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Reduce repair costs
Computers older than 4 years old, on average cost 1.5 times more in repair costs than newer computers.

Improve Performance
Compared with 5-year-old computers, new Windows 10 devices can have performance increase of up to 2.5 times with up to 3 times the battery life.  

Better Security
Modern computers can protect against botnets and rootkits which will prevent malware taking over the computer’s boot process.

Increased productivity
Computers older than 4 years can result in more than twice the amount in lost productivity by the user.

Google have provided a new tool, "My Activity" which can help you protect your privacy online and delete your history.

Google probably knows you better than your closest friends and family. With every search you make or YouTube video you watch, the search giant is quietly collecting information for a personalised profile it uses to serve you targeted ads.

My Activity is basically a timeline that shows you what Google has saved about your online activities going back as far as they have been tracking you.

You can find it by going to myactivity.google.com. You will need to sign in with your Google account and password.

Once you have logged in you should see a long chronological list of things you’ve done using Google’s services – the searches you’ve made, videos you’ve watched on YouTube, and so on (assuming you haven’t already used Google’s privacy controls to block the collection of certain information).

Yup! If you don’t want Google remembering that ‘plantar warts’ search or when you binge watched videos of a cat in a shark costume riding a robotic vacuum, it’s pretty simple to erase.

First, you need to find the record you want to delete, which is made easy with the search bar at the top of the page.

Once you’ve found the shameful bit of your online past in the timeline, you can open a little menu by clicking on the three vertical dots on the right side of the record. Select the delete option on that menu, and voila – Google will forget it.

You can also delete things in bulk by clicking on the three dot menu at the top of the timeline, choose ‘‘Delete activity by’’ and selecting a date range to erase on the next page. If you want an entirely blank slate, opt for the ‘‘All Time’’ option.

How to stop Google tracking your data

You can ‘‘pause’’ Google’s data collection whenever you want.

Go to myaccount.google.com/activitycontrols. From there, you can tell Google to stop saving information about things such as your searches, location history, and YouTube watching habits.

But if looking back through your My Activity timeline has you a little paranoid, it’s probably also worth running through Google’s Privacy Checkup.

That feature, which can be found at myaccount.google.com/privacycheckup, uses a simple interface to not only help you manage what data is being saved by Google, but also things like what information about you may be public through services like Google+.

Is there a downside to erasing my history?

Well, there’s definitely one for Google: The search giant makes the vast majority of its money from distributing targeting ads, which is made easier by the trove of data that they have about users’ online activities.

But that means that limiting the data they save will probably result in you seeing ads that are less relevant to your interests.

And beyond ads, Google uses the information to help personalise their products to users’ preferences, which can mean a more convenient online experience.

For instance, Google has said that letting it save your search history can mean that it returns results quicker and letting it hold on to location history can help it suggest better commute options in its Maps product.

Recently we heard about a file containing a malicious macro (this is a small program, that once run expands into something larger) that Microsoft have flagged under a family of Trojan viruses that have been targeting MS Office software for several years.

The problem was, there wasn’t an immediate, obvious identification that this file was actually malicious. It’s a Word file that contains seven VBA (Visual Basic for Applications – the programming language used within Office to develop Macros) modules and a VBA user form with a few buttons.

These modules appeared to be legitimate programs powered with a macro; no malicious code found there … However, after further investigation Microsoft noticed some anomalies within the macro. These anomalies cause the macro to connect to a URL and download a Locky ransomware payload.

This means the Locky virus will be downloaded to your PC if macros are enabled when opening the Word file in question.

We strongly suggest that to help prevent Office-targeting macro-based malware from infecting your system, you only enable macros if you wrote the macro yourself, or completely trust and know the person who wrote it.

As always, if you’re unsure about your system’s susceptibility to these attacks, or you would like some assistance preventing or dealing with this, please give us a call.

Ever since the first practical computers came on the market in the 1950's, scientists and engineers have been seeking ever more compact data storage technologies, which have gone from giant drums to tiny chips. Now scientists at the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience at the Delft University of Technology (TUDelft) have developed a memory technology that achieves the ultimate physical limit by using individual atoms to represent a single bit of data.

See more here.

It only takes a moments inattention to change a normal day into an unimaginable nightmare.  In this particular case, although we are still yet to verify, we are assuming an employee opened an attachment in an email which started a chain of events which had a serious impact on the company’s ability to trade.

