10 Tips to Cut IT Costs

With the talk of tough economic times, most IT Departments and small businesses are required or are looking to tighten the belt. I just read a Garner report that had some very good tips on how to cut costs. We work with School Districts and Government Municipalities that are always have budget concerns and I thought I would share with you some tips on how to tighten IT.

1. Gartner Group estimates that 37% of the IT Budget is dedicated to personal. Hiring freezes and leaving some non-critical positions unfilled with help contain the cost for enterprise IT departments. Small businesses might want to consider outsourcing functions such as Firewall’s and backups to a company that specializes in such services

2. Virtualization – Virtualization can save on hardware costs and energy costs. Virtualization has an initial upfront investment, but the pay back is usually 2 years or less. Some utilities are also offering a tax credit to move to virtualization. As much as 500 dollars a machine.

3. Deploy a Unified Threat Management (UTM) Firewall – A UTM firewall can eliminate 2 or 3 pieces of hardware and software. You can get saving in maintenance costs and renewal costs as well as reduces hardware costs. You can also reduce energy costs.

4. Review unmanaged costs such as printing and power and cooling costs to your data center. Older aging printers can have high consumable costs as well as high energy costs.

5. Use commodity products when you can and skip using best of breed and use best that fits your needs instead.

6. Find and eliminate unneeded hardware and software. This can save you on maintenance costs and also on power. It

7. Delay PC and server purchases. Extend your life cycle by 1 year if you systems can handle it.

8. Delay going to Vista. Vista does not offer that much to businesses and is an operating system that can be skipped. You can save on the cost of deploying and training users on Vista.

9. Deploy Voice Over IP (VOIP). Voice over IP can save a bunch of money in adds, moves and changes and can also save in long distance and telephone expenses in general. It can also boost productivity by providing easy access to voice mail and email. It can be one less location for someone to check.

10. Bring a finance person onto your team to help analyze your budget and help trim your costs.

These are just ideas on how to cut costs and save money in a down economy.

How Secure is your Network?

Have you stopped and thought about that? Most people think putting in a firewall is good enough. I got news for you, it is not.
A firewall is just a start to securing your network. It will protect the people on the Internet from attacking you, but what about threats that lurk in email and the web pages you visit?
Recently, I had a client which had an end user that was performing a Google search to buy some parts. In that process he was directed to a link and the link downloaded what seemed to be free anti-virus software, it was not. It was a spyware program. The anti-virus program on the machine did not catch it.
Security is more than just putting a firewall up, it is an ongoing effort to ensure that your network is secure with the budget and resources you have.
If you are a small business you should have at least
1. Anti-Virus on the Desktop and Servers
2. A Unified Threat Management (UTM) firewall installed.
3. Outbound Internet Access Filtered
4. Strong User names and passwords on machines and websites that are accessed
5. User education – Educate users on how to properly secure themselves when on the Internet
6. Acceptable Use Policy – This will lay the ground rules on what to do and not to do and also protect the company from a potential lawsuit
7. Patch Machines monthly – Operating systems should be patched monthly. Numerous Security vulnerabilities have been discovered over the past few years. Some of the vulnerabilities leave a computer at great risk.
8. Consider Outsourcing your Firewall- Consider outsourcing your firewall to company you can trust. They will make sure the firewall is updated and also make sure you are protected against the latest attacks
9. Backups – Have a good backup system. If a virus or worm would attack your network, you can always restore the damaged files and machines from a good tape backup.



If you are a large business all of the above applies plus
1. Consider an application firewall – A new line of firewalls’ are being developed that can detect what applications are running across them. You can block traffic such as facebook and Instant Messenger while still allowing access to legitimate websites
2. Consider Network Access Control (NAC) – NAC can detect who if a machine is part of the internal Network or not. If it is not part of the Internal Network, than it can be placed on a guest network or denied access entirely. It can also check to ensure that the most recent virus definitions are installed before allowing network access
3. Consider a VPN that can check machine posture – Checking machine posture can ensure that a machine is part of the organization and it has the proper security such as a personal firewall and anti-virus in place.
4. Filter Internet Access – Employee’s do not need to go everywhere on the Internet. Give them access only to the websites they need to conduct business or are determined as save
5. Web based email – No one needs access to personal email while at work. I have seen companies obtain a virus from someone’s personal email. If they want to view personal email, provide a public access terminal or do not allow attachments to be uploaded and downloaded.
6. Security Audit- An outside firm should perform a security audit. This will ensure you are following best practices and also alert you to potential issues before they become huge problems.
These are just a few of many ways to secure your network and keep your end users save. If you take the steps listed above, you are way ahead of 90% of most businesses and are on your way to maintaining a very secure network.