Is your business IT ready for 2027?
The first few weeks of 2027 bring more hard IT deadlines than most businesses face in a typical year. Here's what's changing, what it could cost and a practical plan for the months ahead.
What should you actually expect from your IT provider?
Most businesses only judge their IT provider when something breaks. By then it's too late to find out whether they're any good. Here's what a strong provider looks like, the questions worth asking and the warning signs to watch for.
What would a cyber security audit find in your business?
Most businesses assume their security is fine because nothing has gone wrong yet. A cyber security audit tests that assumption. Here's what one looks at, what you get at the end and how North East firms can prepare for it.
When did you last test your backups?
Having backup software is not the same as being able to recover. Only 28% of ransomware victims get all their data back, despite 90% of leaders being confident they could. Recovery time versus recovery point, why immutable and offsite matter, and what a real restore test looks like.
Do you know which AI tools your team is using?
Seven in ten UK employees have used unapproved AI tools at work, while only around a third of organisations have any policy. Shadow AI is a data and contract problem rather than a technology one, and banning it makes it worse. Here is what to do instead.
Why your Windows 10 bill might be about to double
Year one of Windows 10 Extended Security Updates ends on 13 October 2026 and the per device price doubles. The licensing is cumulative, the free consumer route is closed to businesses and Secure Boot certificates add a hardware complication. Here is what it costs and how to decide.
Are you ready for Microsoft’s new sign in changes?
Microsoft is retiring SMS and voice authentication in Entra ID, with passkeys the default sign in method from 1 September 2026 and a hard cut off on 1 February 2027 that applies to every tenant. Here is what changes, who it affects and what your business should do before the deadline.
What happens to your business when the internet goes down?
As phones move onto the internet, your broadband connection becomes a single point of failure. Lose it and you lose calls, card payments, Teams and files at the same time. Here is what a backup connection looks like and when satellite makes sense.
Traditional phone lines switch off in January 2027. Here’s what to check
The copper telephone network that has carried UK calls for over a century closes on 31 January 2027. Most coverage focuses on desk phones. The bigger risk is everything else running quietly on those same lines, from lift alarms to door entry panels.
Cyber Essentials has got stricter. Here’s what’s catching people out
Cyber Essentials is increasingly a condition of winning work, and the rules got tougher in April 2026. Two issues now fail an application outright rather than earning a note to fix later. Here are the five things we see catching businesses out.