The innocent looking email opened contained the file locking Trojan which quickly locked up the file system and prevented access to the data.


Normally we would be able to recover the damaged system by restoring the latest backup. Sadly, in this case, it transpired that the unmanaged backup had stopped working several weeks ago which took away that solution.

Due to the daily cost of the disruption a decision was made to pay the ransom, but unfortunately, this wasn’t a straight forward as one would expect.  The criminal(s) behind the ransom demand, would only accept payment in Bitcoins (Bitcoin is a digital asset and a payment system, transacted online).

Under normal circumstances, setting up a Bitcoin account takes several days.  Computer Culture managed to shorten the process by using a trader that accepted payment via a Smart Eftpos money machine. We had 1 hour to withdraw the cash (compounded by BNZ being down during that timeframe) and deposit the cash at the designated machine.

To shorten the story, the unlock code was sent and the majority of the data was recovered. Paying a ransom was a last resort and an action we found abhorrent.  So serious is that treat that in the UK, companies are purchasing large amounts of Bitcoins to reduce the downtime in the event of a ransom attack. Prevention though is better than trying to find a cure and that is what we focus on at Computer Culture.

There are powerful lessons to be learnt from this experience.
1) Organisations need a level of security to reduce the chances of an intrusion and enable early detection.
2) Organisations need a robust and comprehensive backup system
3) These processes need to be proactively managed and reviewed.
4) There needs to be polices, procedure and staff training to mitigate the risk
5) Consider taking our Cyber Insurance (we can recommend some companies)

If you feel your site does not meet this criteria, please contact us urgently and we will help you through the process.

Contributed by Hugh Burns

Your domain name is critical to your business, both as your online brand, and also as something that controls many aspects of your day to day business operations including:

• Email delivery - ensuring you get your email
• Network functions - for example allowing remote access for workers
• Website - ensuring your public website is up and running
• Communications - for example VoIP phone systems, Skype etc

What many companies don’t realise is that they actually have no “ownership” of their own domain, and we’ll cover that issue in this article.

There are three important bits of information associated with every domain:

• Registrant
• Admin Contact
• Technical Contact

The Registrant is the person or entity that registered the domain, and effectively owns it.
The Admin Contact is the person or entity that the registrant trusts to handle issues or answer questions about any non-technical aspect of the domain management. 
The Technical Contact is the person or entity that the registrant trusts to handle any technical aspect about the configuration of the domain, for example your IT provider.

Unfortunately, what we often see is companies registering domains on behalf of other companies, and not setting these details up correctly. For example a business may get a website designed, and the company that hosts the website registers the domain on behalf of their client, and specifies themselves as the domain owner, and not the business they are registering the domain on behalf of. Remember the Registrant is the owner. If you’re not listed as the Registrant, you don’t own your own domain! If you get into a dispute with the company listed as the Registrant, the results can be disastrous. In extreme cases they could shut off email and other critical functions.

So how can I tell if my domain details are correct?

You can do what’s called a “WHO IS” lookup, which shows the information above. There are many websites that can do this for you, but here is one example: https://www.whois.net/
Enter your domain name (without www or anything else in front, e.g. computerculture.co.nz) which will return the Registrant, Admin Contact, and Technical Contact.

Our best practice recommendation is as follows:

Registrant – this should be the name of your company, not another company, and not an individual
Admin Contact – this should be the name of an individual within your company that can answer questions about the domain management.
Technical Contact – this should be someone who can handle the technical aspects of the domain, for example an internal IT person or your IT support company like us.

Please take the time to review your domain registration details. Its such a critical aspect of your business that often gets overlooked, and can have big consequences if not correct. Sometimes it can just be a timewaster trying to complete tasks like changes to email systems or websites if these details aren’t accurate.

If you would like any help with looking this information up, please let us know, or if you’ve had a look and are not happy with the current registration details, please also let us know and we can assist you with getting it sorted.

Lancom is the original source of this article here.

We often share information about malware and the danger of being targeted through the internet. However, the reality is that despite the abundance of information available warning of these issues, the emails of more and more businesses are being compromised. Email-borne risks include viruses, scams, phishing attacks and more. Knowing how to protect yourself against these attacks is challenging because hackers are dynamic and smart about how and who they target, making it difficult to know what is and isn’t legitimate.

In this article we help you to help yourself by pointing out a few common email threats and how you can identify them.

