Tag Archives: cyfin

Time for a change . . . for the better.

culturechange2

Changes are finally showing at Forcepoint since the Raytheon acquisition of Websense. We know Websense customers are feeling some pinch this year since the Raytheon policies are now kicking in. Support or customer service people are harder to get a hold of. When renewal time comes around, the pricing, contract terms, and even the product lines have changed, and more.

Hesitate before you sign on again. Why should you pay extra for add-ons that should already be included in a Web-use security solution, like SSL inspection and U.S.-based technical support? Or why should you pay for a cloud solution that does not have the reporting detail that makes it a useful tracking or investigative tool? Research your options. It may well be time for your own change — to a stable, customer-centric Web-use security solution vendor like Wavecrest Computing.

Wavecrest has cost-effective, comprehensive, agile, and reliable solutions for your employee Web-use security and analytics needs, ranging from software and hardware deployments to cloud and hybrid deployments–all with SSL inspection, forensic-level reporting detail, and U.S.-based technical support included. No matter your business size, industry, or distributed workforce, Wavecrest has an easy-to-setup and easy-to-manage solution for you. Leave the high prices and complicated contractual terms, hidden fees for technical support or product updates, and all the confusion behind. Let Wavecrest focus on your business and your specific requirements. Talk to us today.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services and guest Wi-Fi networks, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. Proud GSA contract holder for over 16 years and counting. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Security should make you feel secure . . . right?!

big_fish_little_fish

It is important to note that many companies are acquired every day, and this can be a good thing . . . for them. Or maybe not . . . “According to collated research and a recent Harvard Business Review report, the failure rate for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) sits between 70 percent and 90 percent,”Business Review Europe, 2015. More importantly for you as customers, many companies that are acquired leave old customers behind, picking up the pieces of what is left of good service, good prices, good products, and even good friendships.

Service is a critical part of finding the right vendor, especially in security today. There are just too many risks out there that SMBs don’t have the time to fully educate themselves about–they just want to go about their business. So for these SMBs, it is more important to rely on a vendor who they know and trust. When this type of service ends, it can be a major disruption requiring many businesses to decide to deal with the higher prices, more complex contracts, and foreign-based service people with endless ticket systems and long wait times.

About a year after the vendor is acquired, the new corporation’s policies really kick in, and customers start getting a good idea of changes. Renewal time comes around and instead of your vendor team member calling you to talk about how everything is and if there are any changes to your needs, you get an invoice with extensive terms and conditions that you need to hire a lawyer to understand. Prices increase and you wonder if it is not just to pay for all the terms and conditions being written!

What once was one of your favorite products becomes a burden. Product names change, product lines are cancelled or combined with new product lines, and the confusion builds. Cybersecurity industry acquisitions are becoming hard to follow. One is bought by another, to be bought by another, and then another that has already bought five other companies . . . names mix, divisions are formed, and old relationships are destroyed.

Security for your business should make you feel secure. It should not be something that holds you back or gobbles you up. Don’t be fooled by the promises vendors make just to hold onto you so that they can raise prices at renewal time. You got into business to focus on what you do. It should not be about keeping up with the fine print of enterprise security, the in and outs of the industry acquisitions, confusing contract terms, and high prices. Find that vendor who will become your “stable go-to.” Get a security vendor that makes you and your business feel secure.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

CyBlock® and ConnectWise® – Integration for MSPs

1-3-Increase-Revenue

Wavecrest Computing is excited to announce a new feature for its Managed Service Provider (MSP) offerings, CyBlock Cloud’s integration with ConnectWise!

The CyBlock integration is built to provide comprehensive Web-use security and analytics along with the time-saving management of the leading ConnectWise Professional Services Automation (PSA) platform. With only one click between ConnectWise and the CyBlock Cloud MSP Partner Portal, MSPs can now automatically populate new client information in the ConnectWise interface, track and manage CyBlock Cloud licenses, proactively pursue timely renewals, and more. This integration is focused on saving time and improving efficiencies, allowing for increased new and recurring revenue, customer satisfaction, and crucial time to focus on mission-critical issues.

