Coleman Technologies Blog

In a society where getting over on other people is the quickest way to the top, people are constantly looking to take advantage of others. We create security systems for this purpose. Since every person’s identity is unique it is often used for authentication into these secure systems. Nowadays, with the advancement of biometric technology, many organizations are pushing the envelope and using unique physical identifiers as authorization methods, and it is causing problems with the security/privacy equilibrium most people favor. 

Biometrics Trending Up

Biometrics are being used everywhere from the digital security of mobile devices all the way to border security and identification. Biometrics include:

• Fingerprint identification
• Iris and retina scans
• Facial recognition
• Gait measurement
• DNA
• Handwriting recognition
• Voice recognition
• Brainwaves

...And more.

These technologies are used to effectively identify and authenticate people simply by pairing the information with existing database information. With this technology being more accessible due to falling prices, it is now being rolled out all over the world for a multitude of purposes. Across the world you can find biometrics being integrated into systems. The US FBI has a massive fingerprint database they use to help identify people. China’s Social Credit system is run on facial recognition. Businesses, like your bank, may be using your voice to authenticate who you are over the phone. With so much data being captured, and with the seemingly endless ways this technology can be used to secure almost anything, it turns out that it really isn’t securing much of anything.

The Illusion of Security

The immense scale of biometric data systems makes securing this extremely personal information nearly impossible. The question has to be asked: can a system be a human identification system and also work as an authentication system? It turns out that with all the challenges people use biometric security systems for, the only thing that it is truly good for is identifying who a person is. That’s not to say that systems can’t work in small doses, but a main problem with these systems is that the information captured--the data that is being used for the security of these physical and virtual systems--has to be saved somewhere. Moreover, with organizations mining data left and right, this very private and extremely sensitive data ends up as just another piece of data captured by corporate entities looking to turn it into a quick buck.

If that doesn’t scare you, consider that organizations and governments possessing this data and losing it to hackers, who much like these massive corporate entities, will be using it to gain a monetary advantage. Losing your identity to a hacker is a traumatic experience, but with these biometric systems, it takes on a whole new meaning. Even scarier yet is that artificial intelligence has been proven to compromise biometric indicators, leaving biometrically-protected systems accessible without physical authentication. 

A Complete Lack of Privacy

We touched on this a little above, but the lack of privacy that a biometric reliant system would provide the individual would be frightening. You see, the biometric security system isn’t designed to allow for invasions of privacy, but because this technology is just in its infancy, and organizations are using it in ways that it may not be designed for, the minute a person puts his/her information into a biometric system, privacy is out. The production of the data, the way it is stored, the way it is compared to database data raise big concerns for the individual and his/her privacy.

Additionally, with changes to physiology, these biometric systems have to have some deviation built in. This poses a lot of questions about what is secure and what isn’t. These systems are definitely state-of-the-art, but if you compare the effectiveness of the security to the systems that we’ve been using (Passwords, PIN, Two-factor authentication), it’s hard to say that these advanced biometric systems are any better at keeping data or infrastructure secure. 

Biometrics are definitely here to stay, but before you implement a biometric security system into your business, call the professionals at Coleman Technologies to discuss the benefits and detriments of doing so; and, the strategies where biometrics will excel. Call us at (604) 513-9428 today.

Today, there is a shift in the ways that people are entering a contract. Using blockchain technology, businesses are using the technology to solidify their contracts, reduce process conflict, and save time. Blockchain offers faster, cheaper, and more efficient options in which to enter a binding agreement with someone. Let’s take a look at how companies are going about using smart contracts.

What is a Smart Contract?

To understand how a smart contract works, you first need to understand how it is smart. Smart contracts are designed to work on clearly defined and conditional principles that work to resolve ownership only after those conditions are agreed upon. Think about it this way, you have a product that you want to sell, but the buyer can only pay over time. You agree to hand over the product under the condition that the buyer pays four equal payments. After the third payment is made, the buyer doesn’t send another payment. It will be evident to the buyer, the seller, and any intermediary or arbiter that not all the conditions of the contract have been met because each action made by either party creates an individual block in the blockchain; and, that information is not only encrypted, it is completely transparent. This means that it can be seen by all parties involved because the information is stored on every system that is in on the contract. 

Why Would You Want to Use a Smart Contract?

