On July 28, 2017, Microsoft announced that they have released version 1706 for the Current Branch (CB) of System Center Configuration Manager that includes new features and product enhancements!
Many of these enhancements are designed for organizations that are going through the digital transformation and want to modernize their IT infrastructure, policies, and processes. With each release of Configuration Manager, we are focusing on the following themes:
Configuration Manager makes it easier to adopt and deploy Windows 10 and Office 365.
Configuration Manager enables the management of Windows 10 security settings to protect users and company data.
Configuration Manager helps customers build the bridge to modern management of Windows to simplify management.
Configuration Manager infrastructure is streamlined for simpler and easier use, reducing your total cost of ownership.
Microsoft continues to provide iterative value to customers using Configuration Manager connected with Microsoft Intune.
Microsoft is committed to delighting our customers by continuing to invest and iterate on Configuration Manager based on customer feedback.
We are continuing to see strong adoption by our customers. As of today, we have more than 40,000 organizations managing more than 84 million devices using the Current Branch of Configuration Manager. And thanks to our active Technical Preview Branch community, the 1706 update includes feedback and usage data we have gathered from customers who have installed and road tested our monthly technical previews over the last few months. As always, 1706 has also been tested at scale – by real customers, in real production environments.
Here are just few of the enhancements that are available in this update:
Windows 10 and Office 365
Manage Microsoft Surface driver updates – You can now use Configuration Manager to manage Microsoft Surface driver updates.
Windows Analytics Commercial ID and Windows telemetry levels – You can now specify the Windows Analytics Commercial ID and configure telemetry, commercial data, and Internet Explorer data collection settings in Client Settings for use with Upgrade Readiness.
Improvement for Express Update support – Express file download time has been significantly improved.
Improved user experience for Office 365 updates – Improvements have been made to leverage the Office Click-to-Run user experience when a client installs an Office 365 update. This includes pop-up and in-app notifications, and a countdown experience.
Windows 10 Security
SecureBoot and TPM inventory data – Hardware inventory can now determine whether the device has SecureBoot enabled and various properties of the TPM (enabled by default).
Windows Defender Device Guard – You can now include trust for specific files and folder paths in Device Guard policies.
Modern Management
Azure AD-enabled Cloud Management – You can now onboard the site to Azure AD via Cloud Services. Additionally, you can install the client on the Internet.
Windows Update for Business enhancements – There is a new dedicated experience to configure and deploy deferral settings for easy discoverability.
Streamlined Infrastructure
Cloud services consolidation – There is now common experience for OMS Connector, Upgrade Readiness, Windows Store for Business, and Cloud Management.
Reload boot images with latest WinPE version – During the “Update Distribution Points” wizard on a boot image, you can now reload the version of Windows PE in the selected boot image.
Boundary Group improvements – Boundary groups now support configuring the time for fallback for software update points.
Configuration Manager Update Reset Tool – We have added new tool to reset and restart in-console updates when they have problems downloading or replicating.
Accessibility – Screen reader improvements and improved keyboard navigation in and out of the ribbon in the Configuration Manager console.
Configuration Manager connected with Microsoft Intune
Entrust as certificate authority for PFX Certificates – Entrust can now be used as the certificate authority for PFX certificates.
Additional Android for Work features – You can now configure app configuration policies for Android for Work.
Additional Compliance Policy settings – We added additional compliance policy settings that were previously available only in Intune standalone.
Cisco IPSec VPN support for iOS – Cisco IPsec will be a new connection type option for VPN profiles for iOS.
Windows Edition Upgrade policy – This policy allows admins to set a policy to upgrade Windows 10 to Enterprise editions.
Additional MAM settings – We added new settings such as block screen capture (Android only), disable contact sync, and disable printing.
Windows configuration settings – We added new Windows configuration item settings that were previously only available in Intune standalone.
Customer Feedback
Create and run PowerShell scripts – You can now create and run scripts with parameters to devices and collections.
Task Sequence improvements – You can now easily toggle when the task sequence progress is or is not displayed to the end user, on a granular step-by-step basis. Additionally, groups in the task sequence editor can be collapsed or expanded.
Share an application from Software Center – You can copy a direct link to an application in Software Center using the new Share button in the Application Details view.
Note: As the update is rolled out globally in the coming weeks, it will be automatically downloaded, and you will be notified when it is ready to install from the “Updates and Servicing” node in your Configuration Manager console. If you can’t wait to try these new features, this PowerShell script can be used to ensure that you are in the first wave of customers getting the update. By running this script, you will see the update available in your console right away.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text][vc_cta_button2 h2="" title="Complimentary Deployment Analysis with Industry Leading System Center Engineering Talent" size="lg" position="bottom" accent_color="#dd9933" link="url:http%3A%2F%2Fwww.managedsolution.com%2Fsccm%2F||"]
The future of client health automation is here. Managed Solution provides businesses with complete, end-to-end solutions for their technology needs.
Gallup has been synonymous with public opinion polling since the 1930s. Today it’s also considered a global leader in advanced analytics, providing advice to organizations and individuals to help solve challenging problems. When Gallup pioneered the employee engagement movement, it introduced innovative tools for measuring how workplaces inspire the people in them. So, when it came to its own employees, it’s gratifying to see how Gallup trusts Microsoft Secure Productive Enterprise E5 to help create the kind of workplace that attracts and retains top talent, and ultimately inspires them to innovate.