CyBlock Cloud for MSPs is a leading Web-use security, analytics, and reporting solution that will fit any MSP client business size or industry type and requires no hardware or software to buy and install, and no maintenance. Monitor, filter, and analyze data to help protect customers from Web-borne threats, such as malware, ransomware, and phishing attacks, while providing useful, time-saving tools, for example, automatically distributed, manager-ready reports, alerts when thresholds are reached, and trusted coverage over any distributed workforce.

“Wavecrest has a great managed service partner program that allows MSPs easy access to manage their CyBlock clients’ needs from anywhere, at any time. Now, we are excited to work with ConnectWise to increase the convenience to MSPs even more. MSPs can now manage their CyBlock Cloud clients directly in the ConnectWise user interface, saving time and expense that they can then use to increase revenue and focus on mission-critical issues,” explains Dennis McCabe, co-founder and President of Wavecrest Computing. “We know that time is money. Developing ways to help MSPs find more time and increase revenue while offering a product and service that surpasses expectations makes us proud of what we do, and motivated to do much more.”

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Provider (MSP), IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Always question the “all-in-one solution” solution.

camperized-wagon

Surveys and statistics still tell us that one of the most important things a business can do is see what is going on within their business. In the past, a business owner or manager could visually see productivity, equipment misuse, or when they were vandalized. Now we rely on digital devices and clouds to handle so much of how our business is run that it is impossible to rely on hands-on owners or managers to see any issues.

When you did your security research, you were most likely reminded that one device or solution will not solve everything. The main takeaway from those reminders–be leery of the product that says it will. Most businesses, big or small, need layers of solutions to truly protect their assets. The problem that is now arising is that big box companies are selling what they like to call an all-in-one solution. This is a fallacy. One solution is not going to cover all your threats from outside or inside the company. They may offer some version of a lot of different things, but we all know that businesses have focused goals. For many of the larger companies, it is to sell large hardware packages such as a firewall that comes with add-ons.

Okay, so we should all know . . . you need a firewall! But when they tell you to give up your focused URL filtering reports because they have one built-in, think twice before you sign on thinking you are getting the same capabilities. They do not specialize in these included or add-on features. The feature they provide will give you a minimal amount of dry, flat, and unresponsive tools. Yes, you have their firewall and that is a good thing, but question whether you can really use what they provide for the security beyond firewall functionality. Today, security is not just about the firewall.

Things to always check for when reviewing included or add-on solutions:

  • Drill-down, forensic-level reporting detail.
  • Interactive features by user, group, category, etc.
  • Manager portal to get managers the information then need without having to schedule time for IT.
  • Comprehensive and current URL categories, including designated cloud services.

Do not believe you have to settle for what is included in your all-in-one package. Wavecrest Computing’s advanced employee Web-use monitoring & analytics solution, Cyfin, will provide clear, detailed, and interactive reporting with automatic log file analysis and detection to work with virtually any gateway device and log file format including Palo Alto, Check Point, Forcepoint (Websense), SonicWALL, WatchGuard, and more.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Think defense.

ransom

Ransomware has the annoying characteristic of sneaking up on you. If you aren’t prepared, you may as well pay the ransom. Why? Because being prepared for loss of data is not at all difficult. First off–think old school . . . BACK UP, BACK UP, and BACK UP! This first very important step is that simple.

Think about what you do on your devices today, professionally or personally. We now live our lives in this digital environment. It is likely your use of technology has increased, even in the past year. This puts all of us at risk. Not just on our desktops either. Wired.com reports “these days ransomware doesn’t just affect desktop machines or laptops; it also targets mobile phones. Last week news broke of a piece of ransomware in the wild masquerading as a porn app. The so-called Porn Droid app targets Android users and allows attackers to lock the phone and change its PIN number while demanding a $500 ransom from victims to regain access.” Not many people could function today without access to their phones. Businesses are becoming more and more friendly to mobile devices as well. All this data floating around just makes it more appealing to hackers.

Where do we go from here? Back . . . back to backing up. Get that portable hard drive back out, dust it off, and use it. Yup . . . I did say that. Back it all up. Of course, for businesses it is more complex (and critical). But that is what cloud storage services are for. My only recommendation when it comes to off-site backups? Use more than one service. This way if anything does happen to your access to one backup, you will still have access to another. Inserting stern warning here: Do not store your passwords on your devices or in your backups unencrypted. If a hacker can access and lock up your systems, then he can find your passwords and have a go at them as well, including access to your backups.

