Directive Blogs

We’re all aware of the outage that Facebook experienced a few weeks before it announced its Meta rebrand, which prevented users around the world from accessing the services that the social media giant provides. While it may not sound like a huge deal that people couldn’t share their thoughts with one another for a short time, the ramifications stretched far beyond the inability to scroll through a Newsfeed.

Almost daily there is another data breach reported that exposes data for hundreds of thousands or millions of people. This is a troubling trend. One of the most troubling events happened recently as 700 million profiles from the social media network LinkedIn were found for sale on a popular hackers forum. What’s worse is that the company isn’t admitting that it had been breached recently. Let’s take a brief look at this situation and try to unpack what is going on with LinkedIn.

With such a heavy focus on remote work over the past year or so, if you have tried to procure equipment or technology solutions during this period, you may have noticed that it is much harder than usual to do so. The global chip shortage has led to many challenges for organizations, chief among them getting the parts needed to put together critical technology solutions. This opens up a whole other set of issues, though, particularly in regards to disruption of the supply chain.

You’ve probably heard by now, a Russia-based hacking collective by the name of DarkSide targeted Colonial Pipeline, a company that supplies nearly 45 percent of the fuel used along the Eastern Seaboard of the United States, with a ransomware attack. Not only does this hack have an effect on fuel prices and availability, it highlights just how vulnerable much of the nation’s energy infrastructure is. Let’s discuss the details of the hack and the raging discussion about cybersecurity that’s happening as a result. 

Being in IT, we’ve seen and heard it all. Between the campfire horror stories of technicians to the outlandish IT conspiracies and ‘home remedies’ that get passed around, we’ve decided to compile a list of some of our favorite IT and technology myths.

Does the U.S. Constitution allow the American government to access the electronic devices of its citizens? According to FBI Director James Comey’s statements at Symantec’s Annual Government Symposium, it certainly does.

2015 was a brutal year for major corporations, as one by one they fell victim to hacking attacks. Major organizations like Blue Cross Blue Shield, Anthem, and even the United States Office of Personnel became victims of major hacking campaigns. A fact that’s often lost amongst these details is that not all hackers use their skill for evil actions, even if they are still illegal.

You're likely familiar with the various ways that hackers can steal your identity, but you may not be familiar with how hackers anonymously buy and sell people's personal information to interested parties. This is done through online ID theft services and a December hearing before the U.S. Senate highlights how one service was selling personal records on more than 200 million Americans!

May 4th is Star Wars Day (May the fourth be with you). In celebration of our favorite space saga, we thought that we would write about our dream job; providing IT support for the mother of all technologies, the Death Star from Star Wars.

The expiration date for Google Reader is set for July 1, 2013. Google’s decision to axe the Reader was not because it was unpopular, but rather, it seems like Google wants to focus their energy into fewer products. This announcement leaves many Google faithful out in the cold, and Feedly has welcomed the Google huddled masses yearning to read free.

It looks like Mac users won't be getting a break from malware as another trojan is breaking out on OS X. In February, malware known as Flashback infected around 600,000 Macs. This month a new trojan called SabPub is making its rounds.

We've been blogging a bit about ways to prepare for laptop theft and what to do if a company laptop is actually stolen.  Laptop and mobile device theft is a widespread issue for businesses and can lead to data theft which can be extremely costly; much more than the mere price of the hardware. This issue is all too familiar with NASA, which admits that thousands of mobile device theft incidents have occurred over the past few years.