Why are you still buying computers for your office?

Weird question right? Not really. I just got out of a meeting with a medical office administrator that manages 6 offices and a surgical center here in Houston. They are looking for ways to cut costs for their business. I had 4 questions that really got her attention afterward:

1. How many IT employees do you have?
2. What if I could eliminate the entire IT staff and guarantee 99.99% up-time?
3. Would you like to never have to buy a computer or server again?
4. Would you give me an hour of your time to show you how to accomplish all three of the prior for the cost of only one of your IT employee salaries?

I can tell you this grabs the attention of most people that manage budgets for companies like this one. The problem is that most IT departments see what we do as a threat. You can view it that way if you’re just looking to cover yourself and your job. Realistically though, we’d rather make you look like a hero for providing a sound bulletproof solution with guaranteed up-time. There are always two ways to look at things, positively or negatively, I’d rather make a choice that works well, minimizes issues and ensures productivity; but that’s just me.

As the Cloud matures, it has now become cost prohibitive to purchase physical hardware and software licenses. If you are at a point where you need to start upgrading any hardware or software, please wait and read on.

Challenges

One of our largest obstacles as IT administrators is user control. We can adjust policies to prevent installation of unwanted software and monitor for unwanted software but we can’t stop users from clicking on infected documents, visiting an infected website or expect them to identify every phishing scheme in their inbox. Every study I have read over the last 18 months is about raising user awareness through training. One of the studies I recently read was about user use of corporate IT assets (laptops, phones, etc) here in the US and the UK as a comparison. They also questioned users about their understanding of malware and ransomware. This really summarizes the challenge we face in educating users:

I could not believe the results with as much press as there has been around this topic. Education of users is where we are failing most. There are many more real issues and I will be glad to provide a link to this 16-page report.

 

What about the misuse of corporate devices?

I think the practice of using work equipment for personal use is a little out of control. How can we as admins be expected to provide a secure environment when employees not only break company policies for use but allow others to use their equipment to do the same.

Solutions

Education. Awareness. Training. I cannot stress this enough. Add room into your IT budgets for these items regarding Cyber-security along with procedures on how to isolate and mitigate threats.

One huge advantage we have using our completely cloud-based solution, Quasar Cloud, is that all systems are snapshotted hourly and include disaster recovery. Your entire networking environment including desktop data and the server data. In most cases, 85% of businesses do not back up any workstation data. We even have business continuity options that replicate your entire environment to our Dallas data center. If Houston was ever to go down, (it never has,) you would still be 100% functional from our Dallas data center.

Another advantage Quasar Cloud has is that we include a cloud-connect device that replaces your computer. Just connect your existing keyboard, mouse, and monitor, connect it to the Internet and you’re done. No more hardware, no more Windows upgrades, and no more Office upgrades. It requires no maintenance and has no moving parts. If it fails for any reason, just call and we send you a new one.

The biggest advantage though is that we have full control of the environment. User abuse of corporate-owned equipment and the risk inherited with that are eliminated. With the desktop being cloud-powered, there is little to no personal abuse, security policies are stricter and more enforceable.

Why all this info on user habits?

It’s simple. When you provide computers to users, you invite personal abuse of those devices and the networks they connect to. With a solution like Quasar Cloud, you eliminate the abuse, protect your users better, provide a completely backed-up desktop user and reduce the risk of loss from user abuse and/or action that could compromise a traditional system.

The best part is, you get all this benefit for less than what it costs to have one full-time IT professional. If you’re a small business, you get an enterprise solution at a small business price.

If you have any questions about the article or really want to save some serious money while getting a guaranteed solution, please email me directly at rtrembath@quasardata.com.

The information above was found on DataBreachToday.com.

Please click or copy/paste the following link to access the report mentioned above: https://dbac8a2e962120c65098-4d6abce208e5e17c2085b466b98c2083.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/user-risk-report-pdf-8-w-4376.pdf