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As most Canadian businesses are aware, CASL or Canadian Antispam Legislation came into effect on July 1, 2014. This legislation has caused concern for our customers that send promotional e-mails to their customers via their internal Exchange server or Office 365 Exchange server. BCNI has recently partnered with CodeTwo to resell Exchange Rules add-on software. CodeTwo Exchange Rules is an Exchange signature manager – a Microsoft Server add-on designed to help server administrators centralize the management of email signatures and disclaimers on MS Exchange. It will help you quickly set up professional signatures for all employees in your company, without configuring anything on their computers or mobile devices. Perhaps most significant, legal disclaimers not only can be easily added to emails, including the ability to place a link in your e-mail which will allow customers to unsubscribe from your marketing, which is key over the next 36 months.

Fact: You can continue to use email if you have express or implied consent from recipients. During the 36-month transition period (after July 1, 2014), you can continue to use your current email list if you have previously provided your products or services to them and they haven’t told you to stop.
For more information or pricing on Exchange Rules add-on software, please contact sales@bcni.ca or 905-825-9404

Below is an excerpt from an article written by Microsoft’s Tim Rains which effectively sums up the risks of using unsupported operating systems.

Microsoft Corp publishes a security intelligence report which analyzes threat intelligence from more than 1 billion systems worldwide to provide in-depth perspectives on exploits, vulnerabilities and malware to help customers manage risk. Among other intelligence, the report examines the security risk that consumers and businesses face when using unsupported operating systems and software and looks at the implications of using Windows XP once support, including security updates, ends April 8, 2014. In addition, new telemetry compares the security of modern operating systems such as Windows 8 with older operating systems such as Windows XP that, according to StatCounter, make up approximately 21 percent of operating systems used today.

The report found these top three worldwide threats for those running Windows XP:
• Sality. Malware family that can steal personal information and lower a PC’s security settings.
• Ramnit. Malware that infects Windows executable files, Microsoft Office files and HTML files.
• Vobfus. Family of worms that can download other malware onto a PC; it can be downloaded by other malware or spread via removable drives, such as USB flash drives.

The report found that in the first half of 2013, nearly 17 percent of computers worldwide running up-to-date, real-time security products from Microsoft encountered malware. Although Windows 8 encountered a similar amount of malware as Windows XP, computers running Windows XP were six times more likely to actually be infected with those threats.

“The data help illustrate the positive impact that security innovations in newer operating systems are having. Modern operating systems such as Windows 8 include advanced security technologies that are specifically designed to make it harder, more complex, more expensive and, therefore, less appealing for cybercriminals to exploit vulnerabilities,” said Tim Rains, director of Microsoft Trustworthy Computing.

Rains added that once security updates for Windows XP stop on April 8, 2014, security risks associated with continuing to use the outdated software will increase as cybercriminals seek to exploit newly discovered vulnerabilities. The last version of Windows XP to go out of support was Service Pack 2. In the two years following, malware infections jumped 66 percent when compared with Windows XP SP3, the version for which support ends next year.

“The importance of upgrading from Windows XP cannot be overstated,” Rains said. “We truly want people to understand the risks of running Windows XP after support ends and to recognize the security benefits of upgrading to a more modern operating system — one that includes the latest in security innovations, provides ongoing support and can in turn better protect them.”
Those wanting to download and learn more about the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report findings should visit http://www.microsoft.com/sir.

Since the release of Office 365, BCNI.ca has assisted local businesses in evaluating and executing a seamless transition to Office 365. BCNI is an authorized Microsoft 365 reseller and vendor of Microsoft server and productivity software.

Consulting services include:

-transitioning from your existing mail service provider
-transitioning from an existing Microsoft Exchange mail server and moving archived mail
-Mobile device requirements and setup
-Planning and implementing Sharepoint services
-firewall and network security planning
-Domain record requirements and management
-workstation requirements and planning
-office 365 version selection and pricing

for more information email sales@bcni.ca or call (905)825 9404

With our office right on the Burlington border, BCNI has been able to provide quick response for Burlington businesses requiring onsite network support. BCNI has expert technical staff well trained on Microsoft server operating systems and hardware including; IBM,HP, Dell, Lenovo, Cisco, Sonicwall, AppAssure and more. Call us today for a no cost consultation to review your onsite network support requirements. sales@bcni.ca or (905) 825-9404 for more information.

With the steady increase of new office space in Western Mississauga minutes from our offices, BCNI has been available to assist Mississauga businesses with their managed IT service requirements. BCNI has well trained technical staff available to tailor a managed IT plan for your business. BCNI specializes in Microsoft server operating systems, Exchange mail and the required hardware including; IBM, HP, Dell, Lenovo, Cisco, Sonicwall, AppAssure and more. Please contact sales@bcni.ca or (905) 825-9404 for more information.

BCNI Oakville has added another data centre service to our existing arsenal of off-site backup hosting and data warehousing services. At BCNI we are constantly looking for innovative products and like DELL who purchased AppAssure in early 2012, we feel AppAssure will greatly benefit many of our clients who support mission critical servers . In order to make the solution simple, BCNI will install an AppAssure core at your site and replicate to our data centre all for one low monthly cost.

What is AppAssure?
AppAssure is a complete data protection software solution which unifies backup, replication and recovery. The AppAssure solution offers flexible replication and recovery spanning physical, virtual and cloud environments. AppAssure can be used with a wide variety of storage hardware, ranging from inexpensive SATA direct attach products to iSCSI SANs.

Features:
Live Recovery
Near-instant recovery of your entire server from your backup in a matter of minutes.
Universal Recovery
No need to maintain identical standby machines. Replace them with AppAssure’s less costly hardware-independent machine-to-machine or machine-to environment recoveries: P2V, V2V, V2P.
Minutes-long recoveries
Live Recovery™ technology cuts RTOs (recovery time objectives) to minutes. Choose from 288 recovery points in a day.
Minimize disk storage footprint
True Global™ deduplication and compression technology cuts storage requirements by up to 80% over traditional single-machine schemes.
Recovery Assure
Know for sure that your backup file is completely recoverable with AppAssure’s automated recovery verification technology.
Near-zero data loss
Schedule snapshot technology and incremental-forever, changed-block tracking backups as frequently as every five minutes.
Replication feature
Turn on a preconfigured virtual machine clone immediately after a production machine failure.
Line-speed efficiency
Dell AppAssure TrueScale scalable architecture backs up fast-changing data without interrupting or slowing user access to physical or virtual production machines.

for more info please call 905-825-9404 or email sales@bcni.ca

BCNI network support services in Oakville has been a Sonicwall Silver partner in excess of  5 years now.  Over this time our technical staff has been very impressed with the performance, support and price of the Sonicwall security suite of products and as a result Sonicwall is often our first recommendation when our corporate clients are sourcing  firewall products, Email security and also data backup/disaster recovery devices.

In a continuation of our commitment to Sonicwall security products, our VP of technical services James Neal,  has completed the CSSA certification exam (Certified SonicWALL Security Administrator)  Congratulations James!

For a comprehensive review of your network and internet/email security please contact sales@bcni.ca or 905-825-9404