The most advantageous part of the smart contract as compared to normal contracts is the speed in which agreements can be completed, but there are almost an endless number of superlatives when compared to traditional contracts. They include:

1. Accuracy - One of the best features of a smart contract is that it records all of the information that needs to be known in explicit detail. 
2. Communication clarity - The explicit nature of the smart contract leaves no room for miscommunication, removing much of the liability, and cutting down on inefficiency that comes as a result of misinterpretation.
3. Transparency - All relevant parties would have a fully visible set of the terms and conditions set forth in the contract.
4. Security - Smart contracts use the highest level of encryption available. 
5. Redundancy - Smart contracts save every transaction in explicit detail. If data were to be lost, it is easily retrievable. 
6. Trustworthy - Since smart contracts are made with some of the most secure, transparent, and reliable tools available, there is no room for outside manipulation and error. 

Where Will You Find Smart Contracts? 

These contracts will be found in some of the most important transactions humans undertake. Some of the industries you may find smart contracts popping up in include banking, insurance, healthcare, and real estate. In fact, anywhere you find the need for a lawyer, you may only need the use of a distributed smart contract.

Emerging technologies are changing the way people do business. For more information about blockchain or smart contracts, subscribe to our newsletter and visit us at www.colemantechnologies.com.

Bandwidth Defined

Bandwidth is one of those terms that you think you understand until you try to explain it to someone else. Basically, bandwidth is how fast data can be transferred through a medium. In the case of the Internet, millions of bits need to be transferred from the web to network attached devices every second. The more bandwidth you have access to, the more data can be transferred. 

Speed vs Throughput

Network speed--that is, how fast you are able to send and receive data--is typically a combination of available bandwidth and a measure called latency. The higher a network’s latency, the slower the network is going to be, even on high-bandwidth network connections. Latency can come from many parts of the network connection: slow hardware, inefficient data packing, wireless connections, and others. 

Throughput is the measure of the amount of data that is transmitted through a connection. Also called payload rate, this is the effective ability for any data to be transmitted through a connection. So, while bandwidth is the presumed amount of data any connection can transfer, throughput is the amount of data that is actually transferred through the connection. The disparity in the two factors can come from several places, but typically the latency of the transmitting sources results in throughput being quite a bit less than the bandwidth. 

What Do You Need Bandwidth For?

The best way to describe this is to first consider how much data your business sends and receives. How many devices are transferring data? Is it just text files? Are there graphics and videos? Do you stream media? Do you host your website? Do you use any cloud-based platforms? Do you use video conferencing or any other hosted communications platform? All of these questions (and a few not mentioned) have to be asked so that your business can operate as intended. 

First, you need to calculate how many devices will connect to your network at the same time. Next, you need to consider the services that are being used. These can include:

• Data backup
• Cloud services
• Email
• File Sharing
• Messaging
• Online browsing
• Social Media
• Streaming audio
• Streaming video
• Interactive webinars
• Uploads (files, images, video)
• Video conferencing
• Voice over Internet Protocol
• Wi-Fi demands

...and more

After considering all the uses, you then need to take a hard look at what required bandwidth is needed for all of those tasks. Obviously, if you lean on your VoIP system, or you are constantly doing video webinars, you will need to factor those operational decisions into your bandwidth decision making. 

Finally, once you’ve pinpointed all the devices and tasks, the bandwidth each task takes, and how many people on your network do those tasks, you total up the traffic estimate. Can you make a realistic estimate with this information?  Depending on your business’ size and network traffic, you may not be able to get a workable figure. 

Too Much or Not Enough

Paying for too little bandwidth is a major problem, but so is paying for too much. Bandwidth, while more affordable than ever before, is still pretty expensive, and if you pay for too much bandwidth, you are wasting capital that you can never get back. 

That’s where the professionals come in. Coleman Technologies has knowledgeable technicians that can assess your bandwidth usage and work with your ISP to get you the right amount for your business’ usage. If you would like more information about bandwidth, its role in your business, or how to get the right amount for your needs, call us today at (604) 513-9428.

At the Beginning

The invention of the radio in the late 19th century and the development of the medium in the early 20th century has more to do with modern day cellular devices than you’d think. As with most new technologies, two-way radio was used by militaries, used in the late stages of WWI, throughout the Russian (and October) Revolutions, and into the Spanish Civil War. Mobility allowed for enhanced communications, but that is a long way from the iPhone 11. 

