Small Business Technology Challenges

Overcoming the IT Hurdle

Background – Infinity Technologies

  Started in 1996 – Retail Software

  Provide IT Support and Phone Systems

  9-person Tech Staff – Microsoft Certified

  Small Business Focus – 5 to 50 Users

Introduction

The Five Biggest IT Challenges Facing Small Business

Introduction

1.  Data Loss 2.  Security Vulnerabilities 3.  Downtime 4.  Cloud Confusion 5.  Productivity Problems

Recommendation: Have a plan to manage your IT

Introduction

1.  Develop a ‘Playbook’ (living document) 2.  Systemize 3.  Delegate tasks and duties 4.  Plan ahead as much as possible

Technology solutions are still seen as critical to survival

The market for small and midsize IT spending in the US continued to grow through the recession, moving from $305 billion in 2007, to a projected $411 billion in 2012.

Compass Intelligence. “SMB Mania: Analysis of vendor marketing strategies targeting the SMB market.” September, 2008.

Introduction

Small businesses’ IT spending tends to involve outsourcing

“CONVENTIONAL WISDOM ONCE TOLD US THAT A COMPANY WITH 1,000 EMPLOYEES IS MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN ONE WITH JUST TEN EMPLOYEES. TODAY, THAT WISDOM HAS BEEN TURNED ON ITS HEAD AND WE ARE SEEING SMALL AND MIDSIZE BUSINESSES ACHIEVING RECORD GROWTH, AND ACCOMPLISHING MORE WITH FEWER RESOURCES.”

Compass Intelligence. “Stimulating SMB: Small and mid-size business IT market today & a look at the latest survey results.” September,

2009.

Introduction

Small businesses’ IT spending tends to involve outsourcing

Threat #1

The data loss threat is real

Threat #1: Data Loss

70 percent of small firms that experience a major data loss go out of business within a year.

Contingency Planning, Strategic Research Corp and DTI/Price Waterhouse Coopers (2004) and is widely quoted in places

such as: Diana Shepstone, National data awareness project launched to help businesses prevent data disasters ( Data Centre Solutions, Jan. 8, 2007)

Equipment theft/loss has become more prevalent as the number of mobile and remote workers has increased


34 percent of small and mid-size businesses admitted that they have lost a company laptop.

30 percent of respondents have important data contained on the laptop, which is not backed up in the office.

Insight UK Survey, 2009.

Redundancy is the key to an effective Data Protection Strategy


RAID

Offsite External



RAID

Offsite External

1. Inexpensive 2. Set and Forget 3. Fairly Standard 4. Local



RAID

Offsite External

1. Hands On* 2. Device Dependant 3. Software Costs 4. Local



RAID

Offsite External

1. Device Dependant 2. Local 3. Subscription* 4. Degree of Trust 5. Configuration

Online Backup is a standard Best Practice


“YOUR BACKUP MUST BE OFFSITE, SECURE, AND AVAILABLE FOR RECOVERY 24/7. ONE POPULAR OPTION THAT MEETS THE ABOVE CRITERIA, WITH THE ADDED BENEFIT OF EASE OF USE AND AUTOMATION, IS ONLINE BACKUP.”

Walzer, Jennifer. “Small business guide: Disaster recovery. New York Times, September 9, 2009.



RAID

Offsite External

Total Solution (sort of…)



RAID

Offsite External

Total Solution (sort of…)

..if you Verify & Test

Monitoring the success/failure results of backups is critical


It is therefore important that backups are not only automated to avoid human error but also periodically tested. It is useless having a backup system if restoration does not function as advertised.

“Security Threats: A Guide for Small and Mid-Sized Nonprofits, Brad Dinerman and GFI Software, 2009

Threat #2

In many cases, Security is viewed strictly as a cost center

Threat #2: Security Vulnerabilities

“WHEN ECONOMIC CIRCUMSTANCES LOOK DIRE, IT IS EASY TO TURN SECURITY INTO A CHECKLIST ITEM THAT KEEPS BEING PUSHED BACK. HOWEVER THE REALITY IS THAT, IN SUCH SITUATIONS, SECURITY SHOULD BE A PRIMARY ISSUE. THE LIKELIHOOD OF THREATS AFFECTING YOUR ORGANIZATION WILL PROBABLY INCREASE AND THE IMPACT CAN BE MORE DETRIMENTAL...”

Dinerman, Brad. “Security threats: A guide for small and mid-size nonprofits.” GFI Software, 2009.


“Trend Micro 2008 Annual Threat Roundup”. Trend Micro, 2009

Exploit and attack threat levels continue to increase



Botnets have become an extreme threat


Botnet is a jargon term for a

collection of software agents, or robots, that run autonomously and automatically.

