How Important is an Acceptable Use Policy (AUP)?

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That depends on how much you value your time, data and money.

You must realize that if someone in your company is using your company’s assets for personal use, or, if they are doing things that can cause your network to be compromised (things you would not approve of), you will find that a lot of time will be needed to resolve whatever issues arise, most likely resulting in significant downtime. Also, in most cases data is in jeopardy. Last, you will spend a lot of money resolving all of this.

Now, would you like to know more about an AUP?

You have built a company, or you oversee running a company, and realize how important IT is to it. You are very busy trying to maximize each minute of the day and you keep track of every dollar. Now you need to educate your users as to what they can do with your assets to reduce problems. An AUP tells users what they can do, what they can’t do and if they do what is prohibited, then what the repercussions will be. You want users to understand how important it is to be careful how they use the web, email and introducing media containing files to the environment. It is not easy because people tend to forget, get to busy to remember or assume a questionable email is safe. In fact, you need to constantly remind them, make sure they understand and be vigilant keeping your company’s security features up to date.

Users will say they want to take a few minutes on break to get some personal things done using the internet, like getting someone a present or finalizing vacation, or, just looking at some pictures taken at the reunion over the weekend, or, just trying to catch up on some unread emails that have piled up in the In Box. You might ask them to keep the pictures on their phones, surf the web on their own device using the company’s Guest WiFi only.

The AUP is not just to educate, or as some have said, warn your users. It is to help you protect your data, your time and your money. It explains that the systems they use are owned by the company, make it possible for them to work there and help the company be successful. Therefore, they need to apply caution and common sense. If there is a question, ask it before not after. You are trying to tell them that you need their help and that you are asking them to be responsible with the systems you provide them. The flip side of that is if there is a disregard for the company, and it is shown that they blatantly, carelessly caused a problem, then the company has the right to hold the user responsible in some way. They need to share some responsibility to work there. They are part of a team.

You are not trying to scare them with the idea that any problem is their fault. For example, one of our clients finds pictures to celebrate whatever there is a national day of. In this instance, it was national cupcake day. A user was to scan the web and find a good picture of cupcakes to add to their website. They were attacked with ransomware. It wasn’t that user’s fault as it was an innocent accident. The big positive side of this was that their backups proved to be the savior. It was a fast and up to date restore.

If you need some help creating an AUP, or, if you need an experienced partner to create one, please call ASE. Lawyers can word things in such as way that it may be difficult to understand. We can help you use language that is easy to read. Again, you don’t want to scare the user, you want them to understand that they are part of a team and if the company is successful then they will be.

Robert Lane
President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
(703) 273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT technical support services and consulting firm in the Washington DC Metro area.  Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex networks as well as security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets.  Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

Backups for Small Business

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Every year ASE reviews some backup solutions to see if they would be a good fit for small businesses. This year 2 issues were kept in mind during the review: is an offsite solution inexpensive, and, how to better protect the data against malware like ransomware (Cryptolocker, etc…).

This year some more providers offer the ability to both store in the cloud, and, use a device, like a Network Attached Storage (NAS), in the small business office to also store backups. Some providers are implementing a solution that better protects the NAS against malware that encrypts data. Having a local backup makes restores much better and faster in the event of a disaster. Then, if that proves to not be an option, the cloud backup can be used.

I’m old fashion and prefer to call a company, as opposed to just reading the website, to discuss their services. Ask them about the onsite option in addition to the offsite service. If you don’t have any compliance requirements there are great inexpensive solutions out there providing online, offsite backup services. Your local solution (NAS) shouldn’t cost any extra. Get a quote for the amount of data you have.

Hope this helps.

