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Windows 7 offers ROI in months, claims study

July 12th, 2010 by William Hobson

Taking up Windows 7 can help improve IT systems at small and medium sized businesses, saving time and money, claims a new report from a leading technology research firm.

An IDC study commissioned by Microsoft claims that SMBs could recover their investment on deploying Windows 7 across their business in as little as seven to eight months.

IDC surveyed SMBs in both the US and the Netherlands, ranging from firms employing just eight employees to larger enterprises with as many as 300. The disparity in size and employee numbers led to a varying bottom line result. Yet Randy Perry, IDC’s vice president of Business Value Consulting, said that all of the firms surveyed by IDC displayed a positive ROI based on their deployment of Windows 7.

“The cost savings per PC results in an overall reduction of 51%,” says Perry, “Windows 7 pays for itself in reduced IT labour costs, depending on the PC.

Given that the study looked at direct implementation of the new operating system, the savings could be even greater for a company who sourced their IT solution from via a hosted service from a Microsoft small business specialist, particularly if it was integrated into an existing Microsoft small business server arrangement.

The key improvements for SMB ROI were identified by IDC as user productivity across a variety of areas both large and small. For example IDC saw that there was a “dramatic” drop in the need for remote IT support, as well as a decrease in the number of reboots per workstation.

According to Small Business Computing, Microsoft has now sold 150 million licenses for Windows 7 in just eight months.

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Cloud computing will become more important than the internet

July 12th, 2010 by Laura Nineham

Cloud computing will become more important than the internet, claimed a university professor talking at the World Future Society conference in Boston.

As reported by PC World, professor Mike Nelson claimed that, as the web continues to develop, cloud computing will overtake the internet with regards to importance. That’s because he isn’t sure that developers posses the foresight to continue develop and grow the internet, he told the conference.

According to Yahoo News, the Georgetown University professor said that cloud computing will allow developing nations to access software that was once reserved for affluent contries. It would allow small businesses to reduce their capital expenditure by using cloud services to store and compute data and could change how enterprise functions currently provided by a small business server are accessed by businesses.

The cloud is more exciting than the internet, claims Read Write Web. The evolution of the cloud is shaping up to become a central nervous system for “a new universal communications instrastructure” they claim.

However, there are challenges facing the development of the cloud, reports Yahoo News.  

“There are a lot of forces that could push us away from the cloud of clouds,” said Nelson. He said he believes that cloud providers will develop technology that locks users into one service provider, rather than opening it up to allow users to swap between providers.

He also said that privacy regulations that clamp down on piracy pose a significant challenge.

This prediction is supported by a poll conducted by Information Week, which found that 60% of IT managers already use cloud computing, or plan to in the next two years.

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Two thirds of employees admit snooping for information

July 9th, 2010 by Laura Nineham

IT professionals have reported that snooping is on the rise in businesses.

As reported by Cnet News, 35% of people admitted snooping last year, but the figure has since almost doubled. Now 67% of IT professionals admit accessing confidential information that isn’t relevant to their jobs.

The research, conducted by a security company, questioned IT staff in the US and UK. It found that, when asked which department was most likely to do the snooping, over half of people said IT because of the department’s power and responsibility in maintaining computer systems. 11% of people pointed the finger at the HR department as the second most likely, followed by administrative assistants.

According to the researchers, it’s data which is also at risk due to the worrying levels of snooping. Ex-employees were blamed by 37% of people, followed by human error as the second most likely cause of security breaches, reports PC World.

Customer databases were the data type most commonly grabbed by competitors, followed by R&D plans, according to Cnet.

The research found that businesses are increasingly stepping up their controls, such as computer network support, in a bid to prevent snooping.

This could be working, as on 61% of people said they could sneak past the controls. Whilst this is an alarmingly high number, which illustrates more still needs to be done, it’s an improvement on last years figure which stood at 77%. 

One company which provides cloud computing saw this as an opportunity to reinforce the message that it is employees, rather than technology, which pose the biggest threats to security. ”Companies that continue to use in-house servers instead of outsourcing their applications to a vendor may be equally as likely, or more likely, to face security threats,” claims the company.

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The private sector can learn from high profile council data losses

July 9th, 2010 by Laura Nineham

A recent case involving Barnet, West Sussex and Buckinghamshire councils illustrates the importance of encrypting laptops which employees take home.

According to The Register, the Information Commissioner’s Office found the councils guilty of breaching the Data Protection Act.

A statement released by the ICO, said that LB Barnet council lost an unencrypted, non-password protected USB stick and CDs which contained personal information about over 9,000 children and their families, when they were stolen from the home of an employee. The employee downloaded the data without authorisation, however the council hadn’t provided training and didn’t have relevant security processes in place to prevent such downloads.

The statement also states that in the case of West Sussex council, a laptop with personal information of children involved in childcare proceedings was stolen from an employee’s home. Just like the USB stick, this wasn’t encrypted and the employee wasn’t given any training on data protection or IT security. The ICO found that more than 2,300 unencrypted laptops were likely to be in use across West Sussex, although steps are being taken to do so.

Furthermore, Buckinghamshire County Council lost documents containing sensitive information relating to two children at Heathrow Airport. “After further analysis by the ICO, it was apparent that no real thought had been given to the security of this personal data during travel,” said the ICO statement.

“These three councils have shown a poor regard for the importance of protecting children’s personal information,” said Ally-Anne Poole, enforcement group manager at the ICO. “A lack of awareness and training in data protection requirements can lead to personal information falling into the wrong hands.”

The implications of the news extends beyond the public sector and can easily be applied to the private. Businesses who don’t have some type of remote back up face the risk of losing data should any data get lost. However, prevention is better than the cure. Businesses must consider their IT policies and how easy it is for employees to make copies of data. Improved security measures would mean that employees can’t copy, distribute or remove data without authorisation which would not only prevent the loss of data, but also one of your greatest business assets from falling into the hands of competitors.

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IT administrators believe data has been handed to competitors

July 7th, 2010 by Laura Nineham

Over a third of IT administrators believe that highly sensitive information has been handed to competitors.

According to Computer Weekly, a survey found that former employees were the most likely way that information was leaked. Customer databases, research and development plans are the most sought after types of information, according to the study.

Perhaps most worryingly, the survey uncovered that one third of IT administrators are turning a blind eye to what is happening in their networks.

Adam Bosnian, executive vice president at the company behind the research, said it was a business’ responsibility to protect information. “Failing to do so makes the company as bad as those who are abusing their privileged positions,” he said.

One way businesses can help safeguard themselves from data theft is through computer network support. By making the network more secure, it will be more difficult for any unauthorised persons to access the data.

The survey found that insider sabotage has increased by 7% compared to last year. Now, 27% of respondents think insider sabotage is responsible for loss of sensitive data. In fact, 41% of people admitted using administrative passwords to snoop on sensitive and confidential information. That’s an 8% increase compared to last year.

The next most likely cause of data loss was human error, followed by external cyber attacks and the loss of mobile storage devices.

The company behind the research said the results are little different to last year’s, recommending that more should be done to safeguard the data.

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