Technology Advisor Blog

Picture this: Your business has assigned you a new license that includes sharing documents with one another, the platform being used that you may be unfamiliar with is SharePoint.
For those new to the full-time workforce or even those that have been using the same applications for years, you may ask yourself; “I know of SharePoint, but I don’t know how to fully explain it to someone else. What is it?” This blog will be a perfect starting point for you and even have some fun tips n’ tricks thrown in you may not have known about! As someone new to the Cybersecurity Industry and a beginner, turning novice, with Microsoft, I learned something new. When I learn something new, my intent is to pass along information I believe will be informative and helpful for other individuals.

Introduction-Basics

To start off, what exactly is SharePoint? SharePoint is a web application; part of Microsoft 365 Suite launched in 2001. The web application is used for building a controlled network open to communications within your team to share, manage files and important documents. There are a variety of ways you can approach SharePoint, such as sharing, uploading files, collaborating with your team or organization, creating a custom team site, various communications, creating smooth workflow operations, custom keyboard navigation shortcuts, and so much more for discovering content. At Ekaru, our team specializes in helping you navigate through Microsoft applications with clear and concise information to apply and digest. Let’s take a look at the key components for a general understanding!

Starting SharePoint-Key Feature Components:

Sites: The landing page of a website, or in this case your home team page to meet up and communicate.
Document Libraries: The ground-zero to store and manage all files
Lists: Location for various spreadsheets to manage your team’s data. Such as inventory, tasks, contacts, project management, etc.
Pages: Content pages sharing information, embed videos, documents and more. I like to call this one the airdrop but for Microsoft.
Web Parts: Building blocks of pages
Permissions: The control room where you can apply who has access or restrictions to documents.
Integration: As SharePoint is part of a larger licensing application, SharePoint works seamlessly with Microsoft apps like Word, Excel, Teams, PowerPoint, and more.

Now that the basics are covered, lets transition to merging documents outside of Microsoft for teams to implement and utilize effectively.

Source: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-with-sharepoint-909ec2f0-05c8-4e92-8ad3-3f8b0b6cf261

Tips to Merge Outside Documents Into SharePoint

As we begin a new month, cybersecurity trends continue to evolve, keeping us in the industry on our toes.
Today’s world of cybersecurity, cybercriminals and hackers use tactical, socially engineered techniques, targeting large and small businesses in stealing their personal information at an alarming rate. At Ekaru, we have seen businesses become targets for these attacks and have provided them with tools to identify their approach and react accordingly to a variety of scenarios. Our goal is to have businesses acquire the resources they need to be aware of cybersecurity, while also being your helpful ally in an unprecedented evolving geopolitical climate a phone call or email away.

The Ekaru team does not slow down in the summertime, we continue by providing local businesses with our specialized skills in cybersecurity to ensure your business has the best tools and security practices in place to protect your team and its assets. We mentioned in a previous blog post that cyber criminals will target travelers when they are away from their desks, especially in the quieter months for work and PTO.
To target travelers with social engineering, scammers will try anything to cause a strong emotional reaction that leads you to making a quick, flustered decision.
How are they doing this now and in the summer, you may ask; cyber criminals are creating hyper realistic sophisticated scams through targeted social media ads and email promotions with too good to be true vacation prices. The goal for them is to create a sense of escapism, love the idea of a trip that you cannot give up on, and all at a fair price that makes you want to impulsively take your credit card and proceed, without taking a moment to be skeptical.
In these scenarios, how you react may either omit safety or have you flustered for falling for a scam. Either way, we are here to help and provide you with awareness, you, your team, friends and family will appreciate.

When it comes to establishing your business on a social media platform, a lot of teamwork and insight goes into its strategy. These calculations apply to tone, values, visuals, color, and messaging to find the right audience to interact with your content. What’s also important in maintaining social media is the security of general accounts and who monitors activity across these accounts. In the case of our social media presence at Ekaru, a small business MSP specializing in cybersecurity located within the outer metropolitan area of Boston serving small to medium sized clients. Our values are to be friendly, helpful, insightful, provide knowledgeable articles that align, bring up conversations surrounding awareness of good and bad cybersecurity practices to learn from. Along with cybersecurity practices to implement within your business, questions you may ask yourself are ‘how can I maintain a healthy social media presence that can apply for my business and self?

Penetration testing (or pen testing for short) is a proactive way to protect your business from cyberattacks. It simulates real-world attacks to identify vulnerabilities before cybercriminals can exploit them. For small businesses, often working with limited security resources, pen testing is a critical tool to uncover hidden risks, meet compliance requirements, and strengthen defenses.

Your business data and customer information need strong protection to maintain trust and meet compliance standards. Modern automated tools make professional security testing both accessible and cost-effective for smaller companies. Through regular testing, you can build a clear roadmap to strengthen your defenses and stay ahead of emerging threats.

It’s Summertime!!! You know what that means, our accumulated PTO is finally put to use to enjoy the outdoors and travel. For some, people travel is local, while others travel internationally for an adventure like no other. While traveling, your cellphone is your most prized possession, capturing memories, laughs and a focal point into monitoring your social media and other necessities.

Although many of us have learned how to recognize scams, bad actors remain persistent and continue to send various fraudulent messages to our devices. Most of the time, they don’t care if the scam attempts are obvious or sophisticated, their main intention is to fatigue you to the point of becoming flustered and making a rushed decision to trick you. Some scams are isolated incidents, some are nationally present happening to your friends, family and coworkers.

Over the weekend, I received a text message on my personal cell phone from a ‘First Name-Last Name-###@RandomOrganization.org’. 
The first thing I noticed right away was how detailed, long, and grammatically formatted the text was upon viewing. Usually, a lot of scam messages feel urgent. They’re trying to create an emotional response, utilizing that heightened state to influence victims to their CTA of malicious links. Mimicking an automated promotional SMS message businesses provide for their patrons that sign up to receive a discount. Seeing the message’s length, it is possible it can come off as legit before reading the contents within.
The second factor I noticed was the message coming from a random organization, stated within the message that they were from the Massachusetts Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). These two did not match and that was my first indicator that this was a smishing attempt using the DMV to take aback trick anyone receiving the message. While I may have known the first indicators as someone new to cybersecurity but practices good cybersecurity hygiene, let’s continue the remaining text to dissect how to further identify this smishing attempt.

Before social media and the responsibility of maintaining multiple accounts, folks tended to keep their passwords written down on paper, stored in what they considered a safe place, or saved into their phone. These are dangerous cybersecurity risks being practiced and they need to be addressed promptly.
The problem is passwords are often weak, reused or exposed in personal data breaches that are out of your control. In the last decade, we have been introduced to Password Managers and following right after, Multi-Factor Authentications (MFA). Both provide thorough measures to protect users’ information and safety. As an effect, this shield has caused bad actors to get creative and find other tactics to infiltrate your systems.
We’re going to go over what MFA is and why it matters to implement for your small business and in personal life or really, anywhere it’s available!

Before AI consumed our media on a daily basis, spoofing would often impersonate important figures in our lives with the malicious intent of sending misinformation for money and spreading malware. Now with AI, it has become even harder to identify these attempts to protect our friends and loved ones from the headache known as cybercrime.

How hackers use AI for phishing attacks has become more advanced, making standard email security measures inadequate for protection. Modern cybercriminals leverage artificial intelligence to create convincing emails with flawless grammar, personal details from social media, and context-aware content that can deceive your most alert employees.  No more language barriers in cyber crime!