Melissa Moreno, executive director of Infrastructure and Cyber Security, recently explained her organization’s plans for boosting mobility and security with Microsoft Cloud productivity services:
“Our associates are very achievement oriented. When we ask them how we are doing with our workplace tools, they tell us that mobility, ease of use and security are most important to them. The Microsoft Secure Productive Enterprise E5 solution will allow our associates to work anywhere while protecting the data that our clients entrust to us, and that’s really the perfect balance. It will also allow us to modernize our workplace apps to conform with our employees’ expectations and provide the most cost-effective way to get us there.”
The Secure Productive Enterprise is one more example of our ongoing efforts to make it easier for customers to move to the Microsoft Cloud. It delivers the “New Culture of Work,” providing the latest and most advanced innovations in enterprise security, IT enablement, collaboration and business analytics, delivered through leading-edge cloud services. It is the most trusted, secure and productive way to work that brings together Office 365, Enterprise Mobility + Security and Windows 10 Enterprise.
By choosing the Microsoft Cloud, Gallup once again reaffirms its expertise in promoting organizational excellence. I’m looking forward to seeing how Gallup associates engage with the new services to work productively in highly secure mobile environments.
The rise of cyberthreats means that the people once assigned to setting up computers and email servers must now treat security as top priority
In the Appalachian mountain town of West Jefferson, N.C., on an otherwise typical Monday afternoon in September 2014, country radio station WKSK was kicked off the air by international hackers.
Just as the station rolled into its afternoon news broadcast, a staple for locals in this hamlet of about 1,300, a warning message popped up on the screen of the program director’s Windows PC. His computer was locked and its files—including much of the music and advertisements the station aired—were being encrypted. The attackers demanded $600 in ransom. If station officials waited, the price would double.
The station’s part-time IT person, Marty Norris, was cruising in his truck when he got the call that something was amiss. He rushed to the station. “I immediately pulled the plug on his computer,” says Mr. Norris.
In a quick huddle, the possibility of paying the ransom was raised, but the idea didn’t get far. “We’re a little bit stubborn in the mountains,” says General Manager Jan Caddell. “It’s kind of like being held up. We thought if we paid, they’d just ask for more.”
Despite all the money we’ve spent—Gartner estimates $81.6 billion on cybersecurity in 2016—things are, on the whole, getting worse, says Chris Bronk, associate director of the Center for Information Security Research and Education at the University of Houston. “Some individual companies are doing better,” adds Dr. Bronk. “But as an entire society, we’re not doing better yet.”
Ever greater profits from cyberattacks mean cybercriminals have professionalized to the point where they are effectively criminal corporations, says Matthew Gardiner, a cybersecurity strategist for Mimecast, which manages businesses’ email in the cloud. Instead of hackers fumbling their way through complicated financial transactions, or money whizzes fumbling their way through malware design, there is true division of labor. As in any other industry, specialization begets efficiency.
Large (legitimate) corporations have the resources to hire talent to protect their digital assets, but for small- and medium-size businesses, it’s harder. There’s no shortage of good advice on how to perform basic security hygiene, but who’s there to implement it? The solution is resource management, with a focus on cybersecurity. Dr. Bronk lays it out like this:
1. Retrain IT staff on security—or replace them. In today’s world of ever-multiplying threats and dependence on connected assets, all IT staff must now be cybersecurity staff first. “The good news is that you don’t need that dedicated person to run your email server anymore—they can run security,” says Dr. Bronk.
2. Push everything to the cloud. It used to be the job of IT personnel was to build and maintain the tools employees need. Now, pretty much anything can be done better with a cloud-based service.“I mean, even the CIA uses Amazon’s web services,” says Dr. Bronk. “If there’s a best of breed, why not use it? If you want a safe car, go buy a Volvo.”
Marty Norris tests program back up at WKSK in West Jefferson, N.C. Photo: Andy McMillan for The Wall Street Journal
3. New IT investment will need baked-in security. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicates jobs in IT security are one of the fastest-growing categories in tech, up 33% in the past four years alone. That’s probably due to companies simply catching up on investing in cybersecurity after years of under-investment, says Mr. Gardiner.
Diana Kelley, global executive security adviser at IBM Security, a division ofInternational Business Machines Corp. , compares the current state of network security to graphical user interfaces in their earliest days, when they weren’t particularly intuitive. Collectively designers and engineers learned to prioritize and improve them. “Security can be like that, too,” she adds. “We can think about it upfront and weave it into the process in a much more effective way.”
WannaCry is a good example of how increasing cybersecurity can be relatively simple—thwarting it was as simple as keeping Windows up-to-date. On the other hand, it used a sophisticated exploit lifted from a hack of National Security Agency tools that allowed it to spread directly from one computer to another, infecting systems in companies that might have been prepared for other kinds of attacks. These kinds of systemic
President and general manager Jan Caddell, program director Nathan Roland and IT staffer Marty Norris monitor things at radio station WKSK in West Jefferson, N.C., on Friday. Photo: Andy McMillan for The Wall Street Journal
As for West Jefferson’s own WKSK, the station was lucky. Mr. Norris, its IT consultant, had backed up the computers. He was able to wipe the slate clean and get everyone back on the air in a few hours. It’s a good illustration of how prioritizing even the most basic cybersecurity practices can be a life-saver.
