Ferrum Technology Services Blog

The online world is full of threats that are waiting for you to let your system's guard down. Thanks to powerful security measures, you might not be worried enough to consider that hackers have found ways to get around your defenses. If you’ve grown complacent, you might be in for a rude awakening when a hacker’s phishing scam works on you.

When you see the results of a major hacking campaign on the news, you might tend to sympathize with the victim. While most hacks target individuals or high-profile businesses, hackers have, for the first time, intentionally targeted each other. The attack in question occurred between Naikon, a cyberespionage group, and another group called Hellsing.

You should never assume that your data is safe from a hacking attack. Just like how the technology industry is working toward new ways to protect the public from hacks, those who lurk in the gutters of the Internet are trying to undermine these developments by any means possible. Some security professionals believe that even radio signals can undermine network security.

Just like any other high-profile entity, a government should place great emphasis on its IT infrastructure. The U.S. government is moving through 2015 with an increased awareness of the state of cybersecurity, and with all of the huge security breaches that happen almost regularly, it qualifies cyber threats as important as other national security threats.

If a company neglects network security, they’ll quickly find their network inundated with threats. However, if you fail to protect your business from internal problems as well, you might have a whole other monster on your hands. Some businesses have encountered this problem when employees access certain documents and then accidentally misplace or delete them, causing damage that your organization was not particularly prepared for.

With spring arriving, “winter is coming” as the new season of the critically-acclaimed television series Game of Thrones returns to millions of viewers worldwide. Ironically, there’s also a type of malware gaining traction in the online community that matches its bark with its bite, aptly dubbed Dyre Wolf. This threat has the potential to cost businesses as much as $1.5 million per hack, and takes advantage of the ever-common spear phishing tactic.

Identity theft is commonplace on the Internet, and if you’re not careful with how you approach your browsing, you could potentially leak sensitive information to hackers. Unfortunately, some people are so concerned with protecting their other information, like Social Security numbers or dates of birth, that they forget that their PIN number is just as vulnerable to hacking as ever.

Normally, you can trust the software that comes preinstalled on a new computer. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case with the shopping-search app Superfish, which came installed on every Lenovo device sold between September and December 2014. If you’ve got the Superfish app on your computer, then you need to remove it before it does some superbad damages. Here’s how you do it.

This month saw one of the largest recorded data breaches ever, when healthcare-provider Anthem experienced a hack causing data belonging to more than 80 million of its patients to be exposed. This includes sensitive information like Social Security numbers, dates of birth, email addresses, and more. How can you protect yourself from a hack like this?

Humans are always striving to create the next big security measure against the massive wave of online threats. One topic consistently in discussion is biometrics as a security measure, which take advantage of unique biological aspects of users in order to maximize security. Now, the US military is seeing the value of this kind of technology, and they’re funding a campaign to make it available to users.

Online dating has been around long enough that it no longer carries a negative social stigma. In fact, you may know of some success stories from online dating--or you may have even successfully used online dating yourself. When looking for online love, remember to use protection from scammers.

As the Internet of Things and BYOD make headlines in the technology world, more and more devices are connecting to wireless networks. While this means that technology continues to grow more mobile, it also means that threats are given new avenues to access countless devices, many of which might contain information of a personal nature.

We’re all hooked on our email. It has revolutionized the way businesses communicate, and in many cases, it can be a major distraction. If you’re a small business trying to manage your own Exchange server, you’re probably aware of how much a headache email can be. Do you really have time to host and manage your own email solution?

Despite cloud computing being commonplace, there are still some businesses holding out when it comes to migrating their data to the cloud. In most scenarios like this, a company has objections to the cloud that are preventing them from taking advantage of its many benefits. Are these objections valid? Let’s find out by addressing two of the most common objections to the cloud.

You’ve got a lot of sensitive information stored on your mobile device. If it were to fall into the wrong hands, you wouldn’t want the new user to have easy access to it. This is why every mobile device should be locked. Here’s how to lock your Android device, as well as how to pick out a lock screen setting that’s right for you.

Believe it or not, there are horror stories told of innocent people being abandoned by 911 dispatchers when they need help the most. This mainly isn’t due to incompetence on the dispatchers’ part, but because there are malicious forces that aren’t taken into consideration. Often, victims of 911 mishaps are misled by the odd hacker.

A business is always at risk of being destroyed, be it online or offline. According to a study by 1&1, 67 percent of people confirmed that someone they know has had information stolen from them while online. In order to prevent your business from joining this statistic, there are several features you should look for when considering your network’s security.

It’s the holiday season… for everyone but Sony, at least. The tech/entertainment supergiant has been experiencing a ton of security issues lately. Last month, someone hacked into Sony’s databases and stole a lot of information (including unreleased movies, which were later released to the world). This December, it was revealed that Sony stored their passwords in a folder on their server titled “Passwords.”

The Internet is infested with threats of all kinds, some of the most annoying are bots. These consist of systems which potentially gather information from a variety of sources. While primarily used by search engines to gather data from websites (these are the good kinds), there are others who may have fallen into the hands of hackers which steal information or send spam.

‘Tis the season for technology vulnerabilities and exploits. In addition to Sandworm and Cryptowall 2.0, another flaw has been found in Microsoft Office. This particular threat allows a hacker to gain control of a computer system, making it a dangerous and potentially threatening gamble for your business to ignore it. Thankfully, the issue has been patched, and the fix is now available to the public.