Experts are predicting the Storm Trojan’s reign will continue.

Antivirus companies, as well as security researchers and experts, have said the size of the botnet creatd by Storm is well into the millions of machines.  In fact, some estimates going as high as 50 million infected PCs.  However, despite all of the attention Storm has received, new research into its impact and reach shows that the number of active Storm bots operating at any one time is significantly less than one million…probably closer to 200K.

Symantec’s research on Storm - which is focused on the amount of spam messages that infected PCs send out -4,375 unique IP addresses were infected during the 24 hour reporting period.  The reporting period was a 24 hour period in August.  In September that number jumped to 6000 with only 25% overlapping from the previous month.

Microsoft added Storm to its Malicious Software Removal Tool, and cleaned Storm from more than 274,000 infected machines - eliminating about 20% of the malware’s DDoS capability in one day.

The economies of scale on the Internet can increase the power and reach of botnets even 1/10th the size of Storm.  Broadband connections and fast PCs mean that a malware author doesn’t necessarily need a botnet of millions to make money sending spam or selling processing power to attackers. In fact, huge networks can be a detriment to criminals looking to evade detection. No need to attract attention with a massive botnet when a much smaller one will do the job just fine.

Storm’s creator has modified and updated the software a number of times this year, and experts expect that to continue. At least for now, they say, there is no end in sight to Storm’s reign.

Are you protected? Let us help you decide. Review: Security Threats

Eight months after Windows Vista’s widespread release, questions remain about the extent of adoption. In this Microsoft Watch podcast, David Cottingham, CDW’s director of product and partner management, talks about Vista adoption, deployment pitfalls and what enterprises should do to smooth migrations.

Click here to visit Digital Reach’s Download Library.

Daylight savings will start three weeks earlier and will end one week later than what has traditionally occurred.  As part of these changes there are a number of impacted systems and devices that need to be updated.  Most of these items will be done to servers, but some items as described below will require your attention and diligence. Unfortunately there are no guarantees being provided by Manufacturers of the effected systems that the steps below will not create issues or allow for the recoverability of lost data.

The effected dates are:

*     March 11, 2007 through April 1, 2007

*     October 28, 2007 through November 4, 2007

PLEASE NOTE SUGGESTED STEPS DURING THESE DATES:

All users of Microsoft/Blackberry/Goodlink products affected by the time change should give extra attention to meetings and appointments scheduled between March 11, 2007 to April 1, 2007 and October 28, 2007 to November 4, 2007, referred to here as the “extended DST period.” Users should view any appointments that fall into these date ranges as suspect until they communicate with all meeting invitees to make sure that the item shows up correctly on everyone’s calendar both internally and externally. To minimize confusion during the affected date ranges:

1.     Include the time of the meeting in the e-mail request so that invitees can double check the correct meeting time (such as, “Project Meeting - 11:00 A.M. CST”).

2.     Exercise caution with the appointments and meetings in the extended DST period. When in doubt, verify the correct time with the organizer.

3.     Consider printing out your weekly calendars during the extended DST period.

Microsoft will be releasing a number of patches that will allow Digital Reach to update Servers and Desktops to address this change, but we have not received 100% assurance that these patches will work for all users and devices.

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This tip brought to you by Digital Reach, Inc.  To unlock the potential of your business, Digital Reach, Inc. offers IT Outsourcing, Fractional Outsourcing, IT Help Desk, IT Consulting, Network and Desktop Security Solutions, Regulatory Compliance, and more. 

Microsoft’s new service, Live Events, offers more than some other existing online invitation services.

Just like evite, users of Live Events will be able to design a Web page and invitation to an event, choosing from over 100 templates. They can customize further by changing the font and background images and dragging and dropping different components of the site.

Users can choose e-mail addresses of people to invite to their event from an address book they may already have in Hotmail or Messenger. They can also type in e-mail addresses.