Since then, he has implemented offline backups of the station’s computers, just in case. He’s also become a keen student of the kind of attacks, such as WannaCry, that can affect small organizations. As soon as he read that it could hit older systems, he rushed to protect them at his day job—as the IT person for the local school district.
Appeared in the May 22, 2017, print edition as 'All IT Jobs Are Security Jobs Now.'
Looking for a technology partner to assist with a specific project? Call Managed Solution at 800-208-3617 or contact us to schedule a full analysis on the performance of your network.
Network Assessment & Technology Roadmap
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British Airways: Thousands disrupted as flights axed amid IT crash
Serious problems with British Airways' IT systems have led to thousands of passengers having their plans disrupted, after all flights from Heathrow and Gatwick were cancelled.
Passengers described "chaotic" scenes at the airports, with some criticising BA for a lack of information.
The airline has apologised, and told passengers not to come to the airport.
BA chief executive Alex Cruz said: "We believe the root cause was a power supply issue."
In a video statement released via Twitter, he added: "I am really sorry we don't have better news as yet, but I can assure you our teams are working as hard as they can to resolve these issues."
Mr Cruz said there was no evidence the computer problems were the result of a cyber attack.
The airline hoped to be able to operate some long haul inbound flights on Saturday, landing in London on Sunday, Mr Cruz added.
The GMB union has suggested the failure could have been avoided, had the airline not outsourced its IT work.
BA denied the claim, saying: "We would never compromise the integrity and security of our IT systems".
All passengers affected by the failure - which coincides with the first weekend of the half-term holiday for many in the UK - will be offered the option of rescheduling or a refund.
The airline, which had previously said flights would be cancelled until 18:00 BST, has now cancelled all flights for Saturday and asked passengers not to come to Gatwick or Heathrow airports.
Other airlines flying in and out of the two airports are unaffected.
Architect and TV presenter George Clarke was stuck in Heathrow. He told the BBC it was one of the "most turbulent, badly organised days, that I've ever experienced in Britain".
"The lack of communication all day was woeful. There wasn't a single Tannoy announcement all day in the terminal, not a single member of staff came up to us," he said.
"The only time I found out my flight was cancelled was from the BBC News website."
Image copyright@ANNAONTHEWEB
Piles of checked luggage could be seen on the floor in the Heathrow
Some passengers have reported having to leave Heathrow without their luggage
The problems have affected BA call centres, the website and the mobile app.
Aviation expert Julian Bray said: "It's frozen the whole system so no British Airways plane can actually take off, they can't move the baggage, they can't issue passenger credentials, in fact they can't do anything at all.
"This is a very serious problem, they should have been able to switch to an alternative system - surely British Airways should be able to do this."
Malcolm Ginsberg, editor in chief at Business Travel News, expects the disruption to last for "three or four days".
BA aircraft landing at Heathrow are unable to park as outbound aircraft cannot vacate the gates, which has resulted in passengers being stuck on aircraft.
Journalist Martyn Kent said he had been sitting on a plane at Heathrow for 90 minutes. He said the captain told passengers the IT problems were "catastrophic".
'Catastrophic'
Mick Rix, GMB's national officer for aviation said: "This could have all been avoided.
"BA in 2016 made hundreds of dedicated and loyal IT staff redundant and outsourced the work to India... many viewed the company's actions as just plain greedy."
BA staff in Heathrow's Terminal 5 were resorting to using white boards, according to passenger Gareth Wharton.
Delays have been reported in Rome, Prague, Milan, Stockholm and Malaga due to the system failure.
Philip Bloom said he had been waiting on board a Heathrow-bound flight at Belfast for two hours.
He added: "We haven't been told very much just that there is a worldwide computer system failure.
"We were told that we couldn't even get on other flights because they are unable to see what flights we can be moved to."
Analysis - By Richard Westcott, BBC transport correspondent
Image copyright@THEBOYGWith a lack of technology, staff were using whiteboards in Heathrow
As ever, it is a lack of information that is really making BA passengers angry… we're still awaiting an explanation from the airline and a timescale for how long the problems might last.
The GMB union says this meltdown could have been avoided if BA had not made hundreds of IT staff redundant and outsourced their jobs to India at the end of last year.
Yes, the union has a big axe to grind, but people will want to know if the airline made its IT systems more vulnerable by scaling back computer support to save money - although BA has just flatly denied it to me.
IT problems ripple through an airline. If planes cannot take off, they cannot leave gaps at the gate for others to land.
If flights are delayed by more than around five hours, the airline must swap crews because shift lengths are strictly limited for safety reasons.
Telling customers to stay away is a drastic measure, but it is the only chance BA has of clearing the backlog of flights.
Image copyrightTWITTER
The BBC's Phillip Norton was at Rome international airport, waiting to fly to London.
He said BA staff were unable to say how long delays would be, telling him "all flights are grounded around the world".
Alma Saffari was in Marseille waiting to get her flight back to Heathrow.
She said: "When we finally boarded the captain came out and told us their computer systems were down worldwide.
"Eventually after sitting on the tarmac for one and a half hours we disembarked the plane.
"Now we are sitting in the departure area outside the gate."
