Depending on the terms of your purchase, every year you’ll need to pay a maintenance fee to renew the license on your SonicWall. When that time comes around, we often see confusion from customers on why they need to pay to continue using an appliance they already own. After all, you don’t have to pay a license for a refrigerator, stove or toaster, right?

Well, the simple fact of the matter is a SonicWall isn’t a static appliance like a refrigerator or stove, and that’s a very good thing; threats are constantly evolving.

Target. Yahoo. eBay. Netflix. JP Morgan Chase. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Sony. Ashley Madison. The Democratic National Committee. LinkedIn. Home Depot.

What do all of those companies have in common? They all have been the victim of cybersecurity breaches.

Imagine how attractive a law firm that specializes in medical malpractice or personal injury is to a hacker. Or what about a defense firm with terabytes of business emails, trade secrets and financial information?

With the rise of virtual reality, in particular mobile VR, 360 degree, immersive photography has really taken off. It’s not a new technology – realtors have been using it for years to create virtual tours, and Google Street View has been giving us a ground-level view for over 10 years – the combination of new viewing methods and action camera style 360 cameras has pushed 360 photography into the mainstream.

For over 16 years, the team at Accurate Systems in Shepherdstown, WV, has prided themselves on having a consultative partnership with all their clients. They see themselves as a member of their client’s organization, working to find the right solutions to their specific needs and delivering the highest quality technical resources. It is with that in mind that they have made the biggest change yet to their business. In order to provide the kind of resources they feel their growing community needs, they have become part of the Advantage Technology team.

Our telecommunications engineers have recently discovered a security vulnerability in the popular NEC SL1100 phone systems that can be exploited for toll fraud. Commonly known as “phreaking,” Toll fraud is the practice of exploiting vulnerabilities in phone systems and is quite possibly the oldest form of hacking. To this day, phreaking accounts for more monetary damage than credit card fraud.