Technologies Employee Highlight of the Month
Jeff Duwe, Cleveland Technician
Networking Technologies

For more than 30 years, Jeff Duwe has served the Cleveland area
in a variety of capacities in integrated IT. Networking Technologies was
lucky enough to bring him on board in 2012 to serve as the technician
for our Cleveland market. Before starting at Networking Technologies, Jeff served as Pre- and Post-Sales Engineer at Integrators of New Systems, LLC, in Cleveland, and as a Field Services Engineer for Digital
Equipment Corporation, Compaq and Hewlett Packard.

Read more →

Letter from the President

A recent survey indicated that nearly half of top-level managers believe
cloud computing would revolutionize the way they do business. The
research also showed that the number of businesses transitioning to the
cloud is increasing. We have seen this growing trend in our region with
a steady uptick in the number of businesses asking us to assist them
with planning and implementation of a cloud migration. These businesses
range from small businesses to large enterprise operations. In fact, we
just met with a 65,000-employee business that transitioned 85% of its
data to the cloud. But, we also know that many companies haven’t started the process. Hesitation with new systems and technology is understandable – it’s a significant business decision; however, hesitating to the point of not moving forward could cost your business revenue in inefficiencies and lost collaboration opportunities. That’s why I want to encourage you to talk to us about your hesitations with cloud computing; we are happy to educate you and provide resources to alleviate your fears. I also encourage you to check out the article in this month’s newsletter on cloud technologies and how it can benefit your company.

We are hosting and attending a variety of educational opportunities for you in April—we hope you’ll join us! Check out our events listing in this month’s newsletter and other events on our events page.

Also, remember to watch your email in the next few weeks for a short (less than five minute) survey. You will receive a free webcam cover for taking time to complete it – we sincerely appreciate your feedback!

From all of us at Networking Technologies and Teceri,

James Bahm
President, Networking Technologies

Monthly Quote
“If you don’t like something, change it. If
you can’t change it, change your attitude.”
– Maya Angelou
Monthly Cartoon

 

Lunch & Learn Event
Join us at our upcoming Lunch & Learns

Attendees at all of our April Lunch & Learns will be entered to win an Amazon Echo. You must be present to win!

HPE 3PAR and Veeam
Don Lind, Senior Storage Solution Architect with HPE, will be discussing the HPE 3PAR and Veeam relationship and how your business can benefit from implementing their storage / backup solutions.

April 18 | 11:30-230 p.m.
Maritime Museum – 150 E Front St #100
Erie, PA 16507

HPE SimpliVity and Aruba
Do you know who or what devices are on your network at any given time? Are
you able to profile every device on your network at any time and automatically place each device into a secure policy and role regardless of whether it’s a guest, a BYOD worker or an IoT device that may or may not support 802.1x authentication? If you answered ‘no’ to either of these questions, HPE Aruba Networks may be your solution. Join HPE experts as they talk about Aruba Networks and Hyperconverged with SimpliVity – the most complete hyperconverged solution in the market today that combines all infrastructure and advanced data services—including guaranteed data efficiency, built-in data protection, and VM-centric mobility.

BUFFALO
April 25 | 11:30-2:00 p.m.
SEAR Steakhouse – 200 Delaware Ave.
Buffalo, NY 14202

ERIE
April 26 | 11:30-2:00 p.m.
Sheraton Erie Bayfront Hotel – 55 West Bay Dr.
Erie, PA 16507

Click here to register for any of these events.

Networking Technologies | Teceri Technologies
ERI 814.836.0000 | BUF 716.216.3104 | CLE 216.487.3104 |service@net-cloud.com
3910 Caughey Rd. Suite 207 Erie, PA 16506 | 403 Main St. Suite 411 Buffalo, NY 14203