IT Trends & Technology

Healthcare data is increasingly under attack. In October alone there were 27 healthcare data breaches reported to the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights, resulting in the exposure of some 71,377 records.

To understand how to best counter these threat, we’ll take a look at some recent breaches, review key best practices, and explore the rise of Artificial Intelligence as a cyber remedy.

Public and private clouds each have their advantages—and limitations—tied to issues of cost, scalability, and manageability. IT leaders are increasingly seeking a “best of both worlds” solution by adopting hybrid cloud infrastructures.

Have you suspected that cyberattacks on businesses are increasing in sophistication? A 2017 report confirms that success via these malicious events stems from three primary factors:

When technology analysts look back on the Equifax hack, they may well see a turning point in cybersecurity.

It’s one thing when a major retailer like Target gets hacked. Certainly breaches in government agencies raise concern. But Equifax is a credit reporting agency. It’s exact function is to safeguard the kind of sensitive personal data hackers are looking to steal.

Did you know that 81 percent of hacking-related breaches were aided by a combination of stolen and weak passwords? The 2017 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report also shows that 62 percent of breaches featured hacking, while more than half (51%) were driven by malware.

First National Technology Solutions (FNTS), an IT managed services provider, announced it will begin offering Database as a Service (DBaaS) cloud computing and managed services due to rising demand from businesses that want to deploy new databases quickly, securely and at a fraction of the cost of infrastructure-intensive projects.

A database can be one of the most important assets a business has to run its applications and operations. First National Technology Solutions can host database infrastructures in the cloud to streamline business operations, allowing companies to focus on other aspects of their business without having to monitor their own data.

According to RightScale’s 2017 State of the Cloud Report, 58 percent of enterprises now have a hybrid cloud architecture, with the numbers going up. A hybrid cloud architecture enables companies to maintain control of an internally managed private cloud while relying on the public cloud as needed.

According to a holiday shopping projection from CMO, the 2017 holiday season will be the first to break $100 billion in online sales.

With credit card numbers and personal information being shared through web browsers and mobile and work devices, it is important for people to be vigilant when making their holiday purchases to avoid becoming a victim of cybercrime.

A 2017 report by CompTIA indicates that the demand for tech talent in the United States will continue to outpace the supply of workers. And among hiring employers, almost half (47 percent) expect hiring to be moderately or significantly more challenging this year.

Traveling for the holidays? The Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s holiday periods are the busiest long-distance travel periods of the year, and we often rely on technology to stay connected and entertained while we’re away. With cybercrime hitting an all-time high, there are security measures you’ll want to consider taking before hitting the road or the friendly skies to ensure your identity isn’t compromised through your smartphone, tablet, laptop and charging devices.

You can utilize the following holiday travel safety reminders to help protect your tech while you’re on the go:

The days of storing personal, health and business records on paper, tucked away in a locked filing cabinet are gone. More organizations are making the digital transformation as a more efficient way to access and share information online, in servers and in the cloud.

When selecting a hybrid cloud solution, you may feel overwhelmed, even though your legacy network infrastructure is costing you too much per month and limiting business growth. You’re not sure about putting all of your sensitive data on the cloud just yet, or how to manage it.

Did you know that by 2020 almost a quarter (24 percent) of the “total addressable IT market will be cloud”? That’s Gartner, Inc.’s prediction in the 2017 Planning Guide for Cloud Computing.

With the continued maturity of the public cloud, and the aggressive adoption of cloud services across all industry verticals, companies are feeling the pressure “to build and invest in cloud-first strategies and architectures.” But the hybrid cloud computing puzzle can turn into a nightmare without key management strategies. Here are four that will help ensure success.

For some companies, the majority of the year is business as usual – they sell, build and distribute their products. Business may be constant, but predicable. However, during the holiday season starting in November and going through the end of the year, most retail companies have an intense selling period where they can make up to 30 percent of their annual sales. This influx may require an increase in bandwidth capacity to accommodate an uptick in online sales.