Blue Ridge Technology

New Year’s Resolutions It may be hard to believe, but the year is over, and 2025 is here! As we jump into the next year, many of us are thinking through New Year’s resolutions at home: maybe this is the year to cut back, to get fit, to start saving, or to finally master that hobby or language. We aren’t much help when it comes to those kinds of resolutions. But as you’re taking stock at home, right now is the perfect time to think through your business. What’s going well? What goals did you achieve during the previous year? And what needs to change heading into the new year? To help get the ball rolling, here are 3 top business resolutions for the new year — changes that businesses like yours might benefit from making. #1: Cybersecurity Audit and Upgrades First up is making this the year that you conduct a cybersecurity audit — and implement any hardware/software upgrades or process changes revealed through the process. Small businesses get hit every single day by cyberattac...

Heads up: there’s another security threat that could be lurking around your business. And even though it’s almost Christmas, today we’re talking about the undead — undead accounts , that is. Keep reading to learn about zombie accounts: what they are, how they come to be, and how they could threaten your business. Zombie Accounts: What Are They? Zombie accounts are network accounts (login credentials) that are active in your systems but that don’t belong to any current user. We call them “zombie accounts” because they're, well, undead. Like TV zombies, they should be dead, but no one went and made sure they really were dead. And now these accounts are bumbling around your network, just waiting for some enterprising bad guy to come along, resuscitate them, and find a way to hurt your business. Why Are Zombie Accounts a Thing? So far these zombie accounts sound like bad news, and they are. So why do they exist at all? Well, there are lots of ways to end up with zombie accounts, but b...

These days, most of us are more flexible than we’ve ever been in how and where we work. As our devices have gotten smarter, faster, more connected, and more portable, it’s now possible to pull out a phone, tablet, or laptop just about anywhere and take care of business. If you do mobile work, then you should know about a fantastic new feature that Microsoft is finally bringing to Windows PCs: Handoff. The Trouble with Mobile Work It’s great that we can whip out any device and get started on work from anywhere. But we’ve all been in situations where we start a task on our phones (maybe something as simple as replying to an email) and then quickly realize that a mobile device isn’t going to cut it. So what happens when you start some business task on a mobile device, only to realize you need a full keyboard or some app that’s only on your work PC? Right now, if you’re like most mobile workers, you probably share the file, attach it to an email, open your PC, open your email, download the...

Microsoft has announced some major upcoming changes to the Windows Photos app in Windows 11. You might tend to think of that app as something for personal use (like organizing vacation photos), not a business tool. But with the updates coming soon to the app, it could be time to reconsider. If you work with photos at all in your workflows, even in seemingly small ways, Windows Photos might have something for you in the next update. Here’s what’s on the way. Biggest New Feature: Visual Search with Bing Microsoft is about to infuse its desktop photos app with the power of its Bing AI, giving you the ability to conduct what it calls Visual Searches. Visual Search looks like a version of something called a reverse image search, possibly with other enhancements as well. So what’s a reverse image search? It’s where you use an image you already have as the “search term”. Imagine going to Google.com or Bing.com to ask a question or search for “best ergonomic keyboard” — but instead of giving y...