Sophicity

Video Conferencing Safety, Security, Tips, and Best Practices: While some tech-savvy people might take naturally to video conferencing, many employees might be struggling with this technology. Video conferencing can really help your municipal operations, but you want to make sure it’s safe, secure, and easy for employees to use. Let’s look at several components of video conferencing that will help your employees. https://hubs.li/H0HTX7P0

Video Conferencing Safety, Security, Tips, and Best Practices While some tech-savvy people might take naturally to video conferencing, many employees might be struggling with this technology. Video conferencing can really help your municipal operations during this crisis, but you want to make sure it’s safe, secure, and easy for employees to use. Let’s loo

6 Cyber Risks That Your Municipal Employees Face Working Remotely—and How to Address Those Risks: If people are not used to working remotely and you’re not used to supporting remote workers, you may not realize that various security vulnerabilities exist that don’t necessarily appear at the office. Teleworking introduces increased cybersecurity risks as employees work from home with their personal computers. Here are some areas you need to assess. https://hubs.li/H0HTWhr0

6 Cyber Risks That Your Municipal Employees Face Working Remotely—and How to Address Those Risks If people are not used to working remotely and you’re not used to supporting remote workers, you may not realize that various security vulnerabilities exist that don’t necessarily appear at the office. Teleworking introduces increased cybersecurity risks as employees work from home with their pe

Last Wednesday, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), a federal agency overseen by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), released an alert about Microsoft Exchange server vulnerabilities. While many organizations no longer use Microsoft Exchange, quite a few still do and may be vulnerable to a cyberattack. Even if you’re not using Microsoft Exchange and this specific alert doesn’t apply to you, it offers several serious lessons for organizations about software vulnerabilities and vigilance in detecting cyberthreats. https://hubs.li/H0HTVx60

Critical Microsoft Exchange Vulnerability Illustrates Importance of Cyber Threat Detection Critical Microsoft Exchange Vulnerability Illustrates Importance of Cyber Threat Detection

During the first week of February in Oldsmar, Florida, a hacker tried to poison the city’s water supply by increasing the amount of lye to dangerous levels. While the city fended off the attack, it’s still scary to contemplate what hackers can potentially do in 2021. An attack on your water supply may not be one of your daily worries. However, if we look at some elements of the attack analyzed by a Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) alert, we will see some areas of concern that overlap with your municipality’s cybersecurity strategy—or lack thereof. https://hubs.li/H0HJVnx0

Water Supply Attack Illustrates Security Lessons for Municipalities Water Supply Attack Illustrates Security Lessons for Municipalities

Remote Work: Maintaining Team Visibility with Microsoft Planner - Maintaining team visibility is a major challenge for most organizations. Many organizations ask themselves, “How do I keep my team organized, have visibility into their progress, and work cohesively while separated?” It’s a tall order but not impossible. If your organization is already using Office 365, there is a tool you can implement today – Microsoft Planner. https://hubs.li/H0Hp2rw0

Remote Work: Maintaining Team Visibility with Microsoft Planner Remote Work: Maintaining Team Visibility with Microsoft Planner

5 Common Squad Car and Body Camera Video Issues Addressed by Video Archiving: Why is the management of capturing and storing squad car and body camera video so challenging? Because video files are huge—and they need lots and lots and lots of storage space. Deciding where to store this video becomes a daily challenge—like directing an always-on firehose toward a repository where you wish to store the water. Once stored, the video keeps coming. Without an appropriate strategy, the water from the firehose will flood your police department. When we talk to municipalities for the first time about their squad car and body camera video archiving, we often note these five common issues. https://hubs.li/H0Hn_8-0

5 Common Squad Car and Body Camera Video Issues Addressed by Video Archiving Why is the management of capturing and storing squad car and body camera video so challenging? Because video files are huge—and they need lots and lots and lots of storage space. When we talk to municipalities for the first time about their squad car and body camera video archiving, we often note

IT and Cybersecurity Lessons from the Coronavirus: We draw upon some of the resilience lessons we see from our federal, state, and local governments and apply them to your town or city’s IT and cybersecurity. https://hubs.li/H0Hn-WC0

IT and Cybersecurity Lessons from the Coronavirus Are you able to completely prevent the coronavirus, a cyberattack, or a natural disaster from impacting your community? No. Are you able to plan in such a way that you can be resilient—bouncing back from a disturbance, learning from it, and continuing your municipal operations? Yes. We can draw up

5 Unexpected Yet Common Data Backup Obstacles: Many organizations have some type of data backup and disaster recovery solution in place—but they believe that fact alone checks this task off their list. But these organizations often run into obstacles that limit their ability to effectively back up their data and recover it after an incident or a disaster. https://hubs.li/H0Hf0Sq0

