Cloud adoption has skyrocketed in the last 5 years as businesses have discovered the magic combination of lower costs and more capabilities by moving their work processes and software to cloud-based services.

The Cloud is the perfect example of how technology can improve a company’s productivity and capabilities at the same time as making their technology infrastructure less expensive.

Cloud-based phone systems, aka VoIP phones, are just another example of the benefits of taking an offline business function and moving it online.

VoIP has been around for a while, but it’s really started to see an acceleration in adoption rates as the cloud infrastructure has become more mature and faster internet connections speeds have enabled crystal-clear quality.

By 2021, 90% of IT leaders will stop purchasing on-premises communication tools.

If you’re still hanging on to that landline-based on-premises phone system, you may want to consider a move to the cloud this year. Read on to learn the considerable benefits that a transition to VoIP can offer.

Advantages of Moving Your Phones to VoIP

Voice over Internet Protocol is basically a system that allows you to use an internet connection rather than phone line to make and receive calls. Some immediate questions that tend to come to mind when considering a move from landline to cloud phones are:

• Can we still use handsets with call transferring? 

(Yes.)

• Will we have to worry about call quality? 

(No. Today’s internet speeds that can support streaming in HD also support excellent voice quality for VoIP)

• Do VoIP phones have the same initial setup costs as traditional phones?

(No. There are no equipment set up costs.)

Cloud phone systems are becoming the new normal for businesses around the world, and here are the reasons why.

Cost Savings in Multiple Areas

A key consideration for making the switch from on-premises phone lines to cloud-based phones is the significant costs savings which can be as much as 75% less for operational costs and 40% savings on local calls.

International calling is also drastically cheaper (by about 90%) because you’re using an internet connection rather than phone carrier plan to make the call.

Cost savings when upgrading to VoIP come from multiple areas, including:

• No initial setup costs (a traditional PBX system for 20 users can cost up to $14,500 to set up)
• No local phone taxes and fees added to monthly phone bill
• No equipment maintenance needed
• You can add or remove lines anytime, paying for only what’s needed
• No installation fees when you want to add a new line
• Costs for both local and international calls are lower

 Phone Calls Can Be Answered Anywhere

The offices of the today don’t necessarily need to be tied to a physical location and workers increasingly have options for remote working from home. Cloud technology has changed our concept of an office and made it much more mobile.

A cloud-based phone system frees you to not only rearrange workstations at your office however you like without worrying about physical phone lines, it also allows you and your employees to answer your business phone from any location.

This flexibility is an important part of keeping your business operational in the face of some type of damage or outage at your physical office. Your VoIP lines can be answered from any internet connected device, including your smartphone.

Enterprise-Class Features

Many small businesses that upgrade to VoIP phones are surprised at all the features that come standard with their plans. Things like auto-attendant, hold music, and dial by name directories can make your small business sound like an enterprise company from a caller’s point of view, but for a fraction of the cost of those features on a landline system.

Number Flexibility

One of the things that holds some businesses back from moving to a cloud phone system is that they don’t want to lose their business phone number. You don’t have to. Digital Crisis can set you up with a VoIP service that allows you to keep your phone number or choose a new one from any state. You can even pick a toll-free number.

Easily Manage Your Lines

With traditional landline PBX systems, you’re at the mercy of a service provider if you want to add a line or change a calling tree or another setting. 

Cloud-based phone systems are designed with user-friendly interfaces and you can simply log into a web portal to manage all your lines and extensions and any features, like changing your hold music.

Local & Personalized Support

You won’t have to worry that you’re not going to have local support when you sign up for a cloud phone system.

Digital Crisis is based here in Houston and we’re here when you need us for any support questions or to help you configure your VoIP features.

Make the Switch to VoIP Today with Digital Crisis

Enjoy the freedom and cost savings that come with a move to a cloud phone system. We can help you get going with the personalized setup you need in no time.

Contact us today to learn more! Call 713-965-7200 or reach us online.

It’s all too easy to put off getting managed backups – until it’s too late and your business data has disappeared. Despite the proven pain of data loss, many small to medium businesses (SMBs) continue to stick their heads in the sand when thinking about the need for backup.

Don’t fall prey to these common SMB fallacies!

