On the night of August 24, 410, an army of Visigoth warriors slipped into Rome through the Salarian Gate and proceeded to burn and plunder the great walled city for three days. It was the first time in nearly 800 years that Rome had fallen to a foreign enemy, and historians often cite the event as marking the end of the Western Roman Empire.

In our last post, we outlined nine must-have IT policies for reducing security and compliance risks. (add link when published) Many organizations have responded to the uptick in cyberattacks by upgrading their IT security arsenal. However, the best security technology in the world will have limited effectiveness if you don’t have policies and procedures in place to support an overarching security strategy.

A recent report from Kaspersky paints a grim picture of the state of cybercrime. Two global ransomware attacks, WannaCry and Petya, were carried out in the first half of 2017. Overall, the number of ransomware attacks increased 11.4 percent in the past 12 months.

The proper disposal of e-waste is a critical component of any data security strategy. In the past, organizations simply had their server hard drives erased. But think about other places where data is stored in your organization – desktop computers, mobile devices, printers, copiers and various Internet-connected company assets.

Protecting your IT environment against cyberattack requires a blend of security tools and constant vigilance. It’s important to note, however, that the best security tools on the market cannot stop every security threat. Every employee in your organization needs to understand the critical role they play in preventing cyberattacks and protecting sensitive data.

The last day of extended support for Microsoft Office 2007 and Outlook 2007 was October 10, 2017. It’s been a great 10-year run, but Office 2007 has reached its end of life. It’s time to move on. Sigh…

Yes, Office 2007 and Outlook 2007 will still function, but the software isn’t supported by Microsoft any longer.

Our last post, discussed the risk posed by data tampering. While data theft gets headlines, data modification is an insidious threat that could cripple a business. File integrity monitoring (FIM) is a security control designed to detect the modification of critical data by regularly comparing files to a known, good baseline.

Most businesses are aware of the risks associated with data theft or exposure. The recent Equifax breach, which compromised the sensitive information of nearly half the U.S. population, is only the most recent in a series of cybercrimes in which massive amounts of data were exfiltrated.

Many people learned about encryption due to the rise of ransomware attacks. Hackers use encryption to effectively “scramble” a user’s files so that they cannot be read without the correct encryption key. The hackers then demand a payment, usually in Bitcoin, in exchange for the key needed to unlock the files.