Ms Saffari, who is with her 13-month-old baby, said she had been given a voucher for food and drink.
EU flight delay rights
Image copyright@TIMREIDCEPassengers have experienced large queues and disruption at Heathrow Terminal 5, British Airways' main London terminal
If your flight departed the European Union or was with a European airline, you might have rights under EU law to claim if the delay or cancellation was within the airline's control
Short-haul flights: 250 euros for delays of more than three hours
Medium-haul flights: 400 euros for delays of more than three hours
Long-haul flights: 300 euros for delays of between three and four hours; and 600 euros for delays of more than four hours
If your flight's delayed for two or more hours the airline must offer food and drink, access to phone calls and emails, and accommodation if you're delayed overnight - including transfers between the airport and the hotel
Looking for a technology partner to assist with a specific project? Call Managed Solution at 800-208-3617 or contact us to schedule a full analysis on the performance of your network.
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Signage for a Chipotle Mexican Grill is seen in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 25, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson/File Photo
Chipotle says hackers hit most restaurants in data breach
Hackers used malware to steal customer payment data from most of Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc's (CMG.N) restaurants over a span of three weeks, the company said on Friday, adding to woes at the chain whose sales had just started recovering from a string of food safety lapses in 2015.
Chipotle said it did not know how many payment cards or customers were affected by the breach that struck most of its roughly 2,250 restaurants for varying amounts of time between March 24 and April 18, spokesman Chris Arnold said via email.
A handful of Canadian restaurants were also hit in the breach, which the company first disclosed on April 25.
Stolen data included account numbers and internal verification codes. The malware has since been removed.
The information could be used to drain debit card-linked bank accounts, make "clone" credit cards, or to buy items on certain less-secure online sites, said Paul Stephens, director of policy and advocacy at the non-profit Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
The breach could once again threatens sales at its restaurants, which only recently recovered after falling sharply in late 2015 after Chipotle was linked to outbreaks of E. coli, salmonella and norovirus that sickened hundreds of people.
An investigation into the breach found the malware searched for data from the magnetic stripe of payment cards.
Arnold said Chipotle could not alert customers directly as it did not collect their names and mailing addresses at the time of purchase.
The company posted notifications on the Chipotle and Pizzeria Locale websites and issued a news release to make customers aware of the incident.
Linn Freedman, an attorney at Robinson & Cole LLP specializing in data breach response, said Chipotle was putting the burden on the consumer to discover possible fraudulent transactions by notifying them through the websites.
"I don't think you will get to all of the customers who might have been affected," she said.
Security analysts said Chipotle would likely face a fine based on the size of the breach and the number of records compromised.
"If your data was stolen through a data breach that means you were somewhere out of compliance" with payment industry data security standards, Julie Conroy, research director at Aite Group, a research and advisory firm.
"In this case, the card companies will fine Chipotle and also hold them liable for any fraud that results directly from their breach," said Avivah Litan, a vice president at Gartner Inc (IT.N) specializing in security and privacy.
Chipotle did not immediately comment on the prospect of a fine.
Retailer Target Corp (TGT.N) in 2017 agreed to pay $18.5 million to settle claims stemming from a massive data breach in late 2013.
Hotels and restaurants have also been hit. They include Trump Hotels, InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG.L) as well as Wendy's (WEN.O), Arby's and Landry's restaurants.
Shares in Chipotle Mexican Grill ended marginally lower at $480.15 on Friday following the announcement.
(Additional reporting by Natalie Grover and Siddharth Cavale in Bengaluru and Tom Polansek and Nandita Bose in Chicago; Editing by Grant McCool and Lisa Shumaker)
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Earlier this month, a monkey caused a nationwide power outage in Kenya. Millions of homes and businesses were without electricity. Which just goes to show that “not all disasters come in the form of major storms with names and categories,” says Bob Davis, CMO, Atlantis Computing.
“Electrical fires, broken water pipes, failed air conditioning units [and rogue monkeys] can cause just as much damage,” he says. And while “business executives might think they’re safe based on their geographic location,” it’s important to remember that “day-to-day threats can destroy data [and] ruin a business,” too, he says. That’s why it is critical for all businesses to have a disaster recovery (DR) plan.
However, not all DR plans are created equal. To ensure that your systems, data and personnel are protected and your business can continue to operate in the event of an actual emergency or disaster, use the following guidelines to create a disaster plan that will help you quickly recover.
1. Inventory hardware and software. Your DR plan should include “a complete inventory of [hardware and] applications in priority order,” says Oussama El-Hilali, vice president of Products for Arcserve. “Each application [and piece of hardware] should have the vendor technical support contract information and contact numbers,” so you can get back up and running quickly.
2. Define your tolerance for downtime and data loss. “This is the starting point of your planning,” says Tim Singleton, president, Strive Technology Consulting. “If you are a plumber, you can probably be in business without servers or technology [for] a while. [But] if you are eBay, you can’t be down for more than seconds. Figuring out where you are on this spectrum will determine what type of solution you will need to recover from a disaster.”
“Evaluate what an acceptable recovery point objective (RPO) and recovery time objective (RTO) is for each set of applications,” advises says David Grimes, CTO, NaviSite. “In an ideal situation, every application would have an RPO and RTO of just a few milliseconds, but that’s often neither technically nor financially feasible. By properly identifying these two metrics businesses can prioritize what is needed to successfully survive a disaster, ensure a cost-effective level of disaster recovery and lower the potential risk of miscalculating what they’re able to recover during a disaster.”
