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Symantec Donation Safeguards Computer Labs for Students

The Inland Empire, which encompasses 27,000 square miles in Southern California, has one of the highest rates of poverty in the U.S.'s twenty-five largest metropolitan areas. One in five people there live at the poverty level. Smooth Transition, Inc., is a nonprofit educational and vocational training organization that has been working with local at-risk populations since 2009. It aims to provide a gateway towards empowerment, educational, and employment opportunities to lead a fulfilling, prosperous, and purposeful life.

Breaking Harmful Cycles

Smooth Transition began working to reach at-risk teens early — before they dropped out of high school or left the foster care system. It later expanded its program to include all at-risk populations, including displaced adults, as a means to better help the community. Smooth Transition's life skills development and educational training increase levels of employability. Its mentorship helps prevent its clients from re-entering the foster and judicial system or repeating poverty and homelessness cycles.

The nonprofit provides flexible and relevant programs that are accredited through the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Its programs are directly tied to career pathways and provide students with vocational certifications at little or no cost to them. Graduates have a high completion rate as compared with other programs that serve at-risk populations. But students also come away with significant increases in their perceived self-value and a decrease in perceived barriers to success.

Keeping the Computer Labs Secure

In 2016, Smooth Transition served roughly 2,800 people with just four full-time staff members. Many of its programs are computer-based and require that its computer labs serve multiple uses and multiple users. One of the organization's board members manages its IT needs on a volunteer basis. He recommended Symantec's Norton Small Business, and the organization has been using it on its systems since it was founded.

Symantec's donation of antivirus protection — through TechSoup — has enabled the nonprofit to safely use its computer labs and has increased the number of programs and services it can offer to its students. According to Dr. Robin Goins, president and executive director of Smooth Transition, "The donations we receive are the foundation of our success, and we cannot express enough the generational and community impact the Symantec donations provide us. Smooth Transition is an appreciative recipient of the donations we received from Symantec and we look forward to providing even more impactful community programs as a result."

Goins goes on to describe how Smooth Transition's testing centers are networked, with students taking roughly 