Blog - Page 43 of 125

How to Fix the Most Common Printer Problems

fix printer, Ophtek, Printer Security, printer vulnerability, PrintersOphtek, printer, Printer fixesOphtek, LLC

Nov 2020

Times may change, but the humble printer is still an important tool in business. But, as with all technology, printers can fail and need repairing.

Luckily, some of the most common printer problems can be fixed without the help of a technician. However, understanding how to fix these problems is crucial to your success. And humans don’t come pre-programmed with a list of printer malfunction solutions. But, thankfully, you can learn how to solve these printer problems relatively quickly.

All you have to do is take a quick look at our guide on how to fix the most common printer problems.

Fixing Your Printer

It’s always frustrating when you hit the print button and your printer does nothing. The accompanying red error light serves only to compound this frustration. But you don’t need to remain frustrated for long. Some of the simplest solutions can be found below:

Paper Jams: There’s nothing worse than the sound of paper scrunching up in a printer. It’s even worse when you’re trying to print something urgently. We’re all familiar with having to carefully remove sheets of jammed paper from printers, but you can do a lot to avoid it in the first place. Start by making sure that your paper tray is not overfilled, in fact, try to always under fill its capacity by 5 – 10%. It’s also vital that your stack of paper is carefully squared as it’s put into the tray, loose sheets can soon cause havoc.

Slow Printing Speeds: A printer which churns out pages at the speed of a sloth is a cause for concern. But it’s a problem you should be able to fix quickly. If you’re printing wirelessly then try moving closer to your router. It’s also possible that your printer simply isn’t able to meet your productivity needs, especially if you’re working with an older printer. However, by printing in draft mode you will be able to speed up the printing process until you have a new printer.

Streaks and Lines on Printouts: It’s irritating when you print out a document only to find that it’s covered in streaks and lines. You want your document to look its best and not like something printed in the 1970s. The most common reason for these defects is down to a blocked print head. Luckily, many modern printers have an in-built ‘head cleaner’ function which can quickly be activated. Just check your printer manual for the best advice on cleaning the head.

Printer Not Connecting to WiFi: The magic of WiFi has meant that wireless printing has never been easier. But when your printer fails to connect it’s enough to make you scream. You don’t have to fret too much though. Firstly, make sure your printer is within range of your router. Secondly, try resetting your devices in order to bring them back online. And, finally, check that your printer drivers are fully up to date. This strategy gives you the best change of solving any connectivity issues.

Not every printer problem can be solved in-house, otherwise there would be no need for technicians. Nonetheless, the advice above should prove invaluable in fixing the most common printer problems.

For more ways to secure and optimize your business technology, contact your local IT professionals.

Understanding the Basics of Botnet Attacks

botnets, Hackers, Online Security, Ophtek, PC Maintenance, Security, Updatesbotnets, Ophtek, security, updates, vulnerabilityOphtek, LLC

Nov 2020

The internet has connected us to each other in a way we would have thought impossible a few decades ago. But these massed connections can be very dangerous.

The beauty of the internet is that one PC can connect to another PC with relative ease. And these connections allow us to pool resources, share information and provide services. The foundations of almost every web service are based upon collections of PCs all working together to deliver an end result. These are often automated tasks that allow a website to continue operating correctly. But the fact that these PCs are generally left to their own devices means they aren’t actively monitored. And this situation makes them a security risk.

Known as botnets, these collections of PCs can have their cumulative power put to use for the gains of hackers.

What are Botnet Attacks?

While most botnets combine harmless coding with hardware, malicious botnets are another matter. A malicious botnet can gain access to your PC via two methods:

A targeted attack such as an infected email or password breach
The discovery of a vulnerability in your PC by an automated code which crawls the internet in search of such weaknesses

Regardless of the strategy involved, the end result is the same: an infection which adds your PC to the hacker’s botnet. Naturally, the more PCs added to the botnet, the more powerful it is. And, with the infection in place, the hacker will have full control of your PC. This allows them to carry out the following tasks:

Spread across the rest of your organization’s PCs by executing malware in order to swell the numbers of the botnet
Loading fake adverts in your internet browser designed to trick you into providing financial details to malicious websites
Use the cumulative processing power of all the PCs in a botnet to carry out DDoS campaigns in order to take websites down
Generating spam emails to be automatically sent from your organization’s email server

How Can You Protect Against Botnets?