“When putting your disaster recovery plan in writing, divide your applications into three tiers,”
says Robert DiLossi, senior director, Testing & Crisis Management, Sungard Availability Services. “Tier 1 should include the applications you need immediately. These are the mission-critical apps you can’t do business without. Tier 2 covers applications you need within eight to 10 hours, even up to 24 hours. They’re essential, but you don’t need them right away. Tier 3 applications can be comfortably recovered within a few days,” he explains.
“Defining which applications are most important will aid the speed and success of the recovery. But most important is testing the plan at least twice per year,” he says. “The tiers might change based on the results, which could reveal unknown gaps to fill before a true disaster.”
3. Lay out who is responsible for what – and identify backup personnel. “All disaster recovery plans should clearly define the key roles, responsibilities and parties involved during a DR event,” says Will Chin, director of cloud services, Computer Design & Integration. “Among these responsibilities must be the decision to declare a disaster. Having clearly identified roles will garner a universal understanding of what tasks need to be completed and who is [responsible for what]. This is especially critical when working with third-party vendors or providers. All parties involved need to be aware of each other's responsibilities in order to ensure the DR process operates as efficiently as possible.”
“Have plans for your entire staff, from C-level executives all the way down, and make sure they understand the process,” and what’s expected of them, says Neely Loring, president, Matrix, which provides cloud-based solutions, including Disaster-Recover-as-a-Service. “This gets everyone back on their feet quicker.”
“Protocols for a disaster recovery (DR) plan must include who and how to contact the appropriate individuals on the DR team, and in what order, to get systems up and running as soon as possible,” adds Kevin Westenkirchner, vice president, operations, Thru. “It is critical to have a list of the DR personnel with the details of their position, responsibilities [and emergency contact information].”
“One final consideration is to have a succession plan in place with trained back-up employees in case a key staff member is on vacation or in a place where they cannot do their part [or leaves the company],” says Brian Ferguson, product marketing manager, Digium.
4. Create a communication plan. “Perhaps one of the more overlooked components of a disaster recovery plan is having a good communication plan,” says Mike Genardi, solutions architect, Computer Design & Integration. “In the event a disaster strikes, how are you going to communicate with your employees? Do your employees know how to access the systems they need to perform their job duties during a DR event?
“Many times the main communication platforms (phone and email) may be affected and alternative methods of contacting your employees will be needed,” he explains. “A good communication plan will account for initial communications at the onset of a disaster as well as ongoing updates to keep staff informed throughout the event.”
“Communication is critical when responding to and recovering from any emergency, crisis event or disaster,” says Scott D. Smith, chief commercial officer at ModusLink. So having “a clear communications strategy is essential. Effective and reliable methods for communicating with employees, vendors, suppliers and customers in a timely manner are necessary beyond initial notification of an emergency. Having a written process in place to reference ensures efficient action post-disaster and alignment between organizations, employees and partners.”
“A disaster recovery plan should [also] include a statement that can be published on your company’s website and social media platforms in the event of an emergency,” adds Robert Gibbons, CTO, Datto, a data protection platform. And be prepared to “give your customers timely status updates on what they can expect from your business and when. If your customers understand that you are aware of the situation, you are adequately prepared and working to take care of it in a timely manner, they will feel much better.”
5. Let employees know where to go in case of emergency – and have a backup worksite. “Many firms think that the DR plan is just for their technology systems, but they fail to realize that people (i.e., their employees) also need to have a plan in place,” says Ahsun Saleem, president, Simplegrid Technology. “Have an alternate site in mind if your primary office is not available. Ensure that your staff knows where to go, where to sit and how to access the systems from that site. Provide a map to the alternate site and make sure you have seating assignments there.”
“In the event of a disaster, your team will need an operational place to work, with the right equipment, space and communications,” says DiLossi. “That might mean telework and other alternative strategies need to be devised in case a regional disaster causes power outages across large geographies. Be sure to note any compliance requirements and contract dedicated workspace where staff and data can remain private. [And] don’t contract 50 seats if you’ll really need 200 to truly meet your recovery requirements.”
6. Make sure your service-level agreements (SLAs) include disasters/emergencies. “If you have outsourced your technology to an outsourced IT firm, or store your systems in a data center/co-location facility, make sure you have a binding agreement with them that defines their level of service in the event of a disaster,” says Saleem. “This [will help] ensure that they start working on resolving your problem within [a specified time]. Some agreements can even discuss the timeframe in getting systems back up.”
7. Include how to handle sensitive information. “Defining operational and technical procedures to ensure the protection of…sensitive information is a critical component of a DR plan,” says Eric Dieterich, partner, Sunera. “These procedures should address how sensitive information will be maintained [and accessed] when a DR plan has been activated.”
8. Test your plan regularly. “If you’re not testing your DR process, you don’t have one,” says Singleton. “Your backup hardware may have failed, your supply chain may rely on someone incapable of dealing with disaster, your internet connection may be too slow to restore your data in the expected amount of time, the DR key employee may have changed [his] cell phone number. There are a lot of things that may break a perfect plan. The only way to find them is to test it when you can afford to fail.”
