CoNetrix Technology announces its partnership with CrowdStrike, a best-in-class endpoint protection software, to provide comprehensive endpoint security for clients.   The complexity of today's IT environments, combined with the increased sophistication of today's security threats, has led to the need for more sophisticated endpoint protection services. Cybercriminals have adapted and found ways around traditional signature-based endpoint protection software. Most malware is now easily modified to circumvent known signatures, making most signature-based anti-virus (AV) solutions on the market today ineffective.  

Marvin Crossnoe, founder and CEO of CoNetrix, has been named to Glassdoor's Top CEO list for small and medium businesses. Crossnoe ranks number 21 out of 50, with a 99 percent approval rating among employees. Glassdoor, one of the world's largest job and recruiting sites, just released its annual award list recognizing Top CEOs in 2021 of small and medium sized businesses across the U.S. Annually, Glassdoor hosts Employees' Choice Awards to recognize leaders and companies who are appreciated and respected by their own employees - leaders who create a positive work culture in countries throughout North America and parts of Europe.

It can be tricky to separate the concepts of risk and significance when it comes to vendor management. Are they just two paths to say the same thing? Does one depend on the other? How does due diligence play into those ratings? If you've asked those questions before, or if this is your first time to see them, you've come to the right place. Let's explore this idea.

Many organizations are adopting Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365) and businesses nationwide are seeing the benefits of improved productivity through its email and collaboration solution. Organizations of all sizes can benefit from a seamless user experience between mobile and on-premise environments.

Microsoft has been emphasizing Office 365 (now Microsoft 365) subscription services since the public introduction in 2011. As a result, the popularity of these services has grown to over 155 million active users as of October 2018, and is gaining new users at over 3 million seats per month. With this growth, on-going marketing, and the increasing acceptance of public cloud services, many businesses and financial institutions are starting to look at Microsoft 365.

If you are like most leaders in an organization, you don't have the time or motivation to do any sort of cybersecurity assessment to mitigate risk. It's easy to question security testing and ask, "why bother." After all, doesn't it take a lot of effort to do security testing when it may not turn up any results?

At CoNetrix we've helped many customers implement Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) over the past year. Most of these implementations have been to support employees working from home or migration to cloud-based services such as Microsoft 365. Overall I consider MFA to be a positive approach to improving account security and preventing unauthorized access due to phishing or weak passwords. But as MFA becomes more common, are there any "gotchas" that we need to consider?

Well, maybe it used to be the question, but it is no longer a question to be asked. Scanning your network is an essential part of your security protocol to ensure that customer information is secured. So, since I need to scan my systems for vulnerabilities, where do I start?

Tandem announces the release of Tandem Incident Management, a new software product for creating an incident response plan and tracking incidents as they occur. "With the current cyber climate, our customers are facing significant operational and reputational risks," said Brady Cook, General Manager for Tandem. "Our goal with the release of Tandem Incident Management is to give our customers the tools they need to prepare for the inevitable and effectively manage incidents."

The title for Best IT/Technology Company in Lubbock, Texas goes to CoNetrix for the third consecutive year. Multiple companies around the Lubbock area vied for KCBD's Best of the West designation. Viewers of KCBD News Channel 11 cast their votes through kcbd.com, selecting their favorite company in each Best of the West category.

Well, maybe it used to be the question, but it is no longer a question to be asked. Scanning your network is an essential part of your security protocol to ensure that customer information is secured. So, since I need to scan my systems for vulnerabilities, where do I start?There are many good products on the market to test for system vulnerabilities. The best method is to review different products and decide which product will take care of your needs. Not only does the product need to give you information on what vulnerabilities exist on your network, but it also needs to provide you with reporting that is easy for you to read and understand. A report is only good if you can take the information and make decisions on how to remediate the findings that it observes.You may be thinking, I do not have the expertise to conduct these scans and read the reports, so what do I do now? This is where you will have to rely on a network vendor or third party to conduct your scanning. You also need to ensure you have a contract and have conducted your due diligence with this vendor because they will need an administrative account on your network to perform an administrative vulnerability scan. User accounts can be used to scan the systems but will not give you a full representation of all your vulnerabilities. The goal is to mitigate as many vulnerabilities as possible, and a good administrative scan will help you reach this goal.Now that I have all this information, what do I do? REMEDIATE and DOCUMENT. Yes, those two words you always love to hear that strike fear in the hearts of man. Most, if not all, scanning software will rate the criticality of each vulnerability that is found on the network. Always start with the most critical and work your way down the list. Findings will require a knowledge of the systems you are running and an understanding of how to remediate the vulnerability. If you do not have the expertise to take care of these issues, a network vendor will need to be used at this point. Some findings require changes in Active Directory, registry settings, or Group Policy. When changing these settings, making the wrong move can cause tremendous damage to your network. If one of these settings needs to be changed, it is always a good practice to change the setting for one computer and test the change to ensure it does not cause issues with existing applications.Sometimes settings cannot be changed due to the harm it causes in the system. If this is the case, document, document, document. Documentation needs to be completed that reveals the issue when you will resolve the issue, how the issue was resolved, and then verify that the issue was resolved.Verification of the resolution is a critical part of the process. If a change is made in Active Directory, how do I know that the change has happened? If there is a change in Group Policy, how do I know if it has propagated to all the systems with the vulnerability? There are multiple ways to verify different vulnerabilities have been remediated, but the best way is to rerun a scan against the system.So how often do I need to run this scan? The frequency of the scan will be determined by your risk assessment and the size and complexity of your system. Sound familiar? Sounds like a statement that may come from your regulator or through guidance, doesn't it? If my system is not that complex, I would not have to scan frequently, but if it is complex, open to the outside world, and includes multiple users, I would need to scan more frequently.New vulnerabilities are being developed all the time, and a system that is scanned and is secure one day may be the target of a new vulnerability the next day. When you are between scans, be sure and keep yourself aware of any new vulnerabilities that may arise, especially those vulnerabilities that target your systems. Keep up to date by receiving emails from publications, vendors, and regulators, and attending webinars and seminars that deal with information technology. Sound like a full-time job? It is!So, to scan or not to scan can never be the question again.

CoNetrix has been selected as the best large employer to work for in Lubbock, TX. Other notable finalists for the award included Tyler Technologies and the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center. CoNetrix was also selected for the 3rd year in a row as the Best Business Computer Technology Company and the Best Computer/IT Services company.