January 2020 - Monthly Mini-Bytes

The Truth About Business Email Today we will be talking about email for business. For consumers we like iCloud or Gmail for mail, but we can go into that later, but a lot of the same reasons we like those two for home users, we like Google's G-Suite or Microsoft's Office 365 Exchange for business. In 2020 email has become a minefield of spammers, scammers, spoofers, and otherwise bad folks trying to impersonate your employees, fool customers, or get back-door access to your systems. It takes a large organization like Google and Microsoft to dedicate the resources both in staffing and technology to build a firewall of protection around business email. It's not to say that they are 100% secure -- no system is, but by having the manpower focused on gray-listing and blacklisting domains, it helps give business owners one more layer of protection. Smaller ISPs cannot compete, which is why you see such organizations as Go Daddy reselling Microsoft Office 365 Exchange. We usually recommend purchasing Office 365 Exchange directly from Microsoft, as some ISPs will resell older or their own server-based versions of Exchange that we do not recommend in 2020. Again, no mail system is even close to 100% secure. You and your company need a good, solid set of policies around passwords, access, and account criteria in addition to a robust email system. Even then, it still takes a savvy and well-trained staff to further your business' protection. One other thing to note: These two products offer a lot more than email. From calendars, to notes, to apps, to cloud storage -- both offer full business suites. To learn more about: Google G-Suite for Business: https://gsuite.google.com/solutions/ Microsoft Office 365 Exchange: https://products.office.com/en-us/exchange/exchange-online

You Have to Pay to Play There is a cost with trying to save money when it comes to technology. You pay for quality and reliability. You pay for security and longevity. And the cost stays the same whether you wait to upgrade or delay it down the road. Nowadays with all the security concerns it is important to keep as up-to-date as possible to make sure that you are taking advantage of the best security. Do we recommend refurbished Macs, iPhones, etc? No. Absolutely never. Macs and other Apple devices retain their value as long as they can run a current system. For a Mac you may save one or two-hundred dollars, but you never know if it is actually "refurbished" and you may just be buying someone else's problems. A well-configured Mac purchased new with Apple Care covers you for three years and can hopefully last well beyond that. What about subscriptions for Adobe or Office? Pay them. That's the way that tech is going. It's frustrating, but with your subscription you have 24/7 support (in most cases) and the apps will always be up-to-date. If you don't like the subscription model that these companies are implementing, you could always buy their stock and show up to the annual meetings to complain. It won't help, but you may get some tasty snacks. What if my iPhone/iPad cannot run a current system? Get a new one. For mobile devices it's important to always be on the current system. If you can't run it, replace it. iPhones have a lifecycle of about 2 years. That's what the industry says. You may get longer, but if it won't run the current iOS, then replace it. A little money spent over a consistent period is better than a lot spent all at once with massive updates to software and systems. Staying current and up-to-date, at the end of the day, is the cost-effective solution to level the technology costs.

Big Changes to Cox Email and Others For many of the reasons stated in our article above about business email, ISPs like Cox are pulling back their offerings. As of August 2019 you are no longer permitted to add additional email accounts. We have also learned that Cox is limiting new customer's emails to one. https://www.cox.com/residential/support/cox-email.html And Cox is not the only internet provider to start pulling back on email. Now is the time to think about moving your primary email address to a different service. We have found iCloud and Gmail to be two attractive options. Remember that moving to a new primary email means changing all logins that use the old @cox.net email address.