Managed.IT - issue 57

BULLETIN 8 MANAGED.IT 01732 759725 The rising cost of ransomware The average ransom demanded from SMEs by hackers has increased to around £2,000, according to Datto’s latest European State of the Channel Ransomware report. This is just a fraction of the total cost of an attack, which rises to an average of £107,956 when associated downtime is taken into account. More than half (54%) of managed service providers (MSPs) surveyed for the report have clients that have suffered a loss of business productivity after a ransomware attack, with 34% describing that downtime as ‘business- threatening’. One third have seen clients lose data and/or devices, infections spread to other devices on the network and reduced profitability. More than half (51%) of MSPs believe the greater sophistication of ransomware attacks will bankrupt entire companies, with attackers increasingly targeting IoT devices (cited by 69%), followed by social media accounts (59%) and utility infrastructures (52%). Phishing (65%), lack of cyber security training (31%) and weak passwords (27%) are the top three causes of successful ransomware attacks. Tim e to make security of physical documents a priority Reconnaissance International has produced a new whitepaper on the implications of the transition from physical to digital security for financial transactions and ID document security. Physical to Digital: A Revolution in Document Security notes that whilst protection and security were primary drivers in the physical document world, the digital world is less concerned with such matters and that as a result the incidence of payment card fraud in the Eurozone is over 300 times bigger than the number of euro banknotes that are counterfeited. Ian Lancaster, lead author of the report and former managing director of Reconnaissance International, urges caution and advises people working on digital finance and digital ID to put data and personal security at the heart of this new world. He said: “A digital revolution is taking place. We are moving from a world in which people can examine and inspect a document to check its legitimacy to one in which we are required to trust that a device, such as our smartphone, is doing what we think it’s doing. Is the data it’s using accurate and secure and is the decision it leads us to make correct and appropriate? Throughout all the issues and considerations this raises, we must ask the question: does digital make us and our data safe and secure?” A copy of Physical to Digital: A Revolution in Document Security is available to download at digitaldocumentsecurity.com/ Welsh spoken Konica Minolta has responded to the demands of customers in Wales and added Welsh language support for its bizhub range of multifunctional devices. Full Welsh language support is available for the latest bizhub i-Series, as well as older 7, 8 and 9 series devices. www.konicaminolta.eu/eu-en/support/download-centre Data, data everywhere More than half (51%) of senior decision-makers feel overwhelmed by the volume of data within their organisations, rising to 61% in companies with over 1,000 employees, according to new research from database management company InterSystems. The amount of data is slowing down decision-making, with 41% of respondents needing one or two weeks to analyse data before making a business decision and 16% requiring a month. One third (35%) say they need just a couple of days. www.intersystems.com Robots on patrol Smart 5G patrol robots equipped with Advantech MIC-770 Edge computers are being deployed to help contain the spread of COVID-19 in China by monitoring mask-wearing and body temperatures in airports, shopping malls and other public spaces. Following the outbreak of COVID-19, Guangzhou Gosuncn Robot Co., Ltd upgraded its 5G-powered police patrol robot with new capabilities to help police officers carry out disease prevention inspections in the cities of Guangzhou, Shanghai, Xi’an and Guiyang. The robots are equipped with 5 high-resolution cameras and infrared thermometers capable of scanning the temperature of 10 people simultaneously within a radius of 5 metres. If they detect a high temperature or the absence of a mask, they send an alert to the relevant authorities. Make better use of data to increase profitability, advises Splunk in new report Data-to-Everything Platform provider Splunk has added a free Data Maturity Calculator to its website to help organisations assess how well they are exploiting the value of data to achieve desired business outcomes. This coincides with the publication of a study, carried out in association with Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG), which found that having an advanced strategy to use data better can boost profitability by 12.5%. What Is Your Data Really Worth? , based on a survey of 1,350 senior business and IT decision-makers in Australia, China, France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US, reveals that organisations with more advanced data strategies experience greater revenue growth, lower operational costs, increased innovation, faster time to market, higher customer retention, and better/faster decision-making. The study groups businesses into three levels of data maturity based on their use of data: 1 Data Deliberator: organisations in the early stages of a data strategy implementation; 2 Data Adopter: organisations that are making good use of their data, but have room for improvement; and 3 Data Innovators: organisations that place the strongest strategic emphasis on data and have an advanced strategy in place to extract business value. Analysis shows that while all organisations benefit from better data use, the 11% of Data Innovators achieve considerably higher key business and economic benefits. For example, in the last 12 months, Data Innovators have added 83% more revenue to their topline and 66% more profit to their bottom line than Data Deliberators.