Tech Prognosis Blog Technology Tips for Businesses in Round Rock, TX

Disaster Planning Essentials For A Small Business Network

November 26, 2019November 22, 2019 by techprognosis

Disaster recovery planning

The 10 Disaster Planning Essentials For A Small Business Network

If your data is important to your business and you cannot afford to have your operations halted for days – even weeks – due to data loss or corruption, then you need to have a disaster recovery plan in place.

A disaster can happen at any time on any day and is likely to occur at the most inconvenient time. If you aren’t already prepared, you run the risk of having the disaster coming before you have in place a plan to handle it.

We have outlined 10 things you should have in place to make sure your business or organization could be back up and running again in the event of a disaster.

1. Have a written disaster recovery plan

As simple as it may sound, just thinking through in ADVANCE what needs to happen if, say, your business server computer has a meltdown or a natural disaster wipes out your office, will go a long way in getting things back up and running, fast. At a minimum, the plan should contain details on what disaster could happen and a step-by-step process of what to do, who should do it and how. Also include contact information for various providers and username and password information for various key web sites.

Writing this plan will also allow you to think about what you need to budget for backup, maintenance and disaster recovery. If you can’t afford to have your network down for more than a few hours, then you need a plan that can get you back up and running within that time frame. You may want the ability to virtualize your server, allowing the office to run off of the virtualized server while the real server is repaired.

Disaster Recovery Plan: How to Survive Cyber Attacks

December 17, 2025November 19, 2019 by Daniel Ihonvbere

There’s no way to predict the future, and Murphy’s Law tells us that anything that can go wrong will go wrong. If you and your business or organization do not have a well-thought out disaster recovery plan, your company’s data is teetering on the edge of a cliff without a safety net.

Having a comprehensive and well thought-out data backup and disaster recovery plan in place when there is data loss can help your organization or business survive malicious cyber attacks like ransomware.

In the last few years, we’ve seen plenty of organizations in the news for suffering huge damage from cyber attacks. And there does not seem to be any pointers that cyber incidents are going to reduce any time soon.

However, while cyber attacks as a cause of downtime have almost doubled as the cause of data loss, the rate at which it continues to cause downtime havoc will depend on improvements made to defensive and responsive measures like having a backup and disaster recovery plan.

What are backup and disaster recovery?

There’s an important distinction between backup and disaster recovery.

Backup is the process of making an extra copy (or multiple copies) of data. You back up data to protect it. You might need to restore backup data if you encounter an accidental deletion, database corruption, or problem with a software upgrade.

Disaster recovery, on the other hand, refers to the plan and processes for quickly reestablishing access to applications, data, and IT resources after an outage. That plan might involve switching over to a redundant set of servers and storage systems until your primary data center is functional again.

How To Protect Online Data Privacy Using Enhanced Tools

November 2, 2019November 2, 2019 by techprognosis

In the first place, and speaking of data privacy, have you ever wondered why some online ads you see are targeted to your tastes and interests? Or how websites remember your preferences from visit-to-visit or device-to-device?

The answer may be in the “web tracking cookies” installed on your computer when you visit a website, and other online tracking methods like:

Device fingerprinting where information is collected about your device for the purpose of identification,
Cross-device tracking technology which enables the tracking of users across multiple devices such as smartphones, television sets, smart TVs, and personal computer, and
Cross-site tracking where companies collect data on where you’ve been and what you’ve done across multiple websites.

What is a web tracker?

A web tracker is a small computer program (called script) placed by a website on your computer and is designed to collect information about your preferences and who you are as you interact with the site. Sometimes this script is placed purposefully by the website you’re on, other times a script may be from a website you’ve never visited.

How Software Vendors Encourage The Use Of Insecure Legacy Applications

October 31, 2019October 31, 2019 by techprognosis

Generally speaking, it is a common practice among IT professionals to associate bad user experience and clunky User Interfaces with legacy applications, and we bemoan the reluctance of users to use new and modern applications “that are right there.”

As a matter of fact, while we very often lament the refusal of technology users to wean themselves away from using legacy or outdated applications, the reality could be that sometimes, users have no choice in the matter: use legacy apps, or productivity comes to a screeching halt.

What Is A Legacy Application?

A legacy application (legacy app) is a software program that is outdated or obsolete. Although a legacy app still works, it may be unstable because of compatibility issues with current operating systems (OSes), browsers and information technology (IT) infrastructures. – – Definition from TechTarget

For example, at the start of 2016, Microsoft ended support for all versions of Internet Explorer (IE) prior to version 11. Users still browsing with older versions like IE 6 could continue to do so, but website pages were no longer going to be coded to be compatible, and any bugs or errors within the Internet Explorer program will not receive attention from Microsoft.

Safeguard Your Organization From Evolving Cyber Threats

October 28, 2019 by techprognosis

Businesses today face a constantly evolving set of potential threats, from data security breaches to downtime from unexpected events. To safeguard your organization from evolving cyber threats, use solutions that help protect your business data and minimize the disruptions caused by unexpected events.

Against the backdrop of these evolving threats, businesses and organizations are asking critical questions like:

With growing use of the cloud and mobile devices at work, how can we keep business data protected?
As my data grows, how can I make sure it is all backed up without spending a fortune?
If an unexpected event occurred, like a fire, physical break-in, flood, or cyber attack, how long would it take our business to get back online?
What would this downtime cost our business?
How do we keep up with a constantly changing compliance landscape?

To safeguard your business and organization from increasingly sophisticated cyber and internal threats to data, it is imperative that modern protection for evolving threats be put in place with emphasis on solutions that help protect critical business data and minimize the disruptions caused by unexpected events.

Why Your Organization Needs An Internet Use Policy

October 21, 2019October 21, 2019 by Daniel Ihonvbere

With computers and Internet access being such an integral part of every business, and the Internet filled with everything from gambling to x-rated websites, it is critical that every business has an Internet Use Policy in place.

This policy can help prevent your employees from accidentally or intentionally causing harm to your company or your company’s reputation. While you don’t want to give your employees the idea that they are living in George Orwell’s 1984, you want them to have a clear understanding of practices that are and are not appropriate during work hours. It is necessary for companies and organizations to create an Internet policy that everyone can live with.

Why Have An Internet Use Policy?

The purpose of a business is to make money, and for non-profit organizations, it is to fulfill the mission. In order to accomplish this, the company or organization has to have productive employees. The Internet can be a time drain and often prevent employees from being as productive as they should be.

With such a wide range of information available on the Internet, it is necessary to clarify the company’s expectations of its employees regarding Internet access. With a strong policy in place, the employee, as well as the employer, will find Internet use less confusing and frustrating.