As you can tell, a botnet attack will do your organization no favors and will cause untold damage to other businesses it targets. Therefore, you need to put these precautions into place:

Make sure that your internet traffic is monitored in terms of both what is entering and leaving your network. Any unusual levels of internet traffic are often an indicator that a botnet is either attacking you or you have become part of a botnet.
Install all updates to prevent falling victim to any vulnerabilities. Hackers regularly unleash web crawling bots that automatically scan online PCs for these vulnerabilities. With all updates in place, however, you are minimizing this risk.
Practice best email security practices such as not opening attachments that look suspicious or from senders you don’t recognize. Remember, all it takes is one infected email to bring your organization to a halt.
Use internet security software to help protect your PC as comprehensively as possible. Tools such as Kaspersky and McAfee’s security suites can provide warnings against visiting malicious websites and infected email attachments – two sure-fire ways of falling victim to a botnet.

For more ways to secure and optimize your business technology, contact your local IT professionals.

The Malware That Cannot Be Deleted

Kaspersky, malware, Ophtek, Security, Trojansmalware, Ophtek, security, trojanOphtek, LLC

Oct 2020

Removing malware threats from your PC is the simplest way to keep it safe from the attentions of hackers. But what happens when you can’t delete it?

Anti-malware software is fantastic at providing you with a means of removing malware from a PC. It can quickly scan your PC for threats and delete them with the minimum of fuss. But the ease with which malware can be removed has provided hackers with an appetizing challenge. What if they could create a strain of malware which couldn’t be deleted? It’s been the holy grail for malware developers since the first virus was created. And it’s a quest which has now been achieved.

A form of malware that cannot be deleted presents many problems for PC users, so let’s take a look at what it consists of.

The Invincible Malware

The unnamed malware was recently discovered by security giants Kaspersky and has left even them scratching their heads at its origin and construction. What they do know is that it’s a highly persistent threat and one that has been designed to resist deletion. It succeeds with this strategy as, rather than targeting a PC’s hard drive, it focuses its attack on a PCs motherboard. In particular, this new malware targets PC’s Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI). The approach of exploiting the UEFI is novel as it is involved in booting up a PC. Therefore, it is separate from your hard drive and will remain untouched by any operating system reinstalls.

Once the UEFI malware is in place it acts much like any conventional malware. Its first task is to create a Trojan file in the Startup folder under the name of IntelUpdate.exe. Without some in-depth investigation, the average PC user is unlikely to know this is even present. But even if it is noticed, and a user decides to delete it, the IntelUpdate app will simply reinstall once the PC is rebooted. And it’s an app which will cause your PC further troubles. IntelUpdate will not only install further malware, but it will spy on your PC activity and transmit data and files back to a command and control server which appears to be located in China.

How Do You Defeat the Undeletable?

The prospect of a malware strain which cannot be deleted may leave you wondering how you can ever be protected from it. Thankfully, it can be deleted, but not by conventional means. Security tools are now available from firms such as Kaspersky and Microsoft which scan firmware on PCs. It’s recommended that you upgrade your anti-malware tools to include this option to counter this new attack strategy. The means by which this latest malware is spread is currently unknown, but it’s recommended that you follow these security tips to maximize your defenses:

· Install all updates and patches as soon as your PC prompts you to do so · Practice vigilance when dealing with incoming emails which contain attachments and links · Make sure that your workforce understand how to create strong passwords

For more ways to secure and optimize your business technology, contact your local IT professionals.

How to Train a Non-Tech Employee to Use a PC

Non-Tech Employee, Ophtek, PC Training, Training TipsNon-Tech Employee, Ophtek, PC Training, Training TipsOphtek, LLC

Oct 2020

We take it for granted that every employee knows how to use a PC, but this isn’t always the case. Particularly if it’s a non-tech employee.

As our workplaces and industries have become more computerized, the need for PCs has increased. And this need is one which has spread to almost every corner of the workplace. Therefore, employees that haven’t previously needed to use a PC are now being asked to use one. For example, warehouse staff and engineers may now need to detail their workload digitally for other departments to access it quickly. However, for this to be achieved effectively, these new PC users need to learn how to use a PC.

This may sound like a mountain to climb, but if you know how to train them correctly then it becomes much easier.