5 Unexpected Yet Common Data Backup Obstacles 5 Unexpected Yet Common Data Backup Obstacles

Webinar: Your Biggest Cybersecurity Threat and How to Handle It - 95% of successful cyberattacks start with phishing. That’s why it’s your biggest threat, and your traditional cybersecurity prevention measures likely aren’t preparing your organization against a phishing attack. In this webinar, Joey Howland, VC3’s Chief Information Security Officer, explains why everyone in an organization, especially leaders, needs to be aware of the threat phishing attacks present. https://hubs.li/H0H1zYh0

Webinar: Your Biggest Cybersecurity Threat and How to Handle It Webinar: Your Biggest Cybersecurity Threat and How to Handle It

IT Budgeting: Top Six Mistakes When Cutting IT Costs and Better Alternatives - Where do you start? As a leader in your organization, resist the urge to pull out your red pen and slash the IT budget. While it may be tempting to postpone projects like hardware updates, it is not that simple. Add in something less tangible like cybersecurity, and budgeting quickly becomes complicated. It is better to start with a more structured and deliberate approach. https://hubs.li/H0H1yV80

IT Budgeting: Top Six Mistakes When Cutting IT Costs and Better Alternatives IT Budgeting: Top Six Mistakes When Cutting IT Costs and Better Alternatives

Bringing IT into Focus: Is Your IT Working for You or Against You? - What does wearing glasses and fuzzy writing on a board have to do with IT? Well, underperforming IT is similar to trying to read a board without glasses. Until it’s clearly in focus, you don’t realize how good your IT could be. https://hubs.li/H0GCdXk0

Bringing IT into Focus: Is Your IT Working for You or Against You? Bringing IT into Focus: Is Your IT Working for You or Against You?

Auburn, Georgia Improves Responsiveness and Effectiveness of IT Support Through IT in a Box—Saving Valuable Time and Money https://hubs.li/H0GCcYn0

Auburn, Georgia Improves Responsiveness and Effectiveness of IT Support Through IT in a Box—Saving Valuable Time and Money IT in a Box offered the City of Auburn a team of municipal-experienced technology professionals who were ready to respond to issues and improve the city’s IT infrastructure. Since contracting with Sophicity, the city's existing issues became nonexistent.

Virtual City Hall: How to Digitize Your Paper Forms in 5 Steps - What if you could improve your residents’ experience while reducing your costs? How do you start moving more services online? It may seem overwhelming at first, but there’s a simple way to try it without major investment. Pick one area or department to start with and follow this 5-step process. https://hubs.li/H0GC7Mx0

Virtual City Hall: How to Digitize Your Paper Forms in 5 Steps Virtual City Hall: How to Digitize Your Paper Forms in 5 Steps

A Guide on How to Stream Council Meetings: Do I need a camera for each council member? Do I need a microphone for each council member? What AV equipment do I need? In this guide, we’ll cover what technology foundation you need, how to choose the right platform, and tips on how to run a virtual public meeting. https://hubs.li/H0GrXJL0

A Guide on How to Stream Council Meetings A Guide on How to Stream Council Meetings

How to Spot a Phishing Attempt and Steps You Can Take: The biggest cybersecurity threat to your organization is unprepared employees. What can you do right now to better protect your organization? And what do you need to do in the long term to become better prepared? https://hubs.li/H0G9W6b0

How to Spot a Phishing Attempt and Steps You Can Take How to Spot a Phishing Attempt and Steps You Can Take

Join us virtually at the 2021 VLGMA Winter Conference 2/10-2/12. https://hubs.li/H0G9Rps0

Municipal Events This Week: February 8-12, 2021 Municipal Events This Week: February 8-12, 2021

5 After Hours Reasons a Municipality Needs a 24/7 Helpdesk: We serve many small cities and you would be surprised at the calls we get after hours—sometimes in the dead of night. True, those calls are not coming from city hall when it’s closed. Yet, many city operations keep running when the traditional workday ends—and those operations need an IT helpdesk during those odd hours. https://hubs.li/H0G1Cdc0

5 After Hours Reasons a Municipality Needs a 24/7 Helpdesk 5 After Hours Reasons a Municipality Needs a 24/7 Helpdesk

During the COVID-19 pandemic, scammers are using fear and taking advantage of people working from home to attempt more aggressive and tricky phishing attacks. Let’s look at the advanced warning signs in such a phishing email scam. https://hubs.li/H0FNfFL0