“It won’t happen to us.”

Based on current rates, it’s a coin flip whether you’ll experience a data breach or get hit by a ransomware attack in the next year.

• 46% of US companies experienced a data breach in the U.S. in 2018 (and the number is growing each year).

• 55% of US businesses suffered a ransomware attack in the last 12 months.

“We’re too small to be targeted for a cyber-attack.”

Attackers see SMBs as softer targets than enterprises, as they have fewer security resources, less sophisticated defenses, and are more inclined to pay ransoms because they simply can’t afford the downtime.

• 67% of SMBs experienced a cyber-attack in 2018 and 58% experienced a data breach.
• 58% of data breaches in 2018 categorized as small businesses.

“We don’t have anything hackers want.”

If you run a business, you have the information that attackers want. From customer/employee records to proprietary information, your data has value to criminals and competitors.

• 57% of SMBs say customer records are their biggest data loss concern and 51% say intellectual property
• When it comes to ransomware, attackers don’t care about the resale value of your data; they just need to hold it hostage so that you’ll pay to get it back.

“We have antivirus software in place. We don't need managed backups"

Installing antivirus software and email filters are simply no longer enough to protect your business in the face of today's’ sophisticated attacks.

• 86% of ransomware victims had antivirus installed, 65% had email/spam filters, and 29% had pop-up blockers.
• 72% of victims say exploits and malware evaded intrusion detection systems, 82% say they evaded antivirus solutions.

“I’m not convinced. I just really don’t think we’re a target for a cyber-attack.”

Even if your business is lucky enough to never face a cyber-attack, there are a multitude of other ways you can lose valuable data…and most of them start with simple user mistakes.

• 47% of data loss was due to end-users deleting information and 17% due to users overwriting data.
• The #1 cause of data loss is human error – deleting files, opening phishing emails, accidentally downloading malware, etc.

“Most of our data is in the cloud – that means it’s safe right?”

SaaS applications are still vulnerable to data loss because human error is the main cause of data loss.

• Over 70% of data loss in cloud apps is due to accidental or malicious deletion by end users.
• 32% of companies lose data in the cloud: 64% due to accidental deletion, 13% due to hackers, 7% due to malicious deletion, and 16% due to software issues.

“Microsoft stores our data, right? So, we’ll be able to get it back.”

Office 365 only stores data for 30 days and Microsoft themselves recommend the use of a third-party backup solution in their Microsoft Services Agreement.

• It takes businesses an average of 140 days from data compromise to detection!
• 81% of surveyed IT professionals experienced data loss in Office 365.

By now, it’s clear that no business is immune to data loss — even yours. When it happens, it hurts.

This a break down of just some of the major statistics we track when a data breach occurs.

• Record loss: Businesses lost an average of 10,848 individual records over the past 12 months
• Cost of a breach: 29% of SMBs say breaches cost them $100k or less and 20% say they cost between $1M and $2.5M.
• Cost of data loss: Average cost of data loss is $3,957
• Compliance fines: Fines can be as much as 4% of a company’s total revenue
• Cost per attack: Average cost of each attack was $383,365 in 2018.
• Downtime: 40% of respondents experienced 8 or more hours of downtime due to a severe security breach in the past year.
• Downtime cost: Lost data due to mission-critical app downtime costs $102,450/hour on average
• Impact of outage: 54% of businesses with an outage experienced loss of customer confidence, 38% damage to brand integrity, and 37% loss of employee confidence.
• Impact on profitability: Only 35% of small business owners said that they could remain profitable for more than 3 months if they lost access to essential business data. More than half reported that they would be unprofitable in under one month

The effects of a breach don’t just end with this list, the impact of a data breach can be felt long after it occurs. Some consequences can’t be measured, like the effect a breach will have on the morale and trust of your colleagues and clients.

So, what can you do to protect your business with managed backups?

While implementing a comprehensive, layered security strategy can be a complex undertaking, the simplest first step you can take to mitigate the threat of data loss is to start using a third-party backup solution. Having a full backup of your data makes recovering from a data loss incident much easier.

Don’t become another statistic about data loss.

Let’s find the right backup solution for your business needs.

