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SCW Blog

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.

What Makes Data So Invaluable to Businesses?

What Makes Data So Invaluable to Businesses?

Data is a critical asset for modern businesses, simply because it can be utilized to help improve an organization’s operations in a variety of ways. Let’s explore some of the various approaches you can take to leveraging the data you collect to add value to your business.

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What Counts as Personally Identifiable Information?

What Counts as Personally Identifiable Information?

We frequently discuss the importance of keeping PII—personally identifiable information—secure, but what does this include? What data qualifies as PII?

Here, we’re going to lock down on a definition (and you may be surprised by what this definition covers).

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Beyond Bitcoin: The Function of Blockchain Technology

Beyond Bitcoin: The Function of Blockchain Technology

Since its origins back in 1991, the blockchain has had one core purpose: to securely store data. The methods behind it are exclusive to it as well. Let’s explore the concept of the blockchain a little further to gain a better appreciation of what it has enabled.

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Your Network Has Been Breached. Now What?

Your Network Has Been Breached. Now What?

We like to focus our efforts on preventing data breaches and cybersecurity attacks, but it’s important to know what you should do if you do fall victim to such an attack. Let’s go over how you should respond to a data breach and what you must consider to come out on the successful side of it.

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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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Protecting Employee Data is Really Important

Protecting Employee Data is Really Important

Privacy for business means a lot more than protecting the data and personal information of clients. It also extends to just about all data collected by a business, including that of the employees. How can you go about protecting this data without also violating the privacy of your employees themselves?

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Helping You Understand What Informatics Are

Helping You Understand What Informatics Are

In the business world, the term “informatics” is generally used synonymously with computer science. While they are certainly quite similar, they are also quite different. What exactly does the field of informatics pertain to, and how can knowing this help your business prosper in the years to come?

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Tip of the Week: How to Engage Your Team in Security Training

Tip of the Week: How to Engage Your Team in Security Training

When it comes to your business’ security, your team members can either be your greatest vulnerability or your greatest strength. In order to ensure that the latter is the case, you need to make sure that they are all trained up in the proper security measures. For your convenience, we wanted to share a few tips to help make this training more effective.

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3 Ways Your Business Can Take Advantage of Artificial Intelligence

3 Ways Your Business Can Take Advantage of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence has taken the world by storm, and with recent improvements to automated technology and machine learning, it should be clear that this technology is not going anywhere anytime soon. With proper implementation, artificial intelligence can help your business cut costs, improve operations, and mitigate unnecessary or repetitive tasks, all of which compounds to create a smoother and more manageable workload for your employees.

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Debunking Over-Exaggerated and Overused IT Buzzwords

Debunking Over-Exaggerated and Overused IT Buzzwords

Have you ever listened to someone talk about something that they really have a good handle on? One of two things will happen. First, their language will be filled to bursting with buzzwords and jargon that—while they clearly know what it all means—is confusing for a layperson. We can be guilty of this ourselves, so we wanted to take a few moments to take the second option and discuss what they mean in more common terms… and, despite how others may use them, what they don’t.

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Trying to Secure Our Votes, Online

Trying to Secure Our Votes, Online

The 2020 election is months away and traces of it can be seen everywhere. As people quarrel about how social media is being used to interfere with the political process, there is pressure mounting on election officials and tech companies, alike, to do what they can to keep solicitation and corruption out of the ballot box. Let’s take a neutral view of the changes that some online platforms are making to the way that political information is shared.

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Data Lake or Data Warehouse... Which One’s for Your Business?

Data Lake or Data Warehouse... Which One’s for Your Business?

Big data, or massive data sets that can be used to make inferences and reveal patterns, has become an increasingly important part of modern business and can be leveraged in many different ways. There are a few different options for storing this data available, which the use case for the data will dictate. Here, we’ll evaluate whether a “data lake” or a “data warehouse” would better suit your needs.

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A Dive Into the US/Huawei Issues

A Dive Into the US/Huawei Issues

Huawei has found itself in an... interesting spot lately. Despite being the top telecom supplier in the world and second in phone manufacturing, many countries have banned the use of the Chinese company’s networking equipment. This is primarily due to the close ties Huawei has with China’s government, and the potential spying Huawei could do.

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Google Now Plays Nice with Microsoft Office

Google Now Plays Nice with Microsoft Office

For some time now, businesses have more or less had to choose between utilizing solutions provided by Google, or those that Microsoft has developed - exclusively. This was because these solutions offered no real inter-compatibility… until now, at least, as Google now allows users to edit Microsoft Office files in Google Docs.

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Intro to Your Tech: Digital Twin

Intro to Your Tech: Digital Twin

It’s a scene familiar from many science fiction movies: a simulation pulled up on a screen, the effects of some proposed action being predicted and demonstrated, telling the heroes that their plan just might work. As it happens, this kind of process is no longer relegated to the sci-fi genre, and is used practically in many industries. Here, we’ll discuss the phenomenon of the digital twin.

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Intro to Your Tech: Protocol

Intro to Your Tech: Protocol

Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol. File Transfer Protocol. Internet Message Access Protocol. Post Office Protocol. While it may not be outwardly apparent, we certainly rely on quite a few protocols in order to use our computers and more directly, the Internet, as we do. Today, we’ll introduce you to what a protocol actually is.

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