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SCW has been serving the Spokane Valley area since 1997, providing IT Support such as helpdesk support, computer support, and technical consulting to small and medium-sized businesses.

Sam is a network engineer with a broad range of experience spanning more than 35 years. He wrote is first piece of code in 1979 and has been involved with the industry ever since. For the last 20 years, he has worked for SCW Consulting where he has embraced his passion for network technology and security.

Just Because You’re Sick of Ransomware Doesn’t Mean It’s Gone Away

Just Because You’re Sick of Ransomware Doesn’t Mean It’s Gone Away

Ransomware is perhaps one of the most difficult types of malware to handle, and it has enabled cyber-extortion to flourish over the past several years. As a business owner, you need to know what ransomware is, how it should be addressed, and how to protect against it.

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Has a Return to the Office Led to Some Employees Leaving Permanently?

Has a Return to the Office Led to Some Employees Leaving Permanently?

The past few years have seen major shifts in the workforce, and not the kind that employers ever want to see. More people than any other time have willingly left their places of work, with social media hashtags like “#quittingmyjob” and “#quitmyjob” getting hundreds of millions of views. Let’s consider why this is, and what you can do to keep your employees engaged  

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3 Tips for Choosing the Right Office Technology

3 Tips for Choosing the Right Office Technology

Getting the right technology for your business can be confusing and downright frustrating if you don’t know what you are looking for. After all, technology is supposed to make life easier and keep your business more efficient and organized. With so many rapidly evolving technologies now available, it can be hard to choose which to deploy inside your business. Today, we’ll go through three tips that can help you identify and deploy the technology that will work for you.

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3 Ways You Can Boost Your Router’s Security

3 Ways You Can Boost Your Router’s Security

Your wireless routers do a lot of heavy lifting, and give a lot of devices access to the rest of your network. Protecting your personal and business data is extremely important, and if you can secure your router it can go a long way toward tightening up your network’s security. Let’s take a look at a couple of practices that work to keep your wireless Internet secure.

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Is Cloud Computing a Decent Option for the Cash-Strapped Business?

Is Cloud Computing a Decent Option for the Cash-Strapped Business?

Exploring how to fuel your business’ data needs typically comes down to whether or not you have the outstanding capital to purchase and manage your own IT infrastructure or if you are looking to utilize utility computing in the cloud to facilitate all of your business’ IT needs. This week, we thought we’d briefly discuss the pros and cons of cloud computing for your business and how much money, if any, moving to the cloud can save you.

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Avoiding Downtime Can Help You Avoid Serious Costs

Avoiding Downtime Can Help You Avoid Serious Costs

Downtime is often associated with losing power or an Internet connection, but in reality, it’s far more than just that. It’s any situation where your team cannot perform their duties as expected, and it can be extremely costly if it’s not addressed. Here are some ways you can address these situations.

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Using Smartphones For More than Instagram

Using Smartphones For More than Instagram

People on average spend nearly 3-to-5 hours of their day on their phones. Today’s smartphones are not only one of the coolest pieces of technology ever invented, it legitimately could be one of the most useful devices any person could use for business; if they are willing to use it that way. Today, we will establish what smartphones are mostly used for and how to readjust your smartphone usage to be your most productive. 

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How Popular Culture has Influenced Our Technology

How Popular Culture has Influenced Our Technology

It isn’t unheard of for popular culture to blur the line between fiction and reality, the imaginations of the past becoming the everyday items that surround us today. Let’s consider a few technologies that first appeared in popular culture before eventually becoming mainstream.

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Tips to Improve Your Microsoft Teams Usage

Tips to Improve Your Microsoft Teams Usage

Collaboration platforms are all the rage these days, and one of the more notable choices out there is Microsoft Teams. With any collaboration software, there will be best practices that you can use to get the most out of it, and Teams is no exception to this rule. Let’s go over how you can use Teams to the best of your ability.

