Please Shop at Home!

While the discussion in this article is a subject we constantly mention in all our offices, it really has been time we revisit the question of allowing staff members to use office computers for personal business. We even need to discuss whether doctors should do any personal business on the office computers. If you even occasionally watch the news, you will see alarming reports of businesses and individuals having their data held hostage by a virus until they pay the blackmailer a certain amount of money to release the data. While I know we all use great IT companies and have our firewalls and anti-virus software in place, this can’t always stop these viruses from getting in. We are also seeing hospitals and other large companies paying a great deal of money to get their data back because they just can’t wait for their computer technicians to spend weeks on this to hopefully clear out the problem. While we can never be 100 % secure, this is a case where we apply the old ounce of prevention adage. Every office needs to have a clear policy that involves warnings, and possibly even threats of termination for repeat offenders, stating that ONLY office business can be done on office computers. It is no longer an issue of whether or not staff members are off the clock while doing their online shopping, but rather an issue of never, ever doing their online business in the office. This should also apply to checking their personal email on office computers. That funny cartoon they opened won’t be so funny when your entire system is locked up. I also mentioned the doctors earlier because I know how tempting it is to check your personal email in the office. Here at Mosaic we only do personal business on our iPads, never on your or our office servers. We strongly suggest you do the same. It’s very easy to think it will never happen to me…..right up to the point where it does!