Botnet From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



Altogether, ZeuS and other botnets control more than 100 million computers. This gives cybercriminals more computing power than the entire world's supercomputers combined.

Trend Micro. Threat Encyclopedia 2010.

ZeuS Server installation page


“ZeuS A Persistant Criminal Enterprise”. Trend Micro, 2010

Security providers struggle to keep up



Social Media has become a favorite method for exploits



Going into 2010, it is likely that social networks will continue to be the target of cybercriminals. However, it is also likely that social networks will be further used by legitimate businesses seeking new ways in which to communicate and engage with customers. For the business the challenge is how to harness the benefits of social networks while ensuring their own business networks remain secure.

Trend Micro, Inc. “The future of threats and threat technologies.” December, 2009.

Attacks are trending to be more localized and targeted


“OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS, THE THREAT LANDSCAPE HAS SHIFTED, THERE ARE NO LONGER ANY GLOBAL OUTBREAKS, AS WERE PREVIOUSLY EXPERIENCED WITH SLAMMER OR CODERED. EVEN THE MUCH-COVERED CONFICKER INCIDENT OF 2008 AND EARLY 2009 WAS NOT TRULY A GLOBAL OUTBREAK—RATHER IT WAS A CAREFULLY ORCHESTRATED AND ARCHITECTED ATTACK. GOING FORWARD, LOCALIZED AND TARGETED ATTACKS ARE EXPECTED TO GROW IN NUMBER AND SOPHISTICATION.”

Trend Micro, Inc. “The future of threats and threat technologies.” December, 2009.

Advice for Businesses: PREVENTION


1.  Keep your PC/network security current 2.  Choose secure passwords 3.  Educate staff on safe web usage 4.  If possible, limit web surfing through

Content Filtering 5.  Do regular scans for spyware infections

Threat #3

Downtime can be the result of many possible factors

Threat #3: Downtime

The costs associated with downtime can add up quickly

Threat #3: Downtime

"In a new study on network downtime, Infonetics Research found that medium businesses (101 to 1,000 employees) are losing an average of 1% of their annual revenue, or $867,000, to downtime.” Infonetics Research. The Costs of Downtime: North American Medium Businesses 2006

Typical Small Business:

Threat #3: Downtime

Economic conditions have forced many businesses to put off purchases of IT equipment

Threat #3: Downtime

“To survive what many view as the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, 69 percent of manufacturers indicated they reduced their workforce, followed by delaying capital expenditures (66 percent), negotiating with suppliers for better deals (48 percent) and cutting promotional activities (37 percent).

Society of Manufacturing Engineers. “Manufacturers detail recession survival strategies in new survey.” September 3, 2009.

Economic conditions have forced many businesses to put off purchases of IT equipment

Threat #3: Downtime

Nearly 40% of the PCs in small businesses are more than 3 years old, and a large percentage of them are running older operating systems such as Windows XP

“SMB Perspectives: SMBs – The Case for Buying Modern PCs. Techaisle, March 2010.

Average Mean Time Failure Rate:

Threat #3: Downtime

Advice for Businesses: Maintenance & Planning

Threat #3: Downtime

1.  Perform regular maintenance 2.  Look into redundant internet services 3.  Develop a failover plan for telecom 4.  Plan for equipment refresh cycles

Threat #4

Mickey does NOT live in the Cloud Threat #4: Cloud Confusion

Reliance on the Internet for satisfying computing needs

Threat #4: Cloud Confusion

Cloud usage is widespread and fairly common:


69 percent of America’s Internet users are using some form of Internet-based computing, such as web-based e-mail or photo storage.

Source: Pew Research Center, 2008

Consumer Cloud Services

Over 600 million unique users Over 6 million songs in the

catalog

14 billion ads per month

10 billion messages processed daily

500 million active Windows Live IDs

Over 3 billion WW queries each month

370 million active accounts

2 billion unique calls per year

Petabytes of data every month to millions of PCs

23 million subscribers

The technical definition:


Cloud computing is computation, software, data access, and storage services that do not require end-user knowledge of the physical location and configuration of the system that delivers the services.

Source: Wikipedia

Reliance on the Internet for satisfying computing needs


Cloud technologies provide a new method for content delivery


The Cloud is changing entire industries


Types of Cloud Services


software as a service infrastructure as a service platform as a service

consume it migrate to it build on it

“SaaS” “PaaS” “IaaS”

Software as a Service (SaaS)


SaaS defined: “A model of software deployment

where an application is hosted as a service provided to customers across the Internet.”

