Panhandle Post

News, Opinion & Data

TECH SCOOP: How to Back up Your Files

by Leave a Comment

There is a sickly feeling that comes over you when you go to open an

Drew Purviance, Eagle Technology Solutions

important file and the computer says “File Not Found”. “It was just there yesterday!” You yell frantically at the machine but that cold metal box has no empathy for your loss. “Ah ha!” you think, as you reach for your flash drive that has a copy of that precious file. Let’s go through the steps to have this copy and never experience that sickly sinking feeling again.

The only safe way to keep copies of your data is to make multiple copies across multiple devices. You want to have your most important files in at least two different spots, maybe one on your computer and another on a flash drive or even another computer. If you make multiple copies and just keep them on the same device then you aren’t really covered if there is a hardware failure.

For this example, let’s say we need to back up our Word document file called “Ancestry.docx”. There is a myriad of ways to go about this but here are two of the simplest ways.  The first step is just making regular manual copies of the file to another device. Now for a second device to store the document you can use a flash drive, external hard drive, or even another computer. In my humble opinion, the easiest way to back up a document would to just be to email it to myself after every time I update it. This keeps it on the server that hosts my email and therefore I can get it on any computer, at any time and access that email. Our second manual option for one of the external media devices is to plug that device in to your computer. Once there you should get a pop-up message asking if you want to view the files on that media device.  Select yes. You can then see everything on that device and you can right-click on “Ancestry.docx” in your Documents folder and select “Copy”. Now go back to that external media device and right-click anywhere inside of that folder and select “paste”. Voila! Backup completed and Ancestry.docx is saved again!  Confused about right-click, flash drives or copy-paste?  Keep reading…

We have a second option to back up our important file, but this time we can set it to go automatically! We can use a backup program to automatically backup our files to external media whenever we want to schedule it! This process is a little more complicated and if it is something of interest and importance, then give us a call at Eagle Technology Solutions. Any of our qualified technicians can help you out!
Call or email at 785.628.1330 techs@eaglerescue.net

Tech Scoop: Neighborhood Grill Gets Grilled

by Leave a Comment

Over the past week a malicious virus was discovered on point-of-sale

Drew Purviance, Eagle Technology Solutions

machines at more than 160 Applebee’s locations. This virus has exposed credit card information from unknowing diners. In Kansas, three of the restaurants have been identified to have been infected, Topeka, Emporia, and Manhattan.

The dates on which the stores were hit vary, but the majority were found to have occurred in November 2017, and several throughout December and January. All things considered RMH, who owns the restaurants, responded quickly and contained the malware by early February. RMH was able to enlist the help of several cyber security forensic firms and reported the issue right away.

POS malware is becoming more and more prevalent for all retailers and medical industry businesses. Already in January, Forever 21 revealed that their POS machines had been infected for almost eight months in its stores before being discovered.

RMH and the other companies strongly urge customers to monitor their bank accounts at this point. RMH acknowledges that the ultimate safeguard against this kind of malware must come from the retailers themselves.

All-in-all you really need to monitor your credit cards and bank accounts regularly if you use debit/credit cards on a regular basis. RMH responded promptly and extremely well to this issue but you never know what business is currently infected and businesses often don’t have any clue. Be wary and be cautious as malicious entities can be everywhere.  If you have any questions or concerns on possible malware or scams give us at ETS a call at 785.628.1330 and we will help you out!

TECH SCOOP: Tax season scams

by Leave a Comment

It is that time of the year again! Tax season is upon us and with it comes a

Drew Purviance, Eagle Technology Solutions

barrage of different types of scams and phishing techniques. There are three certainties in this world — death, taxes and data loss.

Between January and April 15, malicious people out there are trying to combine two of those certainties.
No. 1 on the list of these scams is the IRS contacting you for mistakes on your taxes. Like Microsoft, the IRS is too big to care about us little guys and they will never call you. The scammers are calling now through the next few months telling you that you didn’t pay all of your taxes or that they found out you cheated your taxes and you need to pay now — or else. If you ever receive a call from the IRS, hang up immediately because the next words out of that person’s mouth undoubtedly will be that you owe them money.

