cloud services Archives

Migrating to Azure with Confidence

You’ve already envisioned the benefits: you know migrating to a cloud-based hosting platform can boost the performance of your organization’s computing infrastructure. You can see how it’ll improve efficiency, save time, and reduce costs. And you’re prepared to join the hundreds of thousands of other businesses, large and small, that have already chosen Microsoft Azure for its service quality, security, reliability, and global reach. But there’s no getting around it: migrating to the cloud entails significant organizational change. To make the best possible use of the Azure platform, you need to understand its unique attributes and keep them front of mind throughout the migration process, and beyond. Fortunately, Microsoft offers an extensive set of tools and services that can help ease and simplify migration. And as a Microsoft partner with extensive experience helping our clients shift existing applications to the Azure platform, Red Level can ensure that you’ll take advantage ...

Red Level2023-02-16T16:01:15+00:00

Cloud Security, Part I: Employee Risk

While the COVID-19 pandemic closed down much of society and work environments, one area that was blown wide open was security—in particular, cloud security. In this two-part series, we will examine risks to (and solutions for) businesses. This first part covers employee risk; because it can be the largest and most sensitive topic related to cloud security. Malware delivery continues to shift into the cloud, with 61% of all malware delivered via a cloud app. 36% of phishing campaigns target cloud app passwords and 13% of campaigns use phishing methods hosted in the cloud. Malicious Office documents increased by 58% in 2020 and now comprise 27% of all malware downloads, using cloud app delivery to avoid email and web security. 83% of users in the enterprise use personal apps, increasing the risk of unintentional or unapproved data movement. —Skopje Malware delivered over cloud apps increased from 48% to 61% in ...

Red Level2023-02-16T16:01:19+00:00

Top 5 Infrastructure Trends for 2019

We’ve bid 2018 farewell and welcomed 2019 with open arms. So what's next? What’s going to happen in 2019 from an infrastructure perspective? The answer for 2019 is similar to that of recent years. Cloud and security are still the top priorities. Let’s take a quick look at what may impact your infrastructure focus. 1. Exchange Migration Migrations from Exchange on-premises to Exchange online and upgrades from older versions of Exchange to the latest version are both projects going strong in 2019. We continue to support our clients who are going through these Exchange migration and upgrade processes and predict that Exchange migrations, upgrades, and support will continue to be a trend with our clients. 2. Multi-Factor Authentication To add additional security, Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) provides one or more additional forms of authentication for users when they log into company resources. Traditionally, users would log into their computers or other ...

Red Level2023-02-16T16:01:29+00:00

Red Letter IT Newsletter – November 2018

MEET THE TEAM: Helpdesk Manager, Hayley Sargent Hayley Sargent leads Red Level's Helpdesk team as they wrangle technical issues and support the IT needs Detroit area business. TECH NEWS: What is Cloud Computing? If you aren't taking advantage of cloud computing, or don't know how best to implement it, we've written this guide to help you. THANKSGIVING: Happy Thanksgiving from Red Level A few members of our team of IT pros at Red Level sit down to share their favorite part of Thanksgiving dinner plus some of the reasons they are feeling thankful this year. DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION: What Digital Transformation Means for Your Business Mike Balatzis, Red Level's Microsoft Manager, talks Digital Transformation and what it really means for business owners and executives. FOOTBALL PICKS: Detroit Lions Thanksgiving Football Predictions Red Level shares a few of their predictions about the upcoming game between the Detroit Lions and the Chicago Bears on ...

Kristy Mossoian2023-02-16T16:01:32+00:00

MiCLOUD: ENTERPRISE-GRADE CLOUD SERVICES FOR SMBs

Cloud services have gotten a lot of attention from small to medium-sized businesses in recent years, and for good reason: It’s expensive, risky, and resource-intensive to manage your IT infrastructure. At the same time, a lot of SMBs have held off on migrating to the cloud, for equally good reasons: Most cloud services – and cloud service providers – aren’t prepared to serve their companies optimally. Every company’s IT needs are unique but try telling that to one of the global monoliths dominating the cloud services arena. It’s pretty much a given that signing on for service with most cloud services companies means giving up a good deal of flexibility and control, as well as sacrificing any claim to customization or personalized service. At Red Level, we saw this coming when we launched our MiCloud service over eight years ago. We knew that as technology changes accelerated, many of our ...

Edward Aube2023-02-16T16:01:39+00:00

BUDGETING FOR IT IN 2018? BUILD UP THE BASICS

People don’t usually get too excited about the basics where technology is concerned. It’s not surprising. People are interested in what’s new, and technology is all about what’s new, what’s next, what’s going to change the world – new apps, new phones, and new services are where all the action is. That mindset extends beyond people to companies. When considering what to spend IT resources on, there can be a great temptation to be dazzled by the novelty of that supposedly world-changing new application, that lightning-fast machine or that must-have accessory. And sure – some of them are must-haves or at least extremely-good-to-haves. If they come at the cost of taking care of fundamentals, though, that’s a problem. A lot of companies I work with are starting to think about budgets for the next fiscal year. Almost everyone I talk to would probably describe their IT budgets as “tight” – ...

Edward Aube2023-02-16T16:01:41+00:00

Right-Sizing IT – Power & Flexibility for Growing Companies

Growing a business is never easy, and properly managing that growth can be even harder. A growing company has countless “moving parts” that must be considered, accommodated, and forced to work in synchronization. Head counts have to match resource requirements; facility size has to accommodate head count; budgeting, provisioning and resource allocations have to scale in symmetry with the company’s growth path. And one of the most critical – and difficult – moving parts to manage has historically been IT. Consider the case of Teijin Advanced Composites America. Although its corporate parent is a vast Japanese chemical and pharmaceutical firm, this pioneering Red Level Client is nonetheless subject to most of the same challenges and constraints as any other emerging start-up—and some extra ones besides. When we first became acquainted with TACA, it was in the earliest stages of a collaborative agreement with one of America’s largest manufacturers, and at ...

Red Level2023-02-16T16:01:54+00:00