“Your plan must include details on how your DR environment will be tested, including the method and frequency of tests,” says Dave LeClair, vice president, product marketing, Unitrends, a cloud-based IT disaster recovery and continuity solution provider. “Our recent continuity survey of 900 IT admins discovered less than 40 percent of companies test their DR more frequently than once per year and 36 percent don’t test at all.
“Infrequent testing will likely result in DR environments that do not perform as required during a disaster,” he explains. “Your plan should define recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO) goals per workload and validate that they can be met. Fortunately, recovery assurance technology now exists that is able to automate DR testing without disrupting production systems and can certify RTO and RPO targets are being met for 100 percent confidence in disaster recovery even for complex n-tier applications.”
Also keep in mind that “when it comes to disaster recovery, you’re only as good as your last test,” says Loring. “A testing schedule is the single most important part of any DR plan. Compare your defined RTO and RPO metrics against tested results to determine the efficacy of your plan. The more comprehensive the testing, the more successful a company will be in getting back on their feet,” he states. “We test our generators weekly to ensure their function. Always remember that failing a test is not a bad thing. It is better to find these problems early than to find them during a crisis. Decide what needs to be modified and test until you’re successful.”
And don’t forget about testing your employees. “The employees that are involved need to be well versed in the plan and be able to perform every task they are assigned to without issue,” says Ferguson. “Running simulated disasters and drills help ensure that your staff can execute the plan when an actual event occurs.”
People have been lying in order to con each other out of things since we first began to communicate. In days gone by, the con man had one chance to trick their mark and then had to hightail it out of the area to avoid being hunted down by a lynch mob once the nefarious plot was revealed. Con men had to travel far and wide to find new victims and to avoid being captured. These days, it’s much easier for these scammers. Most of the world has internet, and therefore email, which serves to provide a never-ending supply of targets that can be safely plucked from thousands of miles away.
Why are email scams so popular?
Any scam has to be worth it or it’s not worth doing. A scam that is worth trying has to have a few criteria going for it:
A reasonable chance of success
Some protection against being discovered and captured
Practical in terms of cost and time
Email hits all of these in almost all cases.
A reasonable chance of success
The term ‘reasonable’ is a bit of a moving target. If a certain scam has a one percent chance of success, it is not reasonable for the scammer to travel from town to town and spend a few days at each in the hopes of hitting that one-in-100 mark. In those conditions, the scammer would want a much higher chance of success and so would likely discard any scam with such a poor chance of success.
However, when using email, the scammer has the ability to attempt the scam on literally thousands and possibly millions of targets in a short period of time. A one percent success rate in a pool of millions of targets makes almost any scam ‘reasonable’ to pursue.
Some protection against being discovered
Email provides an almost impenetrable veil to hide behind. Email scammers are not using their own email accounts to perpetrate the fraud. They are using disposable or stolen email accounts which cannot easily be traced back to them. In many cases, the scammers are also operating from countries with little or no internet laws or sophistication. Even if it were possible to identify them, the chances of getting local law enforcement to prosecute is slim.
Be practical in terms of cost and time
While the cost of internet use varies widely across the world, it’s not so expensive that it’s impractical to use for these types of scams. In first world countries almost every household has internet service. Even in less developed countries, wifi cafes are available to large chunks of the population. Many of these email cons are perpetrated by people who don’t even have internet in their house. They borrow wifi from other places, or use internet cafes in their towns. This brings overhead cost to a very low level, even free in some cases.
An added advantage is that it takes very little time to send large numbers of emails. If the message is already typed up and ready to go, it’s possible for a scammer to send an email blast off in a few seconds from an internet cafe and then be gone.
Identifying and avoiding the most common email scams
Email scams and phishing are two very similar, but technically different things. The goal of phishing is usually to gain access to information through tricking someone into divulging their credentials to some important site such as their email or a bank. There’s usually a long game at work with phishing because gaining access to someone’s account is usually not the end goal; rather, using that information to perpetrate fraud or blackmail is common. In contrast, email scams are a shorter game. The goal of an email scam is generally limited to trying to trick someone into sending money to the scammer.
Many scams will attempt to direct you to a fraudulent website at some point. Using a browser that supports Google Safe Browsing such as Google Chrome, Apple Safari or Mozilla Firefox can alert you if you are directed to a known scam site. Safe Browsing only deals with your web activity, though. It can’t alert you about the safety of any particular email you’ve received.
With that goal in mind, an email scam can take any possible form that has a chance of succeeding. Anything that fits the criteria I listed previously is likely to be tried by email scammers. However, email scams that have proven to have worked before satisfy the criteria better. Those scams are known to have a reasonable chance of success and the ones we’ve seen repeated over and over fall roughly into the following categories.
Advance fee
The framework of an advance fee scam is this: You are offered something out of the blue (money, a car, a boat, etc.) for some reason (won a lottery, dead relative, stale bank account, etc.). The scammer wants to arrange for this desirable thing to be delivered to you, but in order to do so you will have to pay some fee in advance. Fees are usually explained as things like shipping fees or legal fees. The scammer promises to send you the item as soon as the advanced fee is paid.