Phishing is the next item up on the popularity list amongst these malicious scammers. Phishing is a form of scamming that takes place in your email. People will send out fake emails from fake addresses that appear real in an attempt to get you to reply with credentials or open a malicious attachment.

There are a lot this time of year “from the IRS” asking for a copy of your W-2 or for you to contact them. Again just delete these emails as they are just trying to steal personal information and or money from you.

This phishing scam is a popular one during the holidays, as well, with people posing as Fed-Ex or UPS and telling you that your shipment is held up and you need to open some malicious attachment.

If you would like further information on IRS scams, check out a full alert from the actual IRS at https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/tax-scams-consumer-alerts. If you have any questions or are wary of any received emails, give us a call at Eagle technology Solutions, and we will be able to let you know if the email is fake.

TECH SCOOP: Weather not the only thing stalling Olympic Games

by Leave a Comment

With the eyes of the entire world on Pyeongchang, South Korea, nothing

Drew Purviance, Eagle Technology Solutions

makes for a better target for hackers and malicious attack groups.

The Olympic Committee has reported it has had several machines succumb to a new malware referred to as “Olympic Destroyer.” With the 2014 Sochi Olympics making about $53 million in revenue, the Olympics are a huge target for ransomware attacks. Money though isn’t always the motive, though. In this case, it appears the attackers just want to disrupt the games and show off their skills.

The Olympic Destroyer malware’s current goal is making devices totally unusable, achieving this by deleting files critical to allowing the operating system of the machines to run but, at the same time, using network devices to further its progression to other machines. This sophisticated malware is also stealing credentials from the machines it has infected. Olympic Destroyer contains two modules it uses to steal credentials — one of them steals the credentials from an internet browser and the other from the local machine’s administrator credentials.

You might have noticed on Feb. 9 that the official Winter Olympics’ website was down for the majority of the day — roughly 12 hours — which left attendees unable to print tickets to events. The malware was able to take down the website with the malicious attack, and it also brought down several television feeds. In January, researchers for various companies reported a Russian hacking group had been sending phishing emails with malicious attachments to South Korean organizations as well as groups that work with the Olympics.

Russia’s foreign ministry has denied any allegations and has said “no evidence would be presented to the world.” So far, investigators of the attacks have made no claims as to who has initiated this attack on the Winter Olympic Games.

At a time when the world is supposed to come together for the love of sports, there are still people out there with malicious intentions fixating on poisoning any happiness this world can get.

If you are concerned about Ransomware in your organization, contact ETS about employee training and ways to help educate your staff and have the necessary “safety nets” in place in the unfortunate event you experience a compromise

TECH SCOOP: Quick speed tweaks for your Windows 10 PC

by

There is nothing worse than dealing with a computer that refuses to move at

Drew Purviance, Eagle Technology Solutions

the pace you want it to. This gets even more frustrating when the computer was working at your desired speed for a while but has suddenly stopped doing so. Below are some quick how-to’s to speed up your Windows 10 PC.

By far, the No. 1 thing that will bog down your machine is temporary files being stored in the machine. The easiest way to combat this is to download and install the free program CCleaner, https://www.ccleaner.com/ccleaner/download

This program will automatically go through and delete all those files that are taking up space on your computer.

  1. Download CCleaner (it’s a small program and won’t take up space on your computer)
  2. Find the CCleaner install file in your computer downloads folder (or wherever you have set files to download)
  3. Double click the application install file and allow it to run on your computer.
  4. Once CCleaner is open you just have to press “Run Cleaner” and then press “OK” on the windows that pop up afterwards.
  5. When the program has finished running, It will then tell you how many temporary files were deleted. Then you are free to close the program. (I run this program about every other week on my machines.)

