DC Technologies

A worthwhile read.

What Is Phishing, and How Can You Prevent This Cyberattack? Phishing is one of the oldest and most common types of cyber fraud. Here's how to protect yourself against all types of phishing.

If you have a Microsoft Office 365 email account and your phone keeps asking for your PW, just delete the account from your mobile device and re-add it.
This was due to MS disabling basic authentication recently. When you add the account back it will use the modern authentication. This mainly affects people with a phone that is a few generations back.

Just a heads up for Windows 10 users. There were updates that started to be pushed out on 5/9 overnight. In certain cases these updates can cause a fatal blue screen error with a code of "Inaccessible Boot Device" after rebooting your computer. You will not be able to boot in to SAFE mode either. If you have rebooted on 5/10 or 5/11 and you didn't get the blue screen, then you are probably okay.

Ransomware, like Locky and Zepto, are bad news. They are spread primarily via email attachments. They encrypt your data and make you pay a fee for the key to unlock. There is NO known way to unlock the files without the encryption key. There is no way to guarantee that if you pay the ransom to the criminals that you will actually get the key to unlock your files. Understand these are criminals.
My suggestion is to have the best security software and keep daily backups of your data. Although the best protection is prevention. Do not open attachments from people you do not know. Even if you recognize the sender you should still be cautious especially if the attachment is an executable file (ending in .exe, .com, ect).
BTW, I am posting this as I am cleaning up a computer that was attacked with Zepto.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3041001/security/five-things-you-need-to-know-about-ransomware.html via

5 things you need to know about ransomware, the scary malware that locks away data Ransomware has become a real scourge for consumers, businesses and even government institutions. Unfortunately, there's no end in sight, so here's what you should know.

Our office has been hit hard this week with recorded calls claiming to be from the IRS. REMEMBER, the IRS will NEVER call you. It is a scam. Sometimes you will get a live person calling you and other times it may be a recorded message giving you a number to call back. Do not fall for it.

Any communication from the IRS will come via the USPS or other courier service.

Some users may have been experiencing problems if you are using Outlook 2016 with POP mail. The issue first popped up after a routine update around 2/20/216. The issue was that email would not be left on the server even if it was selected. This option is necessary if you check your mail in Outlook and mobile devices. Turning off the option of leaving mail on the server would cause duplicate emails to some through plus with the setting off would not allow you receive mail on other devices due to this bug.

Good news is that Microsoft released a fix that is supposed to fix the issue. I am currently testing the fix with clients that use POP mail and will update this status once I have confirmed the fix works.
If you want to try the fix yourself, you can. In Outlook 2016 go to File > Office Account > Update Options > Update Now.

The updated version should be 16.0.6568.2036. You can see which build you have by going to File > Office Account and look under the Office Updates section.

If you try this yourself, please leave your feedback.

Note that as of about 1:15pm 1/7/2016 there is a massive TWC data outage. It is affecting both residential and business class customers. It appears to be a totally outage in Midlands area and possibly state or region-wide.

Having Problems with your Microsoft Outlook.

http://dctechcomputers.com/news/

News | News Microsoft withdraws update causing Outlook to start in Safe Mode Microsoft has withdrawn the 12/08/2015 release of Windows Update KB3114409 because it causes Outlook to start in Safe Mode. This loads the email client without customizations and plugins. Fortunately, it can be easily fixed. The p…

http://www.zdnet.com/article/hands-on-with-windows-10-upgrading-installing-and-activating-in-the-real-world/

Hands-on with Windows 10: Upgrading, installing and activating in the real world | ZDNet Windows 10 is available as a free upgrade from Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. Here's what you need to know before you upgrade, including details about activation and product keys. [Updated December 2, 2015]

When was the last time you backed up your data?