Source: Wikipedia

Why Business is Embracing the Cloud

“By 2012, 20% of businesses will own no IT assets.”

Gartner, Gartner Highlights Key Predictions for IT Organizations and Users in 2010 and Beyond, January, 2010

Survey of 318 customers on satisfaction with SaaS noted “top 3 pros were no in-house maintenance(57%), shorter rollout(49%), usable anywhere via internet(46%).” Burton Group, “Gartner and Burton Group SaaS Surveys: Same High-Level Findings, Different Conclusions.” Craig Roth July, 2009.

Familiar and Integrated

•  25 GB mailbox per user •  Shared calendaring and contacts •  Always-up-to-date anti-spam & anti-virus •  Access from Outlook on PC and Outlook

Web App in the browser •  Offline access w/ Outlook synchronization •  Support for Windows Phone, iPhone,

Android, and Blackberry

•  Single location for sharing and collaboration •  Collaboration sites for teams, projects,

meetings, and documents. •  Offline access to documents in Outlook •  Forms & workflow •  Portal sites, content management, and search

•  Online meetings, presentations, and training sessions

•  Desktop sharing & whiteboard tools •  Rich media, hi-fi recording, live webcam video •  Multi-party video, VOIP/audio, switching •  Web client support for remote attendees

•  Business class Instant messaging (IM) and chat

•  Seamless presence awareness •  1:1 video and voice chat •  Integration across Microsoft Office Outlook

calendar and contacts and other apps, SharePoint

•  Quickly check on another user’s availability

Small Business Feedback

Advice for Businesses: PREVENTION


1.  When time to replace, consider Cloud 2.  Add online storage for additional backup

redundancy 3.  Leverage Cloud solutions to improve

operational efficiencies 4.  Avoid the hype – look for proven

products

Threat #5

Productivity can be negatively impacted by many possible factors

Threat #5: Productivity Problems

Voice Over IP phone systems greatly improve operations


“BEYOND ITS SUPERIOR FLEXIBILITY, VOIP SAVES BUSINESSES MONEY. DEPENDING ON THE SERVICE YOU CHOOSE, YOU MAY BE ABLE TO AVOID PAYING FOR BOTH BROADBAND AND TELEPHONE SERVICES—OR SIGNIFICANTLY SCALE BACK YOUR TELEPHONE BILLS.”

Foley, Mary O. “VoIP: What are you waiting for?”

Web filtering and shaping can also help boost productivity


Are you experiencing any of these situations?   Limited visibility of Internet traffic   Slow Internet despite adequate bandwidth   Lost hours due to internet abuse   Anonymous proxy sites bypassing URL filters

Web filtering and shaping can also help boost productivity



Conclusion


SUPPO

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STRATEGY

INFRASTRUCTURE Proactive Management

Centralized Services  Downtime & Performance Monitoring  Weekend Auto Maintenance Service  Backup Monitoring and Alerts  Security Patch Management  Virus and Spyware Protection  Asset Inventory  Reporting

Network Administration

Day-to-Day Support   Help Desk Support   Backup and Disaster Recovery   Desktop and Server Optimization   Web Content Filtering   Adding and Removal of Users   Best Practices Checklist

Chief Information Officer

Virtual CIO   Technology Roadmap Planning   Design and Implementation Planning   Budget and Strategy Planning   Research & Testing of New Technologies   Vendor Liaison

Reactive Support

Field Support   On-Site Support   Rapid Reaction/Response   Mini-Project Jobs   Third Party Product Support   Virus REMOVAL and Cleaning   Recovery in Event of Server Crash

ITOrganiza+onforAnyBusiness

INFRASTRUCTURE

Proactive Management Centralized Services  Downtime & Performance Monitoring  Weekend Auto Maintenance Service  Backup Monitoring and Alerts  Security Patch Management  Virus and Spyware Protection  Asset Inventory  Reporting

INFRASTRUCTURE

Network Administration Day-to-Day Support   Help Desk Support   Backup and Disaster Recovery   Desktop and Server Optimization   Web Content Filtering   Adding and Removal of Users   Best Practices Checklist

SUPPO

RT

SUPPO

RT

Reactive Support Field Support   On-Site Support   Rapid Reaction/Response   Mini-Project Jobs   Third Party Product Support   Virus REMOVAL and Cleaning   Recovery in Event of Server Crash

SUPPO

RT

STRATEGY

INFRASTRUCTURE

Chief Information Officer Virtual CIO   Technology Roadmap Planning   Design and Implementation Planning   Budget and Strategy Planning   Research & Testing of New Technologies   Vendor Liaison


Conclusion


Small Business Technology Challenges

Business

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