One feature that may set Live Events apart from other similar services is the ability for event participants to visit the invitation site after the event to upload photos or videos or comments, said Jay Fluegel, product manager for Windows Live Events. Then anyone can order prints of the pictures, view slideshows or download the photos to Windows Live Gallery, a beta service that lets users share photos and other content.

Microsoft also announced updates to a couple of other Live services. Users of the Skydrive beta, which lets anyone store and share files online, will now have 1G byte of storage, up from 500M bytes.

In addition, Live Spaces users will see an updated summary of changes their friends have made to their Spaces pages. When a user logs on to their Spaces page, they’ll see thumbnails of new photos and snippets of text entries that friends have posted on their own pages. Microsoft also updated permissioning on photo albums so Spaces users can restrict access to their photo albums to a specific list of people.

Microsoft has slowly been adding to and updating its Live services, with plans to have a complete suite of integrated services by the end of this year. Users can visit get.live.com to find out about the different services.

Source: Nancy Gohring - Seattle IDG News

Building the right technology foundation is easier with the right IT partner. At Digital Reach Inc., we have worked with businesses like yours for years. Our knowledgeable team specializes in helping you:

• Stay productive wherever you are with security-enhanced access to information and resources from virtually any PC with Internet access.

• Store your key data in a single, secure location, so your people can always find and share the information they need.

• Help safeguard your information—and your business—with automatic data backup and recovery.

• Use your Windows Mobile® devices to access contacts, calendars, and more—from just about anywhere, at any time.

As a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, we are experts at Microsoft® Windows® Small Business Server 2003 R2 deployments. By delivering advanced functionality designed specifically for small businesses, this complete, affordable network solution can help you make the most of your IT investment.

Plus, with a knowledgeable partner to help implement your server solution, you can be confident that your systems will be running smoothly, so you can focus on what really matters: growing your business.

For more information about how Digital Reach, click here.

Protect Your Business Information with SBS 2003 R2

Windows Security System: Based on Microsoft best practices, this protects your data and lets you control who has access to what information in your network.

Built-in Firewall: This gives your system protection from unauthorized access or malicious intruders.

Exchange’s Intelligent Message Filter: This helps protect against spyware and malware entering your network through email.

Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 is a robust, flexible platform that can be customized to meet your needs. Affordable today and scalable for tomorrow, it provides a solid “technology building block” for future technology enhancements to your business.

Security

Protect business information with a more reliable and security-enhanced infrastructure, including built-in firewall protection and security-enhanced remote access to help prevent unauthorized users from getting into your network.

Productivity

SBS 2003 R2 provides a central location to store your company data, files, contacts and calendars, so employees can communicate and collaborate on projects, share record-keeping, and quickly find the most up-to-date information.

Staying Connected

With SBS 2003 R2, you can stay more connected, present a professional appearance, and manage your customer relationships more effectively.

Find out more about Windows Small Business Server 2003.

You never need insurance until you don’t have it.  Expect the unexpected right? A Disaster Recovery plan is insurance for the unexpected.  By expecting to encounter a disaster in which you need to restore critical data from another source, you are protecting your business from such a disaster.

However, determining your company’s specific needs for Disaster Recovery can be a complicated task. CIOs have to understand that the lack of a comprehensive Disaster Recovery plan can have a serious impact on ROI, a key indicator as to how successful CIOs are measured.

According to Jeffrey Miller, IT Director at Houston-based Cotton Cos., an organization can measure the ROI of disaster recovery plans, notably data recovery plans, by looking at the cost to the business should a disaster strike. “If we lost all our data, it would be equal to losing $1 million or so, not counting all the lost productivity and the manpower involved in trying to restore the data,” Miller said.

The most important factors a company needs to consider when crafting Disaster Recovery plans are how long it can afford to be down and how current it wants recovered data to be.

Companies are smart to outsource such a vital task as backup and Disaster Recovery to an outside vendor — a specialist with the right technology, the best practices, the experience and the facilities to manage it successfully.