Breaking Down a Sophisticated Phishing Email: 4 Advanced Warning Signs During the COVID-19 pandemic, scammers are using fear and taking advantage of people working from home to attempt more aggressive and tricky phishing attacks. Unfortunately, many people get tricked by such phishing emails because they look legitimate and seem to provide interesting, useful, and time

IT Spending Benchmarks: Too Much, Too Little, Or Just Right - Some organizations overspend and get frustrated by a lack of return. Others sink into technical debt by underspending and incur efficiency losses. But how do you know if you’re overspending or underspending? https://hubs.li/H0FMZs10

IT Spending Benchmarks: Too Much, Too Little, Or Just Right IT Spending Benchmarks: Too Much, Too Little, Or Just Right

Join us virtually at MASC’s Hometown Legislative Action Week 2/1-2/5, NCCMA’s 2021 Winter Seminar 2/2-2/5, and FCCMA’s Winter Institute 2/3-2/5.

Communication Breakdown: 5 Common Issues with IT Support - Do you dread conversations with your IT support? If the answer is yes, you’re not alone. IT support is there to solve problems, but too often communicating with IT support becomes another problem on top of your technical issue. If your IT support is frustrating, communication could be a major part of the problem. Here are the top five examples we hear from clients about their previous experience with IT support. https://hubs.li/H0FD3xf0

Communication Breakdown: 5 Common Issues with IT Support Communication Breakdown: 5 Common Issues with IT Support

Think about your favorite websites that you visit on your smartphone. The text and images always seem to be “just right.” They are built to be “responsive”—automatically adapting text and image size to the type of device. Let’s review why it's a big deal. https://hubs.li/H0FnDFb0

4 Reasons You Need a Responsive-Designed Municipal Website Think about your favorite websites that you visit on your smartphone or tablet. Like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, you’ll notice that the text and images always seem to be “just right.” The “just right” websites aren’t a coincidence. They are built to be “responsive”—meaning they

How do you manage and track your team’s success? Especially if that team is now remote? Perhaps you’re asking questions about new ways to gain visibility on work and performance in lieu of everyone being under the same roof. In this 15-minute webinar, we dive into data-driven performance management. What is it? Why is it valuable? And how can you, as a leader, begin to implement it in your organization? https://hubs.li/H0FnDy-0

Webinar: Using Data to Manage Teams and Drive Performance Webinar: Using Data to Manage Teams and Drive Performance

Join us at the ACCMA Winter Conference 1/27-1/29 in Hoover, AL.

Case Study: Blending Internal IT with a Technology Partner - The City of Greenacres is a community near the coast in southern Florida with a population of over 40,000 residents. The city came to a typical IT crossroads. The internal IT department faced challenges to support the entire staff. Was it time to outsource IT, double down on its internal IT staff, or pursue a hybrid model? https://hubs.li/H0D-L9t0

Case Study: Blending Internal IT with a Technology Partner Case Study: Blending Internal IT with a Technology Partner

5 Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities That Need Strong Policies: Did you know that not all cybersecurity vulnerabilities are technical? Let’s look at five key areas where your organization may have security vulnerabilities—made worse if no policy exists. https://hubs.li/H0Fc5hL0

5 Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities That Need Strong Policies 5 Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities That Need Strong Policies

What is Ransomware and How to Protect Against It: What is a ransomware attack? Why is local government such a big target? How should an organization respond if they are the victim of a ransomware attack? We've got the answers in this post. https://hubs.li/H0D-Pzw0

What is Ransomware and How to Protect Against It What is Ransomware and How to Protect Against It

Sophicity updated their information in their About section.

VC3, a market-leading managed IT provider, acquired Sophicity on July 1. Please follow VC3's Facebook channel at https://www.facebook.com/VC3Inc/

VC3 and Sophicity both saw a great opportunity to combine two very like-minded companies into one so that we can better serve our local government market. Both companies have specialized in local government IT for 20+ years. Together, we are now in 16 states and better able to serve towns and cities of all sizes throughout the country while introducing new strengths and capabilities to help our towns and cities even more.

VC3 VC3 is a leading managed IT & cybersecurity services provider helping navigate the technology journey

Importance of Testing Your Cybersecurity: Many leaders we talk to aren’t sure where they stand with cybersecurity. What are my strengths? What are my vulnerabilities? And what do I do with this information? This webinar covers the signs of a typical cybersecurity attack, two ways you can test your cybersecurity defenses, and what you should do next to shore up your cybersecurity gaps. https://hubs.li/H0D-Pxw0

Cybersecurity Webinar: 2 Ways to Test Your Defenses Cybersecurity Webinar: 2 Ways to Test Your Defenses