Robert Lane
President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
703-273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT technical support services and consulting firm in the Washington DC Metro area. Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex networks as well as security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets.  Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

Let’s Give Credit Where Credit is Due

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I have often stated that sales people find the stage; it’s the engineers that put the show on. Sometimes IT engineers get a lot of heat from clients when they call tech support for the product they are working with at the client’s site. Some clients feel that they should not have to pay for the time it took the engineer to talk to tech support. “I could have done that!” they say. Recently I had one client use an example of a lawyer writing up a case. His comment was, “you learn from law school how to write up a case. When you are in business for yourself you don’t call the law school and ask how to do that.” My immediate response was, “No. But just before the lawyer finishes the write up the lawyer goes to the law library and researches all of the pertinent cases that apply. Cases are decided daily across the country and the lawyer needs to find what recent case law there is. You the client pay hourly for that lawyer to do that.” This client immediately switched the conversation to another subject.

It is a fact that IT engineers know how to narrow down (melt down) a problem, decipher the messages and alerts they are seeing, and, technically describe that problem to tech support. Most, if not all, clients don’t have a clue how to describe what they are seeing, can’t melt it down, and, don’t know how to follow steps being described by tech support without creating more problems. A client calling is much more difficult for tech support, and, it takes a lot more of the client’s time, in many cases resulting in more problems.

The second fact is similar in other industries. Manufacturers create patches and updates in part because of issues they become aware of over time. They come to market with a product or a new version of it, and after some time goes by they become aware of security breaches (holes hackers can use to get in), better ways to install or change the product, and/or simply create improvements. Over time the instructions describing how to install and setup a product can and will change. The steps/instructions the engineer knew are changed and the engineer has to call to get the most recent instructions. When encountering a problem the engineer contacts the respective tech support to see if they recommend different steps that THEY, the manufacturer, have recently developed for their product.

IT Engineers deserve a lot more credit. They are trying to provide the best possible service to clients. Just because they had to call Tech Support doesn’t mean they don’t know what they are doing, nor is it the case that the client gets to be relieved of the invoice for that time. I have seen appliance techs have to use manufacturer support and mechanics call in for the latest updates and changes. Just like the lawyer developing a case, IT engineers research the latest updates pertaining to the issue they have encountered. The clients who value the relationship with the engineer and/or their company understand and even expect this step to be performed. IT service providers must interact with manufacturers. Hearing from the field is one way manufacturers learn of issues that exist and it helps them better their product. Can you imagine what the client would say if they were to find out that the first engineer did not contact the manufacturer and a subsequent IT services provider did and solved the problem? In my experience, those clients who are always looking for a way out of paying will automatically question the need for contacting tech support. While I encourage clients to closely review all invoices, this intentionally overbearing scrutiny is unfair, damaging the client/engineer relationship, and a complete waste of everyone’s time. (Not to mention insulting to the integrity of the engineer!) Most likely they don’t value the engineer or their IT service company as a PARTNER and will pay for the cheapest tech support they can get regardless of quality. Like any industry, they will get what they pay for.

Rock on IT Engineers!

Robert Lane
President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
703-273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT consulting, engineering, hosted and managed support services provider covering the Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC area.  Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex databases and network security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets.  Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

The Cost of the Cloud

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You have heard so much about “the cloud” and you probably don’t know exactly what that means but more importantly you have heard that it can save you time, which can equate to money, and money. Let me tell you what we see in the field.

As IT consultants to small & medium businesses we help them utilize what they have as well as discover what new technologies they can employ to save time and money. It is true that the cloud is an amazing thing. Here are some quick helpful facts:

  1. If you are thinking of starting a business you can get up and running much faster these days with a lot less capital expenditure. That is extremely helpful in this economy.
  2. The cloud can help you off load some very important services that your company must perform such as backups, email and, depending on what data you generate, database type services as well as financial.
  3. From a disaster recovery/business continuity perspective you can recover from a disaster and continue doing business quickly as your data is off site (like backups, email) and you can simply log in from a new location or system and get your data.