Companies that have comprehensive disaster recovery plans in place — including secure, remote, automatic backup for recovery of business-critical information -– are the companies that will see the highest ROI if and when the worst hits.

Source: SearchCIO.com

To learn more about how Digital Reach, Inc. can develop your Disaster Recovery Plan, click here.

Disaster recovery used to be reserved for large enterprises, but in the increasingly 24/7 business world, more and more midmarket firms are finding they can’t afford not to keep things running. And high-availability requirements are growing all the time. Forrester Research estimates that enterprises have doubled the number of mission-critical database applications in the past five years. Yet many firms remained poorly prepared. A Gartner survey found that almost half of midmarket and large enterprises had relatively weak Diaster Recovery plans.

More and more companies don’t have a choice. Publicly traded companies face Sarbanes-Oxley mandates for data retention, while private companies in industries as different as the wine business and finance must meet government regulations for record-keeping and service continuity.

While Disaster Recovery planning may be more challenging for resource-strapped midmarket businesses than large enterprises, there still are basic ways to ensure a timely recovery and maximal continuity.

The first step is to conduct a detailed review of the vulnerabilities that IT and the overall business face by performing a business impact analysis (BIA). should cover what threats are likely (power outage, natural disaster, terrorism) and the possible consequences in terms of lost revenue, productivity and reputation.

The second step is to establish realistic and specific business recovery objectives. RTO and RPO requirements need to be defined in terms of risk/reward. That is, how much protection does the company really need, and how much is it willing to pay for?

IT should advise and execute, but overall responsibility for Disaster Recovery should be vested in line-of-business owners. CIOs should make a case for Disaster Recovery investment so that the business owners can go after the funding. Finding metrics to measure Disaster Recovery can be hard, but IT should at least measure the effective-ness of any solution during a test.

Once the plan is in place, one of the most crucial decisions is whether IT has the expertise and resources to implement the project or if outside help is needed. Forrester reports that most of the enterprises surveyed found that implementing a Disaster Recovery plan required more work than expected. Gartner’s Scott says a quarter to a third of large enterprises outsource Disaster Recovery, while three-quarters of midmarket firms do.

Portions of this post were derived from Roadmap to Recovery - searchcio.com

To learn more about Diaster Recovery and how you can best protect your business, contact Digital Reach, Inc. today.

CIOs understand the importance of disaster recovery while business executives do not.  Not only do business executives underestimate the importance of such disaster recovery planning, they also fail to understand how technology failures can affect their companies. 

In a new survey by Harris Interactive Inc., 71% of IT executives identified disaster recovery as very important or crucial to business success.  Only 49% of business executives felt that way.

IT leaders are more in tune with the importance of diaster recovery because the backup of data and systems has always been an IT responsibility. Business executives who fail to see the importance of disaster recovery and business continuity are failing to understand their customers’ needs.

Many business executives don’t know what’s under the hood in their company. They are unaware of how a technology failure can cause a train reaction that hurts the business.

Just 54% of business executives surveyed believed planning for uninterrupted information availability is necessary, versus 66% of IT executives. Only 63% of business executives thought the availability of networks, data, systems and applications is very important to business success, versus 86% of IT executives.

The survey also found that a lack of understanding of the actual cost and complexity of a business continuity plan by business leaders makes it difficult for IT executives to get the proper funding. The upshot: Business executives don’t think plans cost as much as they do.

Vice President of IT research at Computer Economics, Mark McManus had this to say:

“It’s an education process for upper management,” he said. “Present your case, bring in the experts, and talk about the potential risks they’re facing. It really comes down to making them understand that keeping technology available is crucial. If the technology is not there, the business cannot run. If they don’t do this, and they don’t get complete buy-in from business units, then they might not be able to recover after a disaster. It doesn’t happen that often, but if you look at [Hurricane] Katrina, there are a lot of companies that never came back from that.”

Are you protected should your company be exposed to a disaster?  Find out now!