A recent Wipro study indicated 59% of employees would choose a Mac if given a choice, though only 32% are already using one. Whether it’s a fleet of iPads, iPhones, or Macs, we can deploy and manage all of those devices, including software, without touching them. They can be delivered directly to staff, ready to go almost as if by magic.
The pandemic means tens of millions of employees are now working from home, many for the first time. Even reluctant enterprises have been forced to support this, and in most cases have found that remote workers still get work done.
What about new employee onboarding?
One of the challenges raised by some enterprises concerns the problem of bringing new employees aboard at a time of social distancing. In this regard, Hager shared his own company’s experience recruiting and onboarding new staff:
“We sent everybody home on March 12,” he said. “Since that time, we have fully remotely onboarded over 70 employees and we brought on over 30 summer interns. We fulfilled our internships to over 30 students this summer, and they never came in to work. They were actually very productive all summer long, did a terrific job for us.”
Digital credentials, such as usernames and passwords, connect you and your employees to critical business applications, as well as online services. Unfortunately, criminals know this — and that’s why digital credentials are among the most valuable assets found on the Dark Web.
A Dark and Dangerous Place
The Dark Web is made up of digital communities that hide on top of the Internet, and while there are legitimate purposes for the Dark Web, it’s estimated that over 50% of all sites on the Dark Web are used for criminal activities, including the disclosure and sale of digital credentials. Companies that have had their credentials compromised and sold on the Dark Web don’t know it until they’ve been informed by law enforcement — but by then, it’s too late.
How Does This Happen?
When your employees use their work or personal email on third party websites, like the types listed below, it makes your business vulnerable to a breach. With our Dark Web Monitoring, we can detect if your company is at risk due to exposed credentials on those websites.
HR & Payroll
Ecommerce Sites
Email Services (Gmail, Office 365, Hotmail, etc)
CRM Systems
Travel Sites (Expedia, Kayak, Hotels.com, etc)
Banking
Social Media (FaceBook, Instagram, etc)
What Can You Do to Protect Your Business?
By utilizing Dark Web ID by above.care™, a combination of human and sophisticated Dark Web intelligence with search capabilities, you are able to identify, analyze and proactively monitor for your organization’s compromised or stolen employee and customer data.
Prevent
Attacks on networks may be inevitable, but proactive monitoring of stolen and compromised data allows you to respond to a threat immediately to prevent a major breach.
Train and Phish!
Trained and aware employees are critical to securing an organization, and an effective, ongoing internal security awareness program can help reduce your company’s vulnerability, turning the “weakest link” in your cyber defences into its greatest strength.
Security awareness training and phishing simulations go hand in hand. Phishing has become very sophisticated and almost undetectable, as criminals have found ways to make their emails as realistic as possible. Phishing simulations test employees on how they would respond to a real-life phishing attack. We can send these mock attacks at staggered times, avoiding the “prairie dog effect” where employees warn one another of the email, for the best measurement of all employees’ awareness. We’ll track which employees have clicked on a phishing email, who has given away their password and who has ignored the email.
Once a learning gap is detected, we’ll deliver interactive educational videos to the most susceptible users. These easy-to-understand, short and visually engaging training videos include an online quiz to verify the employee’s retention of the training content. Training can be delivered regularly, to reinforce the importance of every employee’s role in protecting your business.
What We Monitor
Hidden chat rooms
Private websites
Peer-to-peer networks
IRC (internet relay chat) channels • Social media platforms
Black market sites
640,000+ botnets
Report
With 80,000+ email addresses compromised daily, the platform provides extensive reporting capabilities to track and triage incidents.
Predict
Dark Web ID allows us to see industry patterns long before they become trends, and offers the intelligence to keep you and your employees more protected.
How Dark Web ID by above.care™ Protects Your Business
Connects to multiple Dark Web services including Tor, I2P and Freenet, to search for compromised credentials, without requiring you to connect to these high-risk services directly.
Provides intelligent awareness of compromised credentials before breaches occur.
Why It’s So Important
Compromised credentials are used to conduct further criminal activity.
Employees often use the same password for multiple services, such as network login, social media, and SaaS business applications, exponentially increasing the potential damage from a single compromised credential.
Limited visibility when credentials are stolen; over 75% of compromised credentials are reported to the victim’s organization by a third party, such as law enforcement.
Why you need an Integrated and Ongoing Awareness Program
Cyber-attacks are on the rise; particularly among small- and mid-sized businesses.
You may have the most up-to-date and strongest security systems in place, but this will be a wasted investment if you don’t also train and test your staff.
Threats are ever-evolving and become more sophisticated and harder to detect. Regular training on the latest criminal tactics will help mitigate risk.
Alberta’s workplaces have evolved since the Employment Standards Code was last updated in 1988, including growth in part-time jobs, shift work and exible schedules. In June 2017, the Fair and Family-friendly Workplaces Act was passed, and included changes to the Code applicable to employees and employers under provincial jurisdiction. This publication covers the basic standards employers are expected to meet and employees can expect to receive.
Helping companies change their world is an exciting responsibility. When a small or medium sized business invests in a fleet of Apple devices, we sometimes have to help people understand why things are done a certain way. Confusion around Apple IDs and how / why we recommend they be used happens all the time.
This is a DRAFT that may help other business people have the right conversations with their employees when iOS devices are being managed using our preferred approach– this document will evolve and your input is invited.
iPhone / iPad FAQ:
Introduction — Your Apple ID is the email address and password you use to sign in to Apple services including iCloud, the App Store, the iTunes Store and more. Apple takes the privacy of your personal information very seriously and employs industry-standard practices to safeguard your Apple ID.
