Archive for the ‘Mobile Communications’ Category

You Can’t Afford This

Sunday, May 24th, 2009
Very Vulnerable!

Very Vulnerable!

With its usual punchy headline, the New York Post announced “Subway Thief Smokes Bacon“. Apparently a thief in the Seventh Avenue subway station stole a Blackberry from actor Kevin Bacon. Bacon tried to chase down the thief in an apparent effort to protect the privacy of those celebrities whose contact information he had stored on the device. In an earlier blog about this issue, I wrote that small business owners cannot be as careless as Hollywood celebrities. Blackberry has a remote data wipe feature – make use of it! Once your Blackberry is lost or stolen, your systems administrator (or you, if you perform that function) can effectively “nuke” the device by remote control – wiping out all sensitive data and completely disabling it. Of course, once that action is taken, it cannot be undone if the Blackberry is subsequently recovered. So I would like to add a few additional tips to my original recommendation.

Although Kevin Bacon immediately began to chase the thief, this will not always be the case. There will always be incidents in which some time elapses between when the device is lost or stolen and when its absence is noted and reported. This leaves you vulnerable for data breaches before you put into effect the remote data wipe. So do not store sensitive banking or credit card information or other passwords on your Blackberry. And encrypt or password-protect your contact database and e-mail messages. A skilled hacker can probably break through this protection, but it is the first line of defense to slow him down before you direct the remote data wipe.

Not a Good Example

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009
Protect it properly

Protect it properly

Celebrities from Paris Hilton to Tom Cruise have experienced invasions of their privacy when their Blackberries were lost or stolen. Police recovered Hilton’s cell phone when the boyfriend of the person who found it attempted to sell it on Craigslist. It is unlikely that the police would go to such trouble to recover Blackberries stolen from small businesses. But then we should never find ourselves in such an embarrassing position anyway. Blackberry has a remote data wipe function that allows your network administrator to wipe out all contact information, e-mail messages and other sensitive data from the device as soon as it is reported lost or stolen. Of course, if the device is subsequently recovered, it is useless, even for reinstallation. It appears that the celebrities who expressed their dismay at their lost or stolen Blackberries were not familar with how to properly set up their cell phones. Learn from their example; the police won’t likely be tracking down your lost PDA. Set the appropriate security for all devices you and your employees.

Online Banking, Offline Contingency

Thursday, March 5th, 2009
Anywhere, Anytime

Anywhere, Anytime

An excellent posting on Forbes highlights the benefits of online banking: ease of business recordkeeping and, for one entrepreneur, a time savings of one work day each month in writing checks and reconciling statements. The service can help you to reduce late fees by scheduling advance and recurring payments, while managing your cash flow. There is another benefit, however, not mentioned in this post: the ability to conduct your financial affairs from a remote location. This can be helpful to you in a more pleasant circumstance, such as a scheduled vacation away from the office, or a more stressful one, such as a disaster that temporarily displaces you. You can collect electronic payments from your customers while meeting your obligations, such as payroll, online. The latter is critically important, not only to minimize the stress on your employees, but to protect your business. Laws vary from state to state, but typically you must pay employees within two weeks of the time period when they performed their work. Failure to do so is one of the few offenses in which a corporate shield, protecting you from personal liability, can be pierced. Online banking is not only a great convenience, it can save your business.