Go West 10 Year

Go West IT started business ten years ago today. I remember the day very well. The similarities between then and now are striking. We were faced with many unknowns. We watched cashflow very closely. We innovated and adapted quickly. Most importantly, we focused on taking care of customers and employees. We knew there would be challenges and we knew we would rise […]

Go West 10 Year

Businesses are rapidly shifting to work from home strategies in response to the current COVID-19 situation.  Many are already adept at working from home and have strategies in place to protect networks, endpoints, and systems.  They have proven policies in place to keep tabs on business IT assets and ensure that systems are constantly patched […]

Third party VPN services do not secure your data.  They may provide an additional brick in your security bunker but they are not the invisibility cloak they claim to be and in some cases they may actually do more harm than good.  For starters, who is your third party VPN service provider?  Are they trustworthy?  […]

Today the FBI issued a renewed Public Service Announcement (PSA) warning to businesses regarding cyber crime, and more specifically ransomware risk.  If you are not taking action, you are going backward.  All businesses should be regularly reviewing their cybersecurity posture and seeking to make incremental improvements.  Start making improvements today and use the FBI’s PSA […]

My tour of the @Microsoft Cyber Defense Operations Center (CDOC) this week was the highlight of my visit to the Microsoft campus in Redmond, WA.  I was one of approximately 150 Microsoft partners invited to attend a small & medium sized business (SMB) partner executive briefing.   The briefing provided @GoWestIT with a valuable road map […]

Do you remember when Windows XP reached the end of its support lifecycle? We sure do, and it’s about to happen again with Windows 7 and Server 2008. Microsoft supports their operating systems for a minimum of 10 years following public release, after which, they pick a date to end all security updates for good. […]

I’m often contacted by CEOs or managers after a business experiences a cyber incident that results in real damages. After describing the event, they often ask if they should fire an employee who fell victim to a social engineering attack (vishing, phishing, credential harvesting…).  In most cases the answer is a resounding NO! First, the business just […]

I really hate hearing from customers and prospective customers that we were right and that they wish they had taken our advice to harden their systems and implement tighter security controls before their breach. Feedback from customers suggests the inconvenience of implementing additional controls is often what keeps them from taking action as opposed to the […]

Your credentials can be phished, period.  If you think you’re above being phished, you’re wrong.  We all have weak moments and the criminals are really good at praying on our whims and emotions.  Trust me, you can be phished.  Don’t put so much pressure on yourself.  Implement multi-factor authentication (MFA) wherever possible to protect your […]