Why do we get iPhones and iPads? — We want you to enjoy the best and most secure technology available. We know that Apple devices hold their value better, and that the “return on investment” is higher than with other devices.
Why do we have to use an Apple ID on these iPhones and iPads anyway? — iPhones and iPads get many of their capabilities from the “Cloud” based infrastructure that Apple has built. This includes things like the App Store, iCloud email, Pages, Numbers and Keynote (word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software programs). The only way to have the best experience with iOS devices is to use an Apple ID.
Just how secure are Apple IDs and my information in the Apple “cloud”? — Apple IDs are like Social Insurance Numbers, and Apple has designed these systems with the ultimate security and privacy in mind. This design means that even if they wanted to, they couldn’t decrypt your information without your blessing. You can make your Apple ID so secure that the instant anyone TRIES to access your information, you’re made aware of it— that’s part of a feature called Two Factor Authentication.
Why do want us to use our own Apple ID? — We want you to have the best experience possible with your company owned iPhone. Using your own Apple ID keeps it simple for you. None of us have to babysit a bunch of different passwords, and you get the benefit of Apple’s iCloud eco-system which includes Music, Apps, Photos, and more. Note that you CAN create a new Apple ID, strictly for use on your company Apple devices— it’s up to you.
If I use my own Apple ID, can you see any of my information? — No. Apple takes the personal privacy of it’s Apple ID account holders very seriously. We, nor any governmental agency can access your private information, including your photos, messages, iCloud emails, contacts, or iCloud drive documents.
Can you see where I am, or what I’m doing? — Not reliably. Because of concern for YOUR Privacy, Apple does not provide this capability to us. If necessary, we can TRY to see where a phone is located geographically using a management tool, but it’s only accurate under very specific conditions.
So exactly what CAN you see then? — Only things directly related to the safety and security of the device itself. It is an expensive company asset after all. The question is, what are we INTERESTED in seeing?… we want to make sure the device has up to date software, so we can see what version of the operating system is installed. We want to feel confident that the devices are being used mostly for work related purposes, so we can see what Apps are installed. We can see some health related metrics about the device like battery life, network strength, how much storage space is available, and whether information is being encrypted properly.
And what ELSE is happening that I should be aware of? — We want to prevent company secrets from being compromised, so the devices are being prevented from having Company related information inter-mingled with your Personal information. We want to be able to remotely erase the device if it’s lost or stolen, so we can send a signal “over the air” for the device to do that to itself. We have used a security feature of the Apple eco-system called Supervision, which prevents the device from being activated by anyone else if it’s lost or stolen and we can’t recover it. We configure the devices to enforce the use of a Passcode. We may also block the installation of some known “inappropriate” Apps. Later, we may “invite” you to install Apps that WE pay for.
Speaking of devices being lost or stolen, what’s the right thing to do if that happens? — First, tell someone. We may ask you to try to use Find my iPhone to locate, lock, or wipe the device. That alone is a compelling reason for you to use your own Apple ID— as the “rightful end-user”, you have the ability to fairly reliably see where the device is on a map—- if you recall, we do not. If that doesn’t work, we may then try to remotely lock or wipe the device using our management tools. If we’re fortunate enough to recover the device, we can unlock it again.
There are lots of opinions about the importance of constant improvement of your business operations, but no on puts it as succinctly as Andy Lark, CMO of Xero.
I’ve seen it over and over. Small businesses spend some time and money implementing a system that’s monolithic in nature, overly bulky, expensive, and inflexible. “That’s what our accountant said we should use”. Or “I saw the ad on TV during The Masters”.
Companies like SAP, Sage, Intuit, or even Microsoft spend millions convincing you that their product is what you need. Instead, talk to us about a better approach. We can save you money, AND make your company more agile. We’ll show you how to innovate, navigate change, and evolve your business technology constantly, so you can be one of the sharks.
In today’s competitive business world, companies must evolve if they are to survive and thrive.
Today, 1 week after attending the annual Xero conference in Denver, Above Studio 1 attained Bronze Certified Partner status from Xero, maker of the world’s most beautiful accounting software for small to medium sized businesses.
Edmonton based Above Studio 1 is a hybrid Accounting and Technology firm. As Apple Certified Consultants, Xero certified partners, and Cloud experts, they can help reinvent a company’s processes and technology for growth, efficiency, security, and happiness.
“We know business and technology, and we can get you off those PCs and onto gorgeous equipment, beautiful accounting software, and smart cloud integrated systems” said Michael Reinhart, Above Studio 1 founder. “We’ve seen so many clients suffering pain and bleeding money because of stodgy, decrepit, and restrictive PC based systems. We liberate you from the old world.”
Suzanne Morter (CMA), Above Studio 1’s lead Consulting Accountant and Certified Xero Advisor will guide clients on the journey to Cloud based accounting.
Xero announced on June 4th, 2015 that they’re involved in a strategic partnership with Apple, Vend, and Deputy to provide specialized solutions aimed at revolutionizing the business of retail using Apple’s iOS devices.
About Xero
Xero (@Xero; ASX/NZX: XRO) is beautiful, easy to use online accounting software for small businesses and their advisors. Xero has over 500,000 subscribers in more than 180 countries, and seamlessly integrates with over 400 third party tools. Xero was ranked No. 1 by Forbes as the World’s Most Innovative Growth Companyin 2014 and 2015.
About Above Studio 1
Above Studio 1 is Alberta’s best consultancy for evolving the Information Technology systems of small to medium sized businesses. Above Studio 1 uses modern techniques and products to help businesses get the most bang for their IT buck, allowing business people focus on the things that make them happy.