Training Tips for Non-Tech Employees

Everyone learns at a different pace and responds to different techniques, but the following tips should help you get everyone off to a good start:

Don’t Get Technical: As with all forms of learning, it’s best to keep things as simple as possible. An employee who is new to using a PC doesn’t, for example, need to understand the importance of BIOS in the startup process – all they need to know that this is how the PC begins to access Windows. The complex and technical nature of the workings of a PC will be like a foreign language to new users, so it’s crucial you don’t make the learning process intimidating.
Start with the Mouse: The mouse is the most commonly used tool on a workplace PC and it’s important you start your training with this. Your employee will need to learn how to navigate around the PC and, from the very start, this will involve the mouse. It may seem intuitive and natural – for us – to know when to left click, right click and double click, but to a beginner this is a world of uncertainty. Once they are trained into how they use a mouse they have the tools to start moving forwards.
Provide Demonstrations: It may be possible, in theory, to learn how to use a PC from written materials, but we all know how hands-on a PC is. And that’s why you will need to ensure that all training involves a demonstration. With a trainer on hand to, for example, demonstrate the basics of updating a spreadsheet, your trainee will feel more confident in completing this task themselves and be able to ask questions.
Do Not Overload on Training: You can’t teach an employee all they need to know about using a PC in one session. There’s simply too much. And, in fact, too much learning at once is detrimental when it comes to learning new skills. Thankfully, it’s unlikely that your employee will be going straight from paper-based working to using a PC. There will be a transition period and it’s vital that you schedule training sessions that are light, yet regular to help embed them into their new work environment.

For more ways to secure and optimize your business technology, contact your local IT professionals.

Zerologon is the Latest Microsoft Vulnerability

Ophtek, patches, PC Security, Windows vulnerability, ZerologonOphtek, patches, security, vulnerability, ZerologonOphtek, LLC

Oct 2020

Microsoft may be one of the leading names in PC technology, but hackers have recently exposed their Zerologon vulnerability.

A vulnerability is a flaw within a PC which can be exploited and used to gain access to the PC in question. These vulnerabilities can be found in both software and hardware, so pretty much everything on your PC is at risk. Thankfully, the majority of your PC’s apps and components will be secure. But PCs are complex pieces of machinery. The sheer amount of coding involved means that it’s inevitable that mistakes will be made and gaps not plugged. And this is what hackers spend half their lives looking for.

Protecting your PCs is a crucial part of any organization’s security, so we’re going to take a closer look at the Zerologon vulnerability.

What is Zerologon?

Zerologon is not an app or piece of hardware that you will find in your PC, it’s simply the name that has been assigned to this new vulnerability. To understand what the Zerologon flaw is would require degree-level knowledge of how PC software works. But we can describe it in layman’s terms. If a PC is logging on to a specific type of server – one that uses NT LAN Manager – then it performs a specific logon process. But where part of the code behind this logon should contain a random number it actually contains four zeros. And it’s these four zeros that give the vulnerability its name.

How is Zerologon Exploited?

Hackers can exploit the Zerologon flaw within seconds as the number of encryption keys needed to decipher the four zero text is relatively small. With access to a PC account secured, the hacker is then able to begin changing passwords within the network. It’s a strategy which, as well as being quick, also grants full control of the PC. This means that a hacker with unauthorized access has the potential to start injecting malware – such as ransomware – onto the network. And this is where your problems will really begin.

Can You Patch Zerologon?

The good news is that Microsoft has quickly released a patch to address the Zerologon vulnerability. Installing this patch should be labeled a priority to protect your organization’s network. The average time taken on install a patch is between 60 – 150 days which is far too slow. All it takes to install the Zerologon patch is a few seconds, so there are few excuses for delaying it. The best rule of thumb, when it comes to patches, is to install them immediately to nullify any threats.

Final Thoughts

As long as software and hardware is being designed then there will be flaws in their build. Designers are only human and mistakes will happen. Vulnerabilities may be inevitable, but your networks don’t need to fall foul of them. While a PC user will be the last party to know about the emergence of a threat such as Zerologon, they can help their case by installing any patches as soon as possible.

For more ways to secure and optimize your business technology, contact your local IT professionals.

« Previous 1 … 41 42 43 44 45 … 125 Next »