Over the next half-century, it became the go to mass communications method, effectively making it the first wireless consumer device. In fact, over 95 percent of American households had one by the end of WWII in 1945. Radios then went mobile. The development of the portable radio was the first time people understood the convenience of having portable technology. The worldwide reliance on the medium was incredible. In the 1950s, it took the television (a drastically superior medium) over a decade to supersede the radio as the predominant technology of the time. 

Early Wireless Devices

In the early 1970s, technology had reached a point where the idea of a mobile phone was being bantered around. Prototypes were made, and the technology worked! The first set of wireless phones were added to luxury cars and train cars and other places where affluent people could take advantage of the technology. 

The first cellular phones, the 0G generation were introduced to the market in the late 1970s. Meanwhile, personal computers were trending upwards.

Amazingly enough, it would take almost 40 years before the trajectory of the two markets would intercept.

In the early 1980s, something changed. Cellular technology began to improve, as did the form factors of mobile devices. In 1984, the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X Advanced Mobile Phones System was introduced. The phone, which weighed in at a whopping 28 ounces, cost $4,000, and took 10 hours to charge for 30 minutes of talk time. Irregardless, the device, and others of that era had great demand. Motorola sold around 1,200 phones in 1984 alone; and, based on that success, innovation was priority number one.

It took until 1981 for manufacturers to develop anything resembling what we would call a mobile PC. The Osborne 1 was the first, but it wasn’t practical at about the size of a suitcase. The Epson HX-20, a PC that had a four-line display and used a microcassette to store data, would forever be known as the very first true laptop.

Just like cellular phone technology, the innovation of the laptop was moving faster.

‘90’s Mobility

By the mid-90s, mobility had started to become a priority for consumers. The huge, brick-sized cellular phones of the 80s were replaced by smaller, more portable devices. They also dropped significantly in price. Cell phones such as the Nokia 5110 made cellular calling commonplace.

On the mobile PC front, the laptop form factor of the ‘90s largely resembled the laptops we use today, the first touchscreen devices started to pop up, and mobile networks started to become better at transmitting data. 

In the same era, major PC manufacturers began to make laptop computers. These devices regularly fetched $3,000 or more. Once supply started reaching the public’s insatiable demand for these devices, there was a rapid reduction in price. Device manufacturers such as HP, Dell, and Compaq took advantage of the computing boom, and grew quickly. 

Cameras started to show up on devices in the late 1990s. It became obvious that cell phone device demand, as well as access to the brand new World Wide Web was pushing innovation. As a result, each year it seemed as if the new phones were getting more features, were better constructed, and dare I say, smarter.

The New Millenium 

In the dawn of the 21st century, more and more people had a cell phone. Constant innovation of hardware, software, battery technology, and more were powering a technology boom like the consumer world hadn’t seen since the advent of the color TV.

At this time, device manufacturers such as PALM, Nokia, and Apple started putting together the smartphone; devices that could function like a computer in your pocket. Then, in 2006 Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone. The launch of Apple’s iPhone in 2007 set the standard for what consumers would come to expect from their devices. 

Luckily for consumers, the establishment of the iPhone was quickly followed by ‘copycats’. Dozens of other electronics companies started to put together smartphones. The companies may change, but this competition is still raging away today. Today there are 3.5 billion smartphones, most of which are powered by the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store. With millions of apps on each, the smartphone is now the predominant computing device in the world. 

How Smartphones Have Changed Business

Today, the manner in which we communicate, collaborate, and compute has completely changed. These devices have changed the way that people can be productive. This uptick in mobility has helped develop the following changes:

• Remote workers - Today, remote workers are commonplace. Thanks to all the solutions built for mobile devices, employees can do work from anywhere just like they would have done it at the office. 
• Social media - The subsequent development of social media provides mobile users contact with their family, friends, and contemporaries from any place at any time. 
• Immediate demand - This may be the most important consideration that increased mobility has offered people. With the ability to get what they want when they want it, they expect quick responses and resolutions to problems in a blink of an eye. 

The smartphone is one of the best tools you can use. Today’s options are more powerful than ever. For more information about how to maximize your business’ productivity through mobility call the professionals at Coleman Technologies today at (604) 513-9428.

Ransomware

Imagine trying to access your computer (or your network as a whole), only to find yourself locked out and presented with a demand for payment in exchange for your files to be decrypted. This is precisely the scenario that ransomware puts its victims into, usually with a deadline to pay up under threat of the destruction of the encrypted files. If you’ve heard about Cryptolocker, WannaCry, or Petya, they are what we are referring to.