Now let’s talk about the cost. We have seen so many companies pull back out of the cloud mostly due to the cost. Many companies did the math up front and found that for their needs and based on what they had, the service they were looking to use in the cloud was too costly. Here is an example: a company of 10 people has 150 GBs of data that is critical (yes, there is a difference between important and critical data) and that data needs to have a SAS 70 Type II facility (for reasons that would take too long to explain in this article) – IF – they are to store off site. What’s more, they need snapshots of data at intervals of 6 months to be stored. Many cloud backup services don’t have SAS 70 Type II facilities nor do they do 6 month snapshots. They perform rolling 30 day backups meaning that on day 31 the data that was backed up over 30 days ago is gone or copied over. Just like many other companies in the U.S. right now, money is tight and watched like a hawk. Based on the above criteria the cost per GB averages a little over $3.00 so that means that the company would have to pay $450.00 per month for this cloud service. Many would just say, “no”.

Here is another downside. We have seen some small businesses completely outsource all of their software to the cloud (In this case the cloud is basically a company that has a datacenter who owns the software and lets the user “rent” the use of it). This means that the user owns nothing and has nothing on their server and personal systems. You may think it’s a great idea. You would until you encounter the time when you have to be or want to be productive and you have no internet connection. Remember, you need the connection to get to the server that has all of your software which is at the datacenter where all of your software is hosted – the cloud. To do this you have turn on your computer, log in, connect to the internet, log in to their server, open up the application and start working. (So much for quick productivity!) Since, in this instance, there is no internet connection AND since you have no applications on your personal system you cannot simply turn on your personal computer, log in, open the app and start typing.

What should you do? You want to take your time when making decisions about the cloud or any outsourced services. If you don’t have the time or the knowledge to research what you need find a consultant who can not only research the latest services out there but who also may be able to provide them to you. The reputable ones will research with you what you have, your needs, your budget and make the appropriate recommendations. For example, off site backups may be too expensive but hosted email – a perfect fit.

Hope this helps.

Robert Lane

President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
703-273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT consulting, engineering, hosted and managed support services provider covering the Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC area.  Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex databases and network security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets.  Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

Best Information Source When Buying IT Products & Services

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When the time comes to purchase IT products and services where do you get the best nonbiased info? Great question huh? Well, let me ask you this: when you decide to buy a car, and you have narrowed it down to 2 or 3, how do you make the final choice? Best answer: you go to a mechanic and ask, “Which one of these do you see the least?”

Let’s build the scenario. Your company needs to upgrade its network including the server and some end-user computers. Of course any reseller, VAR (Value Added Reseller), integrator, whatever, that is authorized in just one manufacturer is going to push that product. They will tell you why they chose to sell that brand, why it is the golden challis, and how it is the best in breed for some reason that is unclear. Is that unbiased? No! A mechanic in a gas station is a service provider. The gas station doesn’t sell cars (at least not the gas stations I know). Therefore, the mechanic is a great source since he/she just services cars – almost all cars, all day, every day. The mechanic will tell you what they see less of, what major problems they work on in reference to the choices you have, and, will offer their personal choice based on your needs.

In reference to IT, you want to find a technical services provider, one that provides the IT technical services that the product you will be buying would need. For product these services cover managing servers, switches, end user machines, firewalls, routers, et cetera. If the provider sells hardware then ask if they are authorized in more than one manufacturer for that type of product. The engineers will tell you what they work on less, what major problems they see the most of at other sites, and, based on your needs what they think would be the best choice.

By services I mean voice and data lines, (telephone & internet to your office) hosted and managed services; and any service that you buy directly from a major (Tier 1) provider. Our engineers tell our clients which services they see the least problems with when working on site, which provider gives the biggest bang for the buck and which one has the best support.

Price plays a big role, particularly in these economic times. In every industry there are always one or two brands that are substantially more expensive than the rest. This is where talking to an IT technical service provider is most valuable. They will help you decide whether the more expensive product is the best way to go or not.

Hope this helps.

Robert Lane
President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
703-273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT technical support services and consulting firm in the Washington DC Metro area. Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex databases and network security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets. Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

The ATI2DVAG Problem

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You’re working away on your computer and all of a sudden you get a blue screen telling you the problem is an ATI2DVAG infinite loop issue, could be hardware but most likely software. You freak out because you have always heard of the “blue screen of death”. NOT AS BAD AS YOU THINK. I went through this. Here is what happened and how you can fix it. One thing is for sure – you have an ATI video card and driver in your computer.

