Tech Briefs 2008

2008

New Identity Theft Prevention Regulations in Mass.

November 2008

There is a new regulation set to take effect in the state of Massachusetts early next year and chances are your business will be forced to comply with it. 2001 CMR 17.00, issued by the state Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation, establishes a set of standards for how businesses store and protect the personal information of clients and employees. Since the regulation defines private information to include social security, driver’s license, and credit card numbers &

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3G Networks

October 2008

A lot of the technology buzz today is centered around mobile technology, and with good reason. What seemed like only a few years ago cell phones were capable of making calls and not much else. Now technology advances have transformed them into multiple use devices that are capable of performing nearly all the same functions as a desktop computer. Of course all this technology wouldn’t be worth much if there weren’t wireless networks working in the background that were powerful eno

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September 2008 - Business Continuity Planning

September 2008

One of the hottest topics in business today is Business Continuity Planning (BCP), also commonly referred to as Disaster Recovery Planning. Companies of all sizes are starting to ask themselves if they have a plan, and if so, is the plan still relevant to how they do business today? Successful companies must constantly adapt to an ever-changing marketplace in order to stay competitive, and the Business Continuity Plan must evolve and change as the business does. In this month’s Tech

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August 2008 - Instant Messaging Best Practices

August 2008

Although it started off as a home application for chatting with friends, instant messaging is now being embraced by the business world as a productivity-enhancing real time communication tool. While its popularity continues to rise, many businesses are still unsure of the proper policies they should have in place to deal with instant messaging usage. In this month’s Tech Brief we’ll discuss Thrive’s recommended instant messaging best practices and provide some insight into m

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July 2008 - Top 10 Mac Productivity Enhancing Applications

July 2008

Once all but written off, Apple has made an extraordinary comeback thanks in no small part to the success of devices such as the iPod and iPhone. But consumer electronics aren’t the only component of their success; the venerable Mac has been making steady inroads into the PC-dominated world of computers. No longer solely the preference of graphic artists and musicians, Macs have started to appear

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June 2008 - Botnets, A Current Internet Threat

June 2008

The Internet is an ever evolving and changing place. New threats are emerging almost daily that may compromise your businesses. In this month’s Tech Brief we’ll take a look at botnets, an Internet threat which many people have never heard of – but which may be affecting one out of every four computers.

What is a Botnet?

A bot (short for robot) is a computer that has been compr

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May 2008 - Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2008

May 2008

In the past three months Microsoft has introduced two major releases: Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) and Windows Server 2008. With the transition in businesses from XP to Vista underway, and the first new version of Windows Server in 5 years, there is a good chance these releases affect you. In this month’s Tech Brief we’ll discuss what Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008 are, what changes or updates they include, and what they mean for your organization.