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Tip of the Week: How to Secure Your Business’ Credit Card Transactions

Tip of the Week: How to Secure Your Business’ Credit Card Transactions

A major concern for your business is protecting the credit card data you collect from your customers and clients, but you also need to ensure that the company credit card you use to make purchases is secure. Here are some tips, tricks, and best practices you can use to keep this incredibly important asset safe and secure.

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The Main Differences Between Hollywood Hackers and the Real Deal

The Main Differences Between Hollywood Hackers and the Real Deal

Technology drives almost everything in modern society, so it’s not a surprise to see hackers being represented in the entertainment we consume. They don’t always get it right, however. In fact, most of the computing constructs demonstrated in entertainment don’t actually exist in real life. This week, we thought we’d briefly discuss the differences between hackers in real life and the ones consistently represented in today’s movies and TV.

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Tip of the Week: 5 Tips to Help You Keep Your Computer in Good Shape

Tip of the Week: 5 Tips to Help You Keep Your Computer in Good Shape

The modern computer is a marvel, but they can be quite the investment. It stands to reason that when you purchase new hardware—whether it be for yourself or your business—that you should want it to last as long as possible. For this week’s tip, we wanted to go through five things you can do to protect your computer from wear and tear. 

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Changes to Healthcare Technology Improving Care and Data Privacy

Changes to Healthcare Technology Improving Care and Data Privacy

For years you’ve heard how technology is becoming a bigger part of the healthcare delivery system and how it can help stabilize costs, provide increased access, and further personalize care delivery. As these innovations have been taking hold it has brought up serious questions about data privacy. Today, we’ll take a look at some of the changes IT has brought to healthcare and what it means for patient data privacy. 

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Finding the Right IT is Finding Its Purpose

Finding the Right IT is Finding Its Purpose

When you implement a new technology solution, you usually do so with the intent of solving some kind of problem your organization is experiencing. Therefore, as your business should be using technology to move forward and make progress toward your goals; any technology you implement that does not move your business forward can be seen as an impediment to its success.

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Tip of the Week: Typing Through Dictation

Tip of the Week: Typing Through Dictation

Sometimes the last thing you want to do is type on your keyboard, especially if you have already been doing it just about all day. In cases like this, you can give your fingers a break and use Microsoft Word’s dictation features to “write” by speaking into your device’s microphone. Let’s go over how you can use this feature on a desktop, your web browser, and even your mobile device.

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Are Passwords an Effective Security Measure? Were They Ever?

Are Passwords an Effective Security Measure? Were They Ever?

Passwords have been front-and-center for data security since 1960, but even their creator–MIT researcher Fernando Corbató–doesn’t think he should take full credit passwords. In fact, if you brought this up to the researchers who did create them, they would tell you that the security concerns for their time were much more limited.

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What Might Cyberattacks Look Like in the Future?

What Might Cyberattacks Look Like in the Future?

Cybersecurity is anything but a new concept, and if recent and current events are any indication, the concept isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Let’s take a few moments to consider some of the bigger threats currently out there, and how they will influence the threats we see going forward from here.

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Tip of the Week: Switching Your Default Android Browser

Tip of the Week: Switching Your Default Android Browser

Chances are that, if you are a user of an Android device, you prefer Google Chrome as your mobile web browser. However, did you know that you can change your default web browser to a different one? All you have to do is know which browsers are available to use; then all it takes is a quick settings adjustment!

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How to Create a Shared Network by Mapping Network Drives

How to Create a Shared Network by Mapping Network Drives

A shared network is not a new concept in the business world. These shared networks give all computers connected to them access to a centralized file and drive infrastructure where documents can be accessed. Your IT department has likely already set one of these up for your organization, but we thought a short guide on how to map a network on your personal device might be helpful.

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Can Zero-Day Threats Actually Make Chrome More Secure?

Can Zero-Day Threats Actually Make Chrome More Secure?

Google Chrome is a widely used and popular web browser, and because of its popularity, it is a common target for hackers. A recent study showcases how there are more zero-day threats being discovered for Google Chrome, but don’t despair; it might not be a bad thing for your favorite web browser. Instead, it could signify exactly the opposite.

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