Protect your business. Train your employees about new threats and monitor what is happening. Information is a gold mine–get visibility to see where your employees are going and then make some decisions that can protect your business. Ransomware can hit you through just a link in an e-mail. Make sure you have a solution in place that will help stop access to malicious Web sites.

We need to rethink the way we operate. It is just a shift, and if you just do it now, then you won’t be alarmed when you do get hit. Sadly, chances of a business being victimized by cybercrime are becoming more and more likely. Be prepared. And please, don’t let them win. The Internet has opened up so many opportunities for us and generations to come. Singapore is a perfect example of letting hackers win. They are moving to shut down Internet access for government computers, “from May next year and affect about 100,000 computers in use in the public service in the city-state, local media said.” (Reuters)

Do you think giving up Internet access will solve cybercrime?

We can help you find a better way.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Productivity in a Time of Endless Distractions

time online image

Employees have access to all kinds of digital distractions every minute of the day. So, businesses have to make a decision what is acceptable for Internet use when employees are on the clock. This decision can be hard. There are many who think of privacy issues, not wanting to deter human interaction, or who even have a “my managers watch over their employees so I leave it to them” thought. The only real problem is . . . it’s your business that will suffer if Internet-usage privileges are abused on a regular basis. Bandwidth slowdowns and productivity loss, not to mention increased malware risk, can have a substantial impact on your business. No matter which decision you make for your business, you still need to know what is happening to keep your company, your data, and your employees secure and productive.

You need visibility. If you keep up with our Wavecrest posts, we tend to emphasize this point a lot. Why? Because it is a crucial business tool for today’s digital workplace! You have to know what is happening in your business and on your network so you can make informed business decisions. In this particular case, you need visibility into employees’ time spent online.

Wavecrest Computing’s Time Online feature provides the time that a user spends on the Internet in a useful and informative format with easy-to-interpret charts. Find out which users spend the most time online, spot spikes, and analyze usage for productivity issues or potential bandwidth hogs. Each business is unique and your Internet-use policy should fit your specific business needs. Find the visibility necessary to keep productivity high and mission-critical operations running smoothly, with Cyfin and CyBlock solutions from Wavecrest Computing.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Have even more visibility with Wavecrest’s new comparison feature!

compare-contrastWavecrest is pleased to announce an informative new feature that is now included with the latest versions of CyBlock and Cyfin. Now you can compare Web activity trends in selected date ranges to find anomalies or spikes in usage, compare series activity by metric such as Visits, or view the percentage change in activity from the previous to the current period.

The more visibility you have into your company’s Web activity, the more informed your Web-use decisions are. Each business is unique–you make the decisions on what is acceptable or not! Determine these policies, add them to your enterprise Acceptable Use Policy, and proactively protect your business, your data, and your employees.

reportsDashboardTrendUsersCompare

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Potential Victims to Very Smart Thieves

cat paw stealing cookie

Employees need to know what their employers’ philosophy is behind technology. Does my employer want me to use whatever app I choose? Can I just store and share work information where it is most convenient for me? Will my employer listen when I explain how much my cloud app does to improve my workflow? If you as the employer listen, you could save your business from an incident or a serious breach.

It is amazing that the news is filled with data breach, data loss, ransomware, and spear phishing, and yet many businesses still think they are immune from an attack. If you are connected to the Internet, you are a highly susceptible victim. Do not take this to mean that you should not run your business with the highly efficient and collaborative tools that cloud services offer. It just means think and act to protect your enterprise assets and employees.

Let’s first cover where a major number of incidents start. Your enterprise weakness . . . the employee. It doesn’t matter if you have the best employees in the universe, they are human. Hackers perfect the way they attack; that is their job. They have become so good at what they do that good employees send out W-2s, transfer millions to banks in foreign countries, and hand out their logon credentials without question.

Now let’s talk about what you can do to help your employees to not become victims.

  • Educate them; make them a part of the process. Communicate. It is everyone’s fight.
  • Go ahead and make your most techy employee an honorary go-to person for others with questions.
  • Gain visibility with proactive monitoring tools. Trust me–this is not an employee privacy invasion. You need to know what is going on first; then make informed decisions.
  • Make sure there is a process in place for an employee who questions something. Make the process part of your Acceptable Use Policy (AUP).

And then the important basics we all know, but are worth repeating . . .