Suspicious looking emails – how to spot them

Emails are still one of the biggest vectors for malware and, though you’ve likely heard this before, every day private and commercial networks get compromised because - people open emails that they shouldn’t!
So, what should you look for?

• Emails that come from known senders with attachments and links that don’t conform to an expected norm, such as format, greetings, content (one example would be getting emails from yourself!)
• Emails from unknown senders
• Emails that addresses you in an unusual way (e.g. Dear Priscilab)
• Emails that have no greetings or introduction at all
• Emails that suggest that you have an issue that the sender will fix
• Emails that ask you to sign up to a website
• When they seem too good to be true such as "you won a prize" type of emails - that's probably because they are!
• Emails from unknown senders that have an “invoice” or “credit note” attached.

If you notice any of these unusual things, the message is pretty simple: do not open, do not respond, do not forward.

Curiosity killed the cat! Don’t click!

If any of these things pop up on your inbox, the message is simple: delete them immediately. Whatever you do, DON’T click on any links, open attachments or follow instructions to win a prize unless you are sure that the email is legitimate. If in doubt – DELETE!
Curiosity killed the cat, they say, but it can also kill your computer and the network. Hackers cleverly try to pique your interest – don’t fall for it. That ‘invoice’ or ‘tax refund’ that you open can make your life very difficult.

Some examples to help you help yourself

There are plenty of examples of the threats; this March 2016, the Department of Internal Affairs was notified about a spam Netflix email circulating the country, advising members to update their payment methods.
Earlier, in February, an email purportedly from ‘Microsoft’ congratulated recipients for winning an internal promotion. Hint: it wasn’t Microsoft sending the email and the promotion never existed.
These and plenty more examples can be found on the DIA’s website. You can also report spam/phishing emails on the DIA’s site here.

Err on the side of caution

The final note is a simple one: rather err on the side of caution than open something which looks tempting only to find it is a virus, phishing attack or other malware. DELETE should be the default action for any emails which look even slightly dodgy. That’s a far safer course of action than opening it up and opening yourself to compromise.

Waverly Labs have created a simple wearable earpiece called Pilot, which claims to make translation effortless and instantaneous. After a slight pause, the earpiece allows the wearer to hear a basic translation of multiple languages into their native tongue. It is designed for the international traveller and Waverly Labs looks to make it function completely offline. A companion mobile app is used to download language packs and toggle the language within the earpiece, but translation doesn't require an internet connection to work. The Pilot is running a pre-order campaign, but unfortunately won't ship until mid-2017.

Contributed by Steve Shaw

When it comes to people's digital lives, entanglement is pretty much the norm nowadays. Ask almost anyone what's installed on their computer, phone, or digital device and you'll find a combination of work and personal information. We're always online and always connected whether it's to our friends, our family, our co-workers, our clients, or our suppliers. The lines between each piece of this information has become blurred. Now we're simply connected people.

For many, the digital push has started with their work. There's a much better ROI for an organisation than an individual when it comes to cutting-edge digital devices. As such, the devices we become familiar with and embed our digital lives into aren’t actually ours, but the organisation we work for. Likewise, for those whose first email account was provided by work, it easily becomes the default or only account that’s used – both for personal and work relationships.

So what happens when, for better or worse, someone moves on from and out of their native digital environment? Keeping good relationships is an essential part of any organisation, so maintaining a healthy link to an organisation after someone moves on can be key. How then can an organisation or individual prepare for a healthy breakup, digitally speaking?

Like most processes, the first step is always information gathering. What exactly would be lost if someone were removed from your organisations technological infrastructure? Phone numbers and email addresses of friends? A digital music collection? Personal emails? Family photos? Access to an email address linked to bank accounts? Losing any or all of the above could easily sour a relationship.

Once you’ve established just what’s going to be lost, you can then move forward. For each individual there will likely be a need to migrate data. From an organisation, however, the greatest need is to put in place policies and procedures that will set you up for when the inevitable need to disentangle occurs.

If you’re concerned about any of these points, talk to one of our friendly team members for assistance with the data migration.

The free Windows 10 upgrade expires 29 July 2016.

Microsoft’s Statement:
“We are excited to offer a free upgrade to Windows 10 for qualified new or existing Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 devices that upgrade in the first year. Once a Windows device is upgraded to Windows 10, we will continue to keep it current via Windows Update for the supported lifetime of the device – at no cost.”

Please call us if you have any concerns relating to upgrading or would like us to assist you with the upgrade.