The issue could be that somehow your computer improperly loaded a driver (software) so that it has two versions of the same driver. Therefore, as the system sends a signal to display images it goes into an infinite loop from one driver to the other and back. The first time I got this was right after I bought a new HP 6830 notebook. Within 2 months I got the first blue screen. When I called HP support the tech in India told me to load the operating system disc and use the OS repair feature. Absolute mess. This futile attempt messed up my OS so badly that I had to wipe the drive and reload everything – again – from scratch. Two months later it happened again. This time I had my call elevated to a manager who told me that he was simply going to reinstall the driver. It only took about 30 minutes and everything seemed fine. Two months later it happened again. This time HP reloaded the driver AND had me set the Updates process to manual so that I could read each update before accepting. If any of the updates pertain to ATI or video then I was told to skip them. Things were fine for about 4 months. Then it happened again. By now I was not a happy camper.

Even though my company, ASE Inc., is an IT Network Support services provider (great plug, huh?) I didn’t want to bother my engineers as they need to stay billable and focus on the clients. By now I was so mad that I asked my team what they thought. Every one of them came back with, “it’s the motherboard, the chip on the motherboard.” I called HP and demanded that my motherboard be replaced. After looking at my history they agreed and dispatched a technician with a new motherboard early the next day. It took the tech about 30 minutes. The tech was great and the problem was solved.
A few things to think about. First: when I searched the web for ATI2DVAG I saw some postings describing the problem and stating that I could download a utility that would solve it. Don’t do that. The sources on the web can be worse than the problem you have. Second: in my opinion, stay away from the OS repair. As shown above, doing that caused me six more hours of problems and the real problem took only thirty minutes. Last, sometimes it can be the hardware even though you may think it has to be just software. As one person said, it could be as simple as one of the chips not acting the way it should.

Hope this helps someone.

Robert Lane
President/Owner
ASE, Inc.
Getting you ready for tomorrow today
703-273-8388 ext 111

ASE, Inc. is an IT consulting, engineering, hosted and managed support services provider covering the Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC area. Since 2000 ASE has focused on providing full outsourced IT department services to small and medium businesses as well as providing senior level expertise designing, installing and managing complex databases and network security consulting to very large entities in both commercial and federal markets. Call ASE today – 703-273-8388.

The Small Business Dilemma: The right outsource

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stockxpertcom_id8109922_size4Who do you get to work on your company’s IT infrastructure?  Are you big enough to hire someone full time or not?    If not, what rate do you pay for the services you think you need?  I get asked these questions every week.  It’s amazing how many companies make the same mistake: picking the wrong skill sets, the wrong person for your company.  For this article I will address outsourcing – contracting someone to work on your company’s IT infrastructure.  Hopefully, when I’m done you will be able to make a good, educated decision.

You are a company too small to hire a full time employee as an IT administrator – the person who will keep the network that runs your business working.  You have a server, router, firewall, switch and a bunch of end user machines (desktops, notebooks etc… say ten of these).  You know nothing about IT nor do you want to but you don’t know how much to pay someone.   The problem is that a small business needs to look for someone who can handle a wide range of issues for a network like this.  This means someone who knows how to perform Moves, Adds & Changes (MAC), break/fix and remediation services to all of the equipment not just the end user machines, also known as clients.  If you get someone who only knows the clients then you are setting yourself up for disaster when disaster occurs.  Why?  Because the lower end administrator will have a harder time analyzing the problem, probably won’t know how to solve it and have to hand off to a higher skilled person who needs to schedule time to come see you.  All this equates to hours burned that you have to pay for and downtime.  The higher skilled administrator will figure out problems faster, solve them faster and know how to do this to handle all of the equipment you have.  This means less hours burned (most likely) and less downtime.

