VITS Monthly - A Newsletter Covering Recent IT News by Vantage IT Solutions Limited

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Microsoft Products Losing Support

Microsoft has announced plans to end support of Windows XP Service Pack 1 and Office 2003 Service Pack 1 in October. This will mean there will be no more updates, including ones to fix security problems, available from that time. If you are already a customer of Vantage IT, we will be in touch nearer the time to install the necessary updates, so don’t worry. If you are not one of our lucky customers, then do contact us and we’ll let you know how we can help.

Breathe New Life into Old Computers

Would you like to do something useful with your old computers and printers? When Vantage IT installs new equipment, we are often asked if we can find a good home for the old devices. When this occurs, we give an organisation called Computer Aid International a call. Computer Aid takes unwanted computer equipment and sends it to developing countries for use in schools and community projects. In their owns words, they “identify those potential recipient organisations where the application of IT will have the most positive social and economic impact”.

For the donor companies, this is a great opportunity to do something useful with equipment that would otherwise fill up offices or be thrown away. All you have to do is contact Computer Aid to let them know you have some IT kit for them. They can be contacted on 0207 281 0091 or more information can be found on their website at www.computeraid.org. We always destroy data on hard drives before we dispose of computers, whether to Computer Aid or anyone else. Computer Aid also realises how important this is and will wipe every PC before it is refurbished.

More Wireless Woes

Sorry to sound like a broken record, but security of wireless networks has recently been exposed to be worse than previously believed. Two new vulnerabilities have shown that computers can be hacked even when they are not actively using a wireless connection. We always recommend wireless be turned off when not in use and these new admissions confirm our concerns. In one instance, it was demonstrated that a computer could be accessed without authority in less than a minute!

Most laptops have a button for turning the wireless on and off (and an indicator light to indicate its status) and it's always worth disabling the device when it's not in use. It's also possible to disable the wireless to prevent users from activating it, if your company policy is to not permit wireless use.

You May Not Have Considered This...

CD DVD Destroyer

What do you do with old CDs and DVDs that contain your data? If you’re like us, you ensure they are rendered non-readable before they are thrown in the bin. If you don’t want to snap them or scratch the life out of them, then a company called Plextor has introduced an external optical drive whose sole function in life is to destroy data stored on recordable or rewriteable CDs and DVDs. If you do get one, just make sure you put the right discs in it, as the process is irreversible.

The Entertaining Bit

No cyclists were injured in the making of this video... Please click here for a little chuckle.