The most common scams that fall under advanced fraud are:
Lottery winnings
The basic pitch is that a scammer informs you that you’ve won a lottery in some country, possibly your own. The winnings are substantial but can’t be paid to you until some fee is paid. The fee is usually described as a legal fee or money transfer and it must be paid in advance. The math is enticing: pay $5,000 in advance fees to get $1,000,000 in winnings. However, once the advance fee is paid, the winnings will never arrive.
Nigerian 419 beneficiary
Email scams originating in Nigeria have reached such epic proportions that the Nigerian Prince has become a punchline of western pop culture. The term 419 refers to the section of the Nigerian penal code which covers fraud. 419 scams are identical in intent to the lottery winning scam in that you must pay some fee in order to release a larger amount of money. The first 419 scams usually involved the story that some rich and unknown relative had died and left money. Over time, however, the 419 scams have really strained the credulity of even the most naive people.
Avoidance
The transaction starts with a request from the scammer for you to send them money. In almost all cases, situations like this will be fraud to some degree. Your best defence is to simply not get involved at all and report the attempt to your law enforcement agency.
If there is some legitimate reason why you need to be involved with this, then do thorough research on the internet about the company and find other people who have dealt with them. Do not use any references supplied by the scammer because they will almost certainly be non-existent, or also be involved in the fraud and will confirm anything you ask in order to get you to send money. Offline references are helpful as well – it’s very easy to produce a website but it’s much harder to plant an entry in a phone book or government licensing listings. Do a thorough check using as many different resources as you can think of before sending any money.
Overpayment
The main difference between the Overpayment scam and the Advanced Fee scam is that that the Overpayment scam doesn’t ask for money in advance. Rather, the scammer will send you money first and then ask you to refund some part of it. In most cases, scammers use classified ads and other sites to identify people who are selling items. The scammer then contacts the seller, makes an offer, and then sends too much money to the seller citing some unusual reason for the overpayment and giving directions on how to handle the surplus. The seller will be instructed to either refund the difference to the buyer, or send it to some third party for shipping. The scam occurs because the money that the scammer sent is not valid, perhaps a fraudulent cheque. The entire scam hinges on the seller dispensing the surplus funds before they discover that the original money sent is fraudulent.
Avoidance
Recall that the main characteristic of this type of fraud is to send you too much money and ask that some portion of it be refunded or sent to some third party for some reason. The scammer may introduce this idea during the initial contact when they indicate they want to purchase whatever you’re selling, or it may not become apparent until the payment arrives. In either case, there should be no legitimate reason for money to be funnelled through you to a third party.
It’s also useful to stop and think for a minute about overpayments. If the situation were reversed, and you were buying something from someone you’d never heard of before and had no reason to trust, does it make sense to send that person money in advance at all? Never mind too much money and then ask them to return or forward a portion of it? The world is not such a trustworthy place that a transaction like that should seem normal.
Disaster relief and pulling at heart strings
This class of scam involves pulling at the heart strings of people to trick them into sending money for some sort of disaster relief fund or to save a group of puppies who are in some mortal danger. The critical part of this scam is to create a sense of incredible urgency. If the mark doesn’t send this money right now, something dire will happen to the suffering people or puppies. The scam counts on the fact that once our emotions are fully engaged, our critical thinking abilities tend to dip and we are more susceptible to falling prey.
In many cases the scammer will craft emails and possibly a website that looks like a legitimate charitable organization. In other cases, the scammer will just make up a convincingly fake charity name.
Avoidance
If you would like to donate money to a relief effort it’s best to donate directly to a reputable organization than responding to an email. Contacting an organization such as the Red Cross or Salvation Army directly will ensure that your funds do not end up in a scammer’s hands. It’s also the only way to ensure that you will get a proper charitable receipt for your donation.
If the organization in the email is not known to you, then follow the golden rule: do extensive background checks. All charitable organizations will need to be registered with their respective government in order to be eligible to issue tax receipts. Check the listings of the applicable government that the charity purports to be from to see if it really exists.
Work from home fraud
Work from home fraud gets its own category because of the complexity of the scheme. Some advance fee fraud uses working from home as its mechanism; requiring potential employees to pay an advanced fee for materials before employment,. But that’s not quite the same thing as work from home fraud.
Some cultures deem working from home to be the ultimate goal. Being able to make a living from your own home without having to deal with the commute or unpleasant coworkers is a very popular idea. Therefore, many people are very susceptible to work from home claims that normally would not stand up to much scrutiny. However, there are some tell-tale signs that the work is probably non-existent, which I will cover in the next section.
Avoidance
There are a lot of tell-tale signs to work from home fraud:
Money is required up front to get to work. While it’s not uncommon to have to provide some pre-employment things such as a criminal record check which you may have to pay for, paying for anything directly related to doing the job itself is a warning sign.
The work pays much more than it appears to be worth. Adverts claiming you can make $2,000 per week stuffing envelopes are hard to believe. We live in the age of assembly lines and robots. If the job involves doing repetitive manual labour of some kind, a robot could do that much better than a human so it makes no sense to pay humans to do it.
The work indicates that you’ll be doing work that would normally require higher education in an office setting. Jobs regarding the transcription of medical records abound, but most medical offices use well-known services to do this type of work because there can be some very high stakes if something is transcribed incorrectly. While some medical transcript companies may use home workers, they will usually have to have undergone some language and competency assessment rather than just replying to an email.
