What are Remote Management Services?
Remote Management Services allows OTS to deploy remote services to equipment installed behind customer firewalls securely, over the Internet. The solution has been designed with high performance and security standards at every level of its architecture. It makes use of Web services to communicate over the Internet and links OTS equipment to a central server at the OTS support center. Through Remote Management Services, your equipment can now provide performance data and alerts to our support team so that we can deliver proactive, rapid service and support with advanced remote troubleshooting capabilities. Our goal is to reduce time-to-repair, and increase reliability and uptime.
Security
- The service will provide as part of the monthly subscription a physical firewall device with VPN capability, and weekly maintenance sessions with a technician will verifying the integrity of that firewall.
- The weekly maintenance session will run diagnostics to identify and eliminate spyware, adware, keystroke logger programs, etc.
- A live OTS Technician will ensure that all security updates are run and installed properly, and antivirus is updated.
Maximizing PC speed
Setting up and updating Spam filters
- Identifying programs on the start-up menu that are never used, and removing them from the start-up process. Installing pop-up blockers
- Running Defrag
- Removing Adware and Spyware which cause the computer to use up processing power
- Running diagnostics to ascertain if the computer could be running more efficiently
Basic Technical Support
- Providing assistance in setting up email accounts, via text chat or phone call
- Providing basic network assistance in connecting to a printer, or another PC on the network
- Troubleshooting and assisting on Office programs such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint etc. via email, text chat or phone
What is a VPN (Virtual Private Network)?
VPN is a private network that uses the Internet to connect remote sites or users together. Instead of using a dedicated, real-world connection such as leased line, a VPN uses secure, password-protected "virtual" connections routed through the Internet from the company's private network to in this case, the remote site of OTS.
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Why do I need Remote Managed Services?
Data Recovery is the key. Even a small amount of lost data can prove costly for you or your business. A 1998 Pepperdine University study, "The Cost of Lost Data," estimated that the average incident of lost, stolen, or damaged data cost companies more than $2,500 per affected PC. The same report estimated that the cost of lost data to U.S. economy totaled more than $11.8 billion and that's in 1998 dollars!
It gets worse: The National Archives & Records Administration in Washington reports that 93% of companies they surveyed that lost their data center for ten days or more due to a disaster filed for bankruptcy within one year of the disaster. Fifty percent of businesses that found themselves without data management for this same time period filed for bankruptcy immediately.
In your business, 4 primary assets are needed to effectively operate your information system-facilities, hardware, network and data. In the unfortunate event of a disaster, your hardware and networks can be replaced, and facilities can be moved to a new location. In fact, with the exception of data, virtually every company system asset can be replaced. If you're like every organization, you have a core set of data upon which your business operations depend. Whether it's payroll information, customer records, valuable research, financial records or e-mail files all corporate data is valuable and thus is vulnerable to loss or irreparable damage. Data loss can result from any number of factors:
- Human error
- Operating system or application software bugs
- Hardware failure
- Fire, smoke or water damage
- Power outages
- Employee theft or fraud
- Manmade disasters such as sabotage, hacking or viruses
- Natural disasters such as earthquakes or hurricanes
Any one of these factors can cause data loss, and the results in real dollars, lost opportunity and customer dissatisfaction can be catastrophic. It can result in the loss of irreplaceable information or files that may take hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars for you to re-create.
Your computers are also vulnerable to malicious files, such as spyware and malware, which can be contracted via your Internet connection. These files can allow others to steal your data, or steal your customer lists and information. Spam is often the majority of email a company gets. Cleaning up spyware and spam is time consuming. Spyware blockers, for example, identify potential spyware, but you have to decide what to do with it. With remote managed services, regular malware, spyware and spam removal is done for you, in off-hours you designate, so your computers are busy working full-time for your company.
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How does this service work?
The two major technical components of OTS Remote Management Services are the Agent and the Server. The Agent would be installed at your site while the Server resides at OTS within our support center.
The Agent is software that handles Remote Management Services functions at your site. The Agent is installed directly on the device. Its role is to collect device performance data on an ongoing basis; establish secure communications to the Server via the Internet; send data and log files to the Server; provide Web services to the device.
OTS will provide you-at no additional charge-with anti-virus and spam protection that will be constantly updated on your protected computers by our technicians, so you can be sure your company's PCs have the latest protection & scans for viruses on a regular basis whether or not you remember to update them.
In addition, our live Microsoft-certified technicians will run dozens of security & maintenance tasks every day, week or month to keep your PC's system & Internet connectivity running at peak performance
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What's wrong with the anti-virus and anti-spam software I already have?
It's probably fairly effective. However, for it to be most effective, as new viruses and spam profiles come out daily, you have to take extra care to make sure that all of your sure that ALL of the computers in your network have the most up-to-date protection. OTS has contracted with top-brand software that we will make sure is updated daily to protect your business.. This software would be available to you at no additional cost.
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Why do small to mid-sized businesses have special IT needs?
Larger business have the luxury of being able to have an IT staff. Not just one IT professional, but an entire staff that allows the ability of having someone on-site or on call around the clock. However the cost of maintaining an in-house IT presence is often beyond the fiscal abilities of most small to mid-sized businesses. Yet, the risk of data loss, system crashes, spyware, slow-running systems, is every bit as great for businesses such as yours.
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Can the services be customized to meet my special needs?
Yes, special plans are available. For an additional fee, more frequent backups are also available. Also, OTS offers software-specific solutions on a case-by-case basis for the following applications:
- Outlook
- Word
- Excel
- PowerPoint
- Photoshop
- QuickBooks
- Project
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What special equipment will I need?
Other than the hardware to set-up the VPN connection, you won't need any special equipment. As part of our services, OTS will provide you with a Firewall device with a VPN capability to plug into your network.
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Do I need to sign a contract?
No, you don't. The service is self-renewied monthly. There’s no need to do anything, but you can cancel anytime. If you do want to sign a contract, you can lock in your monthly rate beyond 1 year.
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I have never heard of such a service
These are services that large companies utilize every day. Now we are using our experience serving these companies to offer them to home users or small and mid-sized business owners like you.
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If you can access my computer, can anyone else?
No, only people with a valid username and password will be able to access your network.
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Aren't computers just supposed to run without any maintenance?
Computers are sometimes like cars. With a car you need to change it oil and tune it up every now and then. Computers are also like this. If left alone the computer will become bogged down and begin to slow. Computers need regular maintenance in order to perform at their best. A neglected computer could suffer from program crashes, slow performance, system freezes etc. A few hours and some money spent on some basic computer maintenance could prevent problems later on, will improve the overall health of a computer and should also help improve its performance.
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Who are your technicians?
All OTS personnel are Microsoft-certified Technicians MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineers) having passed all the required rigorous exams. The Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE) Certification is a premier credential for technical professionals who analyze business requirements and design and implement infrastructure for business solutions based on the Microsoft Windows® 2000 platform and Microsoft server software. Implementation responsibilities include installing, configuring, and troubleshooting network systems.
By earning the premier MCSE credential, individuals are demonstrating that they have
the skills necessary to lead organizations in the successful design, implementation, and administration of the most advanced Microsoft Windows platform and Microsoft server products.
