Category Archives: Uncategorized

Cloud Computing, IT Consulting, IT Support, Managed IT Services, Uncategorized, Websites

Heartbleed bug

 

Heartbleed was the popular word of the internet last week, and it still is. What exactly is heartbleed though?

Heartbleed is a major bug within the authentication system for website which use OpenSSL to authenticate website logins. The problem is, a great majority of the internet uses OpenSSL as their authentication system.

The fix against this bug is to update the OpenSSL software on webservers. Major websites like Yahoo, Facebook, Google and plenty of others were affected, however they quickly patched the bug. After the fix is applied, users should change their passwords and make it complex.

Upon the discovery of this bug, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) temporarily suspended their online portion of the website. However, today it is reported that on average 900 Canadian social insurance numbers were stolen using the heartbleed bug.

How does heartbleed work though? Take a look at the image below. heartbleedexplained

 

 

 

 

To get more information on the heartbleed bug, visit http://heartbleed.com/

To test some websites, to see if they are currently affected with the heartbleed bug, visit https://filippo.io and enter the website address you wish to test.

In an upcoming article we will talk about password managers and how to choose a strong password and why you should do so.

If you would like more info on passwords, heartbleed, or internet security in general, feel free to contact Group 4 Networks.

About Group 4 Networks

We provide Toronto and GTA businesses with IT Support, IT Consulting and Managed IT Services at a fraction of the cost that they would pay a low-level full time IT Manager. Our team eliminates the hassle of dealing with the single knowledge and abilities of a lone “computer guy.”  What makes us unique is that we proactively manage our customer’s computer networks to eliminate many of the headaches and hassles of using computers to run a business.

We guarantee our customers a response within 60 minutes or less and are the only IT service provider in the region that offers a 60-Day 100% no hassle money back guarantee on our flat rate all inclusive service plans.

 

Cloud Computing, IT Consulting, IT Support, Uncategorized, Websites

Managing Passwords 101

pass

 

A good, strong, complex password is what is needed on the internet these days to prevent your account from being compromised. Most, if not all websites encrypt the passwords for user accounts when it’s stored in their database. An encrypted password cannot just be read as a normal word or sentence. The password appear as gibberish. Even if a hacker would get their hand on your encrypted password, it takes considerable amount of computer power to decipher the password. This is where password complexity comes in. If a password included the use of special characters such as $, @, &, %, numbers, letters with capitals, it’d be way harder to decipher.

For example: “blogpost” as a password is weak, it has no complexity, it could be cracked, and guessed within minutes. However, “Bl0gp0$t” is harder to decipher as there are a lot more variations of the password which the cracker would have to guess.

Password managers such as Keepass are great tools. A password managers sole purpose is to remember your usernames, passwords for specific sites. They also have builtin tools such as random password generators, which create complex, meaningless passwords which get stored in the database.

From the manager you search for which website you’d like to login to, and you could copy and paste the credentials into your browser.

Password managers are secure, and you’d only need to remember one password, the manager will remember the rest. Some other managers besides Keepass are LastPass, 1Password, and DashLane

If you’d like more info on password complexity, feel free to contact Group 4 Networks.

About Group 4 Networks

We provide Toronto and GTA businesses with IT Support, IT Consulting and Managed IT Services at a fraction of the cost that they would pay a low-level full time IT Manager. Our team eliminates the hassle of dealing with the single knowledge and abilities of a lone “computer guy.”  What makes us unique is that we proactively manage our customer’s computer networks to eliminate many of the headaches and hassles of using computers to run a business.

We guarantee our customers a response within 60 minutes or less and are the only IT service provider in the region that offers a 60-Day 100% no hassle money back guarantee on our flat rate all inclusive service plans.

Uncategorized

The Cloud Explained

 

The cloud is best explained as a remote server, that’s it.cloud-backup-G4ns

Instead of storing your content, such as your work, music, pictures on your local hard drive or your external hard drive, you’d store them on a remote server.

Another method of the cloud would be the all time popular applications like DropBox, Google Drive and SugarSync. Uploading your documents, and pictures to these services provide a safe haven, should your hard drive crash and not have any backups. The cloud is not just for backups, but it also gives the ability to work remotely.

In summary, the cloud are really just servers that are not local to your computer. Not a flash drive, not an external hard drive. Some companies run their own cloud, within their organization, to provide remote access to work files and data, from wherever it may be needed.

Group 4 Networks offer cloud services for all sizes of business. Should you be interested in our cloud services or want more information about the cloud, feel free to contact us.

About Group 4 Networks

We provide Toronto and GTA businesses with IT Support, IT Consulting and Managed IT Services at a fraction of the cost that they would pay a low-level full time IT Manager. Our team eliminates the hassle of dealing with the single knowledge and abilities of a lone “computer guy.”  What makes us unique is that we proactively manage our customer’s computer networks to eliminate many of the headaches and hassles of using computers to run a business.

We guarantee our customers a response within 60 minutes or less and are the only IT service provider in the region that offers a 60-Day 100% no hassle money back guarantee on our flat rate all inclusive service plans.