Call Digital Crisis today to schedule a free consultation.

One of the hottest sale items on the Dark Web are login credentials. Those user name and password combinations can get a hacker anywhere from $12 to $120 each, and Office 365 login credentials are among the most lucrative.

One of the most important best practices when it comes to cybersecurity is to ensure you’re using good password habits. If you’re working with outsourced IT services in Houston or another city, they’ll tell you that this includes using a strong password and not reusing passwords in multiple places.

But while most people know they should be more vigilant about password security, juggling the multiple login passwords used every day makes that a challenge. 

Passwords are reused an average of 5 times each.

According to a password security report by the Ponemon Institute, 51% of people say that passwords are too difficult to manage. The conundrum is that there are so many different passwords people use daily, and making them all “strong” with a combination of letters, numbers, and symbols, makes them harder to remember.

But that user password is often the only thing standing between a hacker and all the data stored in your Office 365 account.

What Does a Hacker Do with Stolen Office 365 Credentials?

Once login credentials are hacked or stolen, hackers can do things like:

• Send out emails on your email accounts, including phishing emails
• Access all the data you have stored in OneDrive
• Access other user login credentials
• Change your security settings to allow malware to run
• Change passwords, locking you out of your system
• Use your connected Skype account for social phishing attacks

A newer scam that’s been seen on eBay is to sell a license for Office 365 for much less than the list price using stolen login credentials to access it, which gives cybercriminals even more reason to go after Office 365 passwords.

How do you balance needing to secure your Office 365 account with the difficulty in managing user password security? The answer is using multi-factor authentication (MFA).

How Multi-Factor Authentication Secures Your Office 365 Logins

Multi-factor authentication is a setting in Office 365 (and multiple other cloud services) that you can turn on for all users. Once turned on, it will require users to set up MFA and link it to their mobile device or another code delivery method.

MFA requires another factor of user authentication to ensure that the person is authorized to access an application. 

There are three main factors of authentication:

• Something you know: A username and password combination
• Something you have: A smartphone that can receive a code via text
• Something you are: A fingerprint or facial recognition scan

Unless multi-factor authentication (also referred to as two-factor authentication) is enabled, then a system is just using a single factor to approve a login, which is the username/password.

When you enable MFA in Office 365, once a user logs in, they’re then sent a code to their phone, which has to be entered to complete login and gain access. This greatly reduces the chance that a hacker can breach your system with a stolen password because they won’t be able to get past that second authentication factor.

How Well Does MFA Work?

Google did a study on how well adding a second factor of authentication worked, and the results showed that it significantly reduced the chance of a data breach.

Their findings showed that enabling MFA and using an SMS code for the second factor:

• Blocked 100% of automated bot attacks
• Blocked 96% of bulk phishing attacks
• Blocked 76% of targeted attacks

When an on-device prompt was used for the second factor instead of SMS, the number rose to 90% of targeted attacks blocked.

Why It’s Important to Enable MFA in Office 365

Office 365 has become the most popular cloud service by user count, which makes it a big target for hackers looking to steal and resell credentials, access sensitive information in cloud storage, or use its email capabilities to send out millions of spam messages from your organization’s domain.

The popularity of Office 365 has given rise to phishing scams that are specifically targeting platform users and admin users. These include:

• Phishing emails that look like a request to share a file from SharePoint that include a legitimate OneDrive link that takes users to a spoofed Office 365 login page.
• Phishing that targets admins and looks like a real email from Microsoft that warns about an “action required” or a “hold placed on your account, “ which leads to a fake login page.
• Various phishing campaigns with subject lines like “approved invoice,” “FYI,” and “Fw: Payments.” These are all designed to take a user to a fake login page and steal their credentials.

Multi-factor authentication adds an important layer of security that protects your accounts even if a user login has been breached and helps you ensure account security despite poor password practices and the ongoing barrage of Office 365 phishing attacks.

Get Help Securing Your Cloud Services Today!

Are your cloud services at risk of a breach? Don’t leave your data at risk, Digital Crisis offers expert Houston IT services, including ensuring the security of your Office 365 accounts and any other cloud solutions you use.

Contact us today to make sure your accounts are protected. Call 713-965-7200 or reach us online.