It’s a decades-old question that businesses continue to ask: should we outsource our IT? What benefits can a managed service provider (MSP) bring to our business, and are managed services cost effective? The ideal option varies from business to business, but the strong growth trend for managed services provision indicates an increased willingness among businesses to utilise managed services. Why? Let’s look at some of the primary benefits of MSPs.

Certain UK industries such as manufacturing, telecommunications, retail, and others who collect large volumes of data, have the potential to reap substantial benefits from Big Data analytics projects. If you really think about it, almost all industries accumulate huge amounts of data. And so it follows that practically all industries can potentially benefit.

We can’t feature every single industry here, or at least, in a single post. So, for now, let’s just focus on these 10 industries and provide brief examples or ideas on how these industries can take advantage of this relatively new trend:

The year 2017 was a dismal year for IT security, particularly in the arena of ransomware.

Less than 12 months ago, the ransomware worm WannaCry wreaked havoc across the globe, placing large organisations – including NHS trusts in England and Scotland, at the forefront of one of the most prolific cyber attacks in history. Then followed NotPetya (initially believed to be the Petya malware of 2016) in June, which also spread quickly and, even without the aid of human intervention, managed to harm multinational companies.

Yet more ransomware attacks compromised the data of individuals and organisations, but they were not nearly as high profile as the aforementioned attacks, and this prompted many people to believe that ransomware is no longer the threat that it was twelve months ago. But is this really the case?

We all witnessed the flurry of activity that led up to May 25, 2018; the date on which GDPR became enforceable. Organisations and businesses of all types made a gargantuan effort to ensure compliance. However, GDPR compliance is not a one-off effort.

GDPR compliance involves ongoing, but difficult to enforce, habits covering the responsible use and the protection of your customer data. Most resource-pressed businesses will benefit from whatever resources are available. Enter Office 365.

On the 16th and 17th of May, HTL demonstrated our broad range of hosted desktop and cloud solutions at Excel London, the biggest exhibition of its kind. Representatives from companies big and small witnessed first hand just how much difference our services could make to their workflows.

With the onset of new technologies, most organisations have come to rely heavily on their IT practices and systems to ensure that operations are carried out with utmost efficiency. But how do corporate executives and business owners know that their IT system is effectively contributing to the company's business objectives?

The careful consideration given to the acquisition of software assets or the upgrade of IT infrastructure is justified. However, less attention is devoted to evaluating if these investments are actually providing a positive return for the company. Perhaps more important than ascertaining whether IT resources are properly leveraged, is to ensure that the enterprise's IT systems are reliable and secure enough to maintain the integrity of the company's data and information assets. 

It is easy to follow the mistaken belief that beefing up security at your business involves buying expensive hardware and software or hiring a top-rated security consultant to step in and make major changes. In fact, it is possible to make solid security progress by simply following good practice, and by tightening protection where needed.

Making these essential improvements is important for businesses of all sizes. In 2016, the Federation of Small Businesses found that the UK’s small businesses are collectively attacked over 7 million times a year, costing up to £5.26 billion. In this article, we cover some of the most effective ways to improve resilience against these attacks without spending an arm and a leg.

The challenges of actively managing information security are growing, and every business, regardless of size, should pro-actively protect their systems and the data held within. But how do customers know that your information security practices are fit for purpose?

Even the best intentions do not guarantee sound security practices for businesses. The only way for customers to judge the internal processes of your business is by checking for accreditation such as ISO 27001. In fact, 71% of respondents to a 2016 survey by IT Governance Ltd said that they had fielded a question about ISO 27001 accreditation.

HTL Support is delighted to announce that it will be exhibiting at The Business Show, London, on May 16th and 17th.

Our professional and friendly team is looking forward to welcoming visitors, and learning about the areas in which they most need IT support, as well as demonstrating the latest software solutions that can provide a competitive edge to businesses throughout London. Find our stand at exhibitor number 110.

DDoS attacks are typically designed to inundate servers and entire networks by consuming computing resources through large volumes of traffic, connections, or requests. And so, because cloud infrastructures are assumed to be backed by a large assemblage of such resources, many people believe their servers are less susceptible to these types of attacks if they’re hosted in the cloud. But that’s not entirely true.

If your servers are hosted in a multitenant environment along with a bunch of other servers belonging to other organisations (which is usually the case in a public cloud), your servers could be at risk of collateral damage. If those other servers (note: not yours) are bombarded by a DDoS attack and your cloud service provider (CSP) attempts to absorb the attack, your own servers, which share the same underlying infrastructure with those other servers, could also suffer.