The work requires you to purchase kits of some sort that you can re-sell, or use to construct items for re-sale. If the job involves straight re-selling, such as selling cosmetics to friends, it makes more sense for your friends to just take the same job and get the wholesale rate rather than buy from you at retail. If the job involves constructing items for sale, I remind you that things are made by robots and assembly lines these days much more efficiently than humans can.
To prevent becoming a victim of work from home fraud, look for those telltale signs. You should also do research about the company in question. If they have a history of scamming people it’s likely that there will complaints about that company on the internet. Conversely, if there is no trace of the company at all, that is also a warning sign. Virtually every business has some kind of web site or email address so a company with no visible presence on the internet is unusual. Especially if you consider that this company is using email to contact you.
CEO fraud
CEO fraud involves identifying the person or people within a company who are in charge of the money, and then attempting to get them to transfer money out by impersonating someone with authority to do so, ie – the CEO.
It is very easy for scammers to use services like LinkedIn to search for all the employees of a given company, and then look at job titles to determine who has control over the money and who has the authority to direct fund transfers. From there, the attempted fraud can range from very complex and hard to catch, to very basic. The basic scam is to send a request to the money person instructing them to transfer some money to some bank account. While this may seem very basic, many companies wire money as a matter of routine so a request like this would not seem out of place. The instructions usually state that the money is for an important deal closing very shortly. There’s always some urgency for the funds to be transferred immediately in order to prevent some bigger loss to the company. The scammers hope that the money person does not have the type of relationship with the requester to see that the request is unusual and will fulfill the request right away.
Avoidance
I recently saw an unsuccessful attempt at CEO fraud. It didn’t work because the money person in this company had a good enough relationship with the CEO to note that the CEO did not normally sign their emails in that way, among other small details. The money person simply picked up the phone and confirmed with the CEO that it was not a valid request and saved the company a large chunk of money.
The best defence against CEO fraud is to ensure that your company has a set procedure for funds transfers which includes double-checks to make sure the request is valid. Another factor that helps defeat this type of fraud is to foster good working relationships at all levels. If a workplace is supportive of questions then the money person is more likely to lean across their desk to their coworker and say does this look right to you? or pick up the phone and call the alleged requester directly.
How to respond to and report email scams
The first rule is to not respond to something that you think is fraudulent. If it happens at work, report it to your security team and your supervisor and let the company figure out the best course of action.
If scam email comes in your personal email, the best course of action is to just delete it or mark it as spam if your email provider has that option. You can also report it to your law enforcement agencies as well. That can be a useful step because these agencies usually operate alert systems whereby they can reach a larger number of people to let them know this scam is happening now. It also helps these agencies gain an understanding of how deep and wide a scam is which can help track the people behind it.
Reporting in Canada
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) is Canada’s Federal police force. It outlines the police agencies to contact depending on the type of fraud. It also indicates that all types of fraud should be reported to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre which collects intelligence on mass fraud and identification theft in Canada.
Reporting in the United States
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) operates the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) which is a central place for lodging complaints about internet fraud. The IC3 may share your complaint with the law enforcement agencies that have jurisdiction for a complaint.
Reporting in the United Kingdom
ActionFraud is the national reporting centre for fraud and email scams in the United Kingdom and works with the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau.
What are Internet Service Providers doing to help?
Internet Service Providers (ISP) and Email Service Provider (ESP) typically run extensive anti-spam software. This software analyzes incoming email messages and determines the likelihood of them being spam. Emails that are determined to be spam are usually placed in your Spam or Junk folder, while safe emails are put into your inbox.
Many of the factors used to analyze an email are done behind the scenes and we don’t even see them in action. Spam filters look for things like:
Did the email originate from an authorized mail server? Domain owners have the ability to designate which servers are allowed to send email on behalf of their domain by the use of Sender Protection Framework (SPF) DNS records.
Does the sending mail server have a reputation for sending email spam?
Is the content of the email likely to be spam?
Some of these checks require collaboration to perform. For example, your single email provider may not have enough information to know if the mail server that sent the email has a reputation for sending spam. Likewise, judging the content of an email to be spam can be tricky because some people really are looking for low-rate mortgages and prescription drugs. Those types of checks are done using shared lists such as Spamhaus blacklists. Spamhaus has a large database of characteristics associated with email spam, so if an email shares some of those characteristics, there is a fairly decent chance it actually is spam of some sort.
Having said that, spammers are creative and they are very motivated to get their email scam into your inbox by avoiding these spam filters. There’s no surefire way to be confident that every email in your inbox is safe. Your common sense and paranoia is the last line of defence.
Where to stay on top of new email scams
Email scams are very fluid and change rapidly. Some become widespread and hit mainstream media news shows and newspapers, and some are smaller and come and go without much fanfare. Due to this it’s very difficult for any organization to keep up with a list of current scams in action. It’s therefore important to recognize the hallmarks of a scam, instead of attempting to identify specific characteristics of any one scam.
The governments of many countries maintain some sort of fraud bureau and may publish known scams as alerts which you can monitor.
The Canadian Competition Bureau publishes The Little Black Book of Scams periodically. It’s not clear how often it is updated, so it may not be as good as a current alert list. However, it seems to be the only scam alert type of information that the Canadian government produces.
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