  • Back up regularly and make sure your recovery process is tried and true. Think ransomware attack recovery, so keep it where you can get to it but others can’t.
  • Patch – There is no longer an option to do updates. Many are for security, so just do it and do it consistently. It’s patch management, not patch whenever.
  • Passwords – Maintain, manage, and get creative. Use a password manager if needed.
  • Off-boarding – Make sure to purge all credentials for ex-employees or contractors. How do you know if they are still there? Monitor!!
  • Layered security – Get a firewall, but don’t expect all-in-one add-ons to be impressive. For example, don’t expect the firewall Web-use reporting feature to provide comprehensive and interactive reporting capability. Invest in the solution that means serious employee Web-use reporting business–no more wishy-washy reports that are useless.

Think and act to protect your enterprise assets and employees. Take some time to communicate with your employees about the exploits that they may fall prey to. It is not their fault; they are not an “insider threat” but a potential victim to very smart thieves.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Feeling neglected? Let’s fix that.

article-5-photo

It seems the newly named Forcepoint has finally settled into the company they planned since the Raytheon acquisition of Websense. As a Websense customer before the acquisition, are you feeling a bit neglected now? In this new corporate culture, are you finding it difficult to get a hold of technical support or that customer service is not there when you need them? Could it be that their focus is more on the larger Raytheon cyber security customer base than on their Websense customers? Whichever the case, your business is the one that suffers. Stop spending your precious time on working through multiple levels of bureaucracy to get what you need.

Wavecrest has comprehensive, agile, and reliable solutions for your employee Web-use security and analytics needs, ranging from software and hardware deployments to cloud and hybrid deployments. No matter your business size, industry, or distributed workforce, Wavecrest has a solution for you.

Retaining a positive SMB mentality, the Wavecrest team believes strongly in one-on-one communication with prospects, customers, and partners. When you reach out to us, we have a human being on the other end of the line that knows the product well, communicates well, and will take the extra step to get your enterprise and employees secure. You don’t have to go through automated calls, ticketing, or several levels of technical support to reach the person with the knowledge you need.

Leave the government contractor-level pricing, contractual terms, and confusion behind. Don’t remain just a ticket number. Let Wavecrest focus on your business and your specific requirements. Talk to us today.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.

Do You Have the Necessary Enterprise Cloud Services Visibility?

img_cloud_computingToday, cloud services are the way businesses run. Collaboration among employees, file sharing, data storage, and even accounting are accomplished via cloud services. There are very few businesses left that use absolutely no cloud services. It is just a fact that we all live in a world with data spread out everywhere, at speeds we could not even fathom ten years ago. Hence, the concept of Shadow IT, Shadow Data, and Shadow IoT (Internet of Things) are becoming more commonplace terms. All of these are basically variations on employees using services and devices outside of their IT department’s knowledge. What does it all mean when running your business? Two questions . . . do you know what cloud services are being used and where your data is going?

Visibility . . . a key element for enterprise security. Knowing what cloud services your users are accessing is detailed visibility that a business can’t live without. Unsanctioned cloud applications and services can expose the company’s network and data security to a long list of serious threats. The IT department knows managers want the Web-usage visibility too . . . without the rest of the “visual noise” and meaningless information (to them, at least). They want detail on what employees are doing with cloud services, and they want it easily accessible, interactive, understandable, and meaningful.

It is time to take a good look at what’s being used to monitor and control your employees’ cloud services usage. Make sure you have a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) solution that gives you the critical cloud services management tools you need. Learn more about how to Detect, Analyze, and Manage Cloud Services in the Enterprise.

About Wavecrest Computing

Celebrating 20 years in business, Wavecrest Computing, headquartered in historic downtown Melbourne, FL, has provided commercial business and government clients with reliable, accurate Web-use management and Cloud Access Security Broker products since 1996. Managed Service Providers, IT specialists, HR professionals, and business managers trust Wavecrest’s Cyfin and CyBlock products to manage employee Internet usage — managing cloud services, reducing liability risks, improving productivity, saving bandwidth, and controlling costs. Wavecrest has clients worldwide, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Florida Department of Health, Siemens, Department of Homeland Security, and a growing list of global enterprises and government agencies. We are a proud long-term GSA contract holder. For more information on the company, products, and partners, visit https://www.wavecrest.net.