In 2019, a business was infected with ransomware once every 15 seconds, racking up a total of $11.5 million in total losses. Spam and phishing attacks were responsible for infecting 66 percent of affected companies, and in 2017, almost half of companies surveyed were affected by ransomware.

Denial of Service

Denial of Service (DoS) attacks, and their more-popular offshoot, Distributed Denial of Service attacks are the most common form of cyberattack. Using automation, an attacker has resources batter a target with the aim of taking it down. The rise in Internet of Things-enabled devices now allows an attacker to take over these devices and turn them against a single webpage. Naturally, this takes the website down.

The biggest DDoS attack on record happened on March 5, 2018, but was fortunately unsuccessful in taking down the targeted ISP… despite clocking in at 1.7 TB/s. On average, one of these attacks costs somewhere between $20K-to-$40K each hour, or in other terms, just under the average American worker’s annual salary. In the UK, businesses lost £1 billion to cybercrime in 2019.

Man-in-the-Middle

A Man-in-the-Middle attack compromises any communications between a business and their contact. Any and all data can be interfered with, allowing cybercriminals to have their way with personal data, business correspondence, or financial data that is transmitted. It can be intercepted, altered, or redirected, potentially causing more problems than can be counted. The worst part: because Man-in-the-Middle attacks are relatively easy to carry out, they are rising in popularity on a daily basis. They are most commonly used to extract information, whether personal or professional, that otherwise wouldn’t be available. This includes things like login credentials, banking information, or payment card data.

Okay, that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part is that the majority of servers are still vulnerable. As in, 2016 saw 95 percent of HTTPS servers still at risk.

Phishing

Believe it or not, phishing attacks are ranked as the biggest threat to businesses out there today. Phishing is a kind of social engineering where an attacker will reach out to the victim through some format, from email to instant messaging and beyond, in order to gain access to a secure system by fooling their victim into erroneously trusting them. While phishing emails have been around the block a few times, today’s attacks have grown to be quite sophisticated.

Many statistics surrounding phishing emails demonstrate how effective this relatively simple attack has proved to be. Phishing is involved in 93 percent of all social engineering attacks, and was directly responsible for 70 percent of government network breaches. In the last 12 months, 64 percent of organizations had first-hand experience with phishing, notably, 82 percent of manufacturers. The aforementioned ransomware relies on phishing for 21 percent of its delivery. As recently as 2016, 30 percent of phishing messages were opened.

SQL Injection

Abbreviating a structure query language injection, an SQL injection attack does what it says on the box - it injects malicious code into a target’s SQL servers and feeds the database information back to the attackers. While this is another “golden oldie” of an attack, web-based applications that call for database access have given new life to SQL injection attacks and allowed attackers to extract very valuable info.

It should then come as no surprise that 65 percent of all web application attacks are performed through SQL injections. So, if your organization draws information from a database for an application, you could easily be victimized to a significant degree. Even gamers need to be concerned, as 12 billion out of 55 billion detected SQL attacks that Akamai security experts found were leveled at the gaming community.

Malware

If only these other attacks meant that attackers didn’t have time to try anything else, but unfortunately, that isn’t the case. Malware attacks still rank among both the worst, and most common, attacks against businesses. Of course, there are many types to consider, including:

• Trojan horses - Malicious code will be concealed within other files and applications and allow an attacker a point of access to a computing system or network.
• Worms - Malicious and self-replicating applications that travel along and infect networks and individual devices.
• Viruses - Samples of malicious code that infect applications for a variety of motives, including sabotage and theft of data and other resources.
• Spyware - Code that, while it seems harmless, piggybacks to software and gathers information about how a device or network is used.

There are many ways for malware to be introduced into a system. Again, phishing messages can be responsible, but many attackers will use something called “droppers.” Droppers are specialized programs that will install a virus after bypassing cybersecurity solutions. Since there is nothing inherently malicious about the dropper, protections usually don’t flag them.

Fortunately, there are ways to protect your business’ resources, network, and infrastructure from the millions of different versions of these attacks - and you need them, as your business is actively targeted by these attacks. To learn more about putting these protections into place, reach out to the professionals at Coleman Technologies by calling (604) 513-9428.