So what do you pay?  In the suburbs of Washington DC for on call support meaning that you call when you need help, a lower end administrator will charge from $60.00 to $80.00 per hour for skills that handle the client side and have mid level server skills.  A server expert with knowledge of various operating systems and the applications that go on servers like Exchange, and well skilled at switches, firewalls and routers for a company of this size will charge from $125.00 to $175.00 per hour.  Please keep in mind that long term contracts will affect these rates lower as the person is guaranteed a certain level of time. 

As a last note, on call services or even a routine schedule is areactionary mode (waiting for problems to occur) and will ultimately cost more long term.  Companies of the size described above should look at managed services that monitor and are proactively(monitoring trends to head off disaster or reducing traditional support time spent) supporting you network.  This is complimented by on site visits.  The savings will be realized certainly in the first year and most likely in the first six months.

For further discussions on hosted and managed services contact Robert Lane of ASE, Inc. @ 703-273-8388 ext. 111.  Robert.Lane@goaseinc.com;goaseinc-staging.coydhea2-liquidwebsites.com. ASE, Inc. is an IT consulting, engineering, hosted and managed services provider in the Washington DC metropolitan area since 2000.

The IT Dilemma: Who To W2 for IT?

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stockxpertcom_id8109922_size4So you can hire someone as an employee to handle your IT support internally.  Great.  Who?  This discussion will focus on who a small to medium sized business should hire to handle the company’s IT support.

You’ve checked the boards and see everyone from kids in high school to retirees who just want to stay busy.  You are a company of 65 people with servers, a core switch, firewall, router and lots of end user machines – clients. (desktops & notebooks.)  The old statement, “you get what you pay for” will certainly apply here so watch out.  Yes, there are lots of people out there but you need someone who can cover all of the bases. (see my previous discussion, “The Right Outsource”)  This person doesn’t have to be a Certified Information Security Specialist Person (CISSP) but certainly one who know how to troubleshoot all of the end user machines and the peripherals like the printers – blindfolded.  The person needs to know how switches work, how routers work, and absolutely needs to know how firewalls work.  Your servers: this person needs to know how to work with the operating system running your server(s) and the applications on them like Exchange,SQL, Terminal services etc… Why?

If you hire someone who only knows the client side of things, the end user equipment, you will find yourself in big problems when, for example, the server has trouble.  The diagnosis will take forever; the resolution will be slow if you don’t call out for another person to visit, and all of this at a tremendous cost to you.  Say your firewall has a problem and you can’t communicate.  An inexperienced person will only foul that up more or at least take a long time to solve the problem.

Make sure the person of choice has strong server skills by asking what operating systems are you proficient with; knows firewalls by asking what firewalls are you skilled at like SonicWall and Cisco; does this person know how to manage switches and if so which ones.  How good is this person with Exchange or whatever you use as a communications server.  Have that person give you references that you can call and then ask them how they found him/her and call them.

For a full time employee with the skills to cover all of these technologies in the Washington DC Metro area, not in the city, you are looking at paying someone an annual salary of ninety thousand per year. ($90,000.00/year)  Why so much? Because it’s a lot to know and if they do know their stuff they will diagnose problems quicker no matter what the technology, remediate faster minimizing down time.  Also, they will know how to set an IT strategy that protects your investment as time goes on.

Don’t be fooled by a great looking resume.  Make sure they have a broad range of skills and are good at them.  They don’t need lots of certifications but do needs lots of experience.  Some of the best engineers have no certs.  They are just really good.

One last note, a company this size may benefit from using hosted and/or managed services.  These services can be used to compliment your IT staff.  If used properly your IT employee will find more time to manage bigger problems while proactively managing the entire network, from firewall to BlackBerry.

For further discussions on hosted and managed services contact Robert Lane of ASE, Inc. @ 703-273-8388 ext. 111.  Robert.Lane@goaseinc.com; goaseinc-staging.coydhea2-liquidwebsites.com. ASE, Inc. is an IT consulting, engineering, hosted and managed services provider in the Washington DC metropolitan area since 2000.