If you still haven’t noticed any improvements, then you can dig a little deeper and shut off some unnecessary Windows services.

  1. On your Windows machine, press the windows key (next to your ctrl and alt button) and the r key at the same time. After that combination has been pressed, a run command box will open in your bottom left hand corner. From there you can type in, services.msc and press enter or click “OK.”
  2. This will open up your Windows services. The first service to look for is one called Superfetch.
  3. Once you find it you can right-click on it and select “Properties.”
  4. This will open another window.
  5. Find start up type and change it to “Disabled.”
  6. At the Service Status, go ahead and stop the service and the press “Apply” and then “OK.” You can also apply the same steps to the services, “Background Intelligent Transfer Service” and “Windows Font Cache Service.”

As always, if you have any issues with these or would just like us to go through and help you out with them, we are always here! Any one of our technicians can help you do this, and you don’t even need to leave home. We can work with you remotely or help you if you encounter an issue with the process described above.

ETS can be reached at 785.628.1330 or you can email us at techs@eaglerescue.net. 

TECH SCOOP: How to Mute Specific Browser Tabs

by Leave a Comment

Have you ever been trying to read an article on your favorite news site and they start auto playing a video or playing the sound of one and you can’t find the source?
It can become absolutely infuriating to try and find the source of that annoying sound going off in the background. What if you could just mute that one tab so that you wouldn’t have to dig around in search of that source so you can read your article in peace?
I have the trick to allow you to do just that.
If you are using Apple Safari, Mozilla Firefox or the ever-popular Google Chrome, the fix is just two clicks away. In Mozilla FireFox and Google Chrome, your tabs are displayed right above the address bar that shows the name of the site you are on. You simply need to right click on the desired tab and select the option “Mute Tab.”
The same steps for Apple Safari also apply, but the tabs are displayed just below the address bar that shows the name of the site you are on. Voila! All done. No more searching for that annoying sound source.
Microsoft Edge is just a bit trickier if you want to mute a tab. You may have noticed in your computing time there is a sound icon in the bottom right corner of your screen, right next to the date and time.
If you have Microsoft Edge open, you can right click on that sound icon and select “Open Volume Mixer.” Your Edge tabs will be displayed there, and you have the option to turn them down or mute them completely by dragging the arrow up or down or clicking the sound icon, respectively.
 For more information or pictures, click HERE.

 Eagle Technology Solutions–Best-in-class Technology Company, working hand-in-hand with both business and residential clients to bring the highest degree of unrivaled support.  Our focus on serving customers has given us the advantage to work with IT industry’s leaders to partner with us and support our teams.  We support thousands of businesses, non-profits and residential customers.  Top businesses turn to Eagle Technology Solutions for their end-to-end information technology needs.  

Eagle Technology Solutions is “Technology Done Right!”  Phone: 785-628-1330

Tech Scoop!

by 1 Comment

 

Welcome to the wonderful world of Tech Scoop! What is Tech Scoop? Tech Scoop is a new link on your favorite Eagle Post site with the latest in technology centric information! We will be covering the latest in technology, security, and how-to’s. Tech Scoop will be your first and only stop for the ever changing world known as technology. If Yahoo is subject to a security breach or a new strain of ransomware, we will be here reporting on the facts as they become available.

My name is Drew Purviance and I will be one of the writers taking to the World Wide Web to get what you need to know about the latest technology happenings. I am a Network Technician at Eagle Technology Solutions, I have an Associate’s degree in Internetworking and Computer Programming and am ready to help with anything in our articles that may possibly affect you.

I am excited to be here providing you with the latest news along with computer support. Eagle Technology Solutions has a well-versed staff that can help meet any of your IT needs, whether it is a question on how to do something or you are in need of a hardware upgrade or refresh. As an Eagle employee it is my goal to keep Our Community Connected, and I believe through your favorite Post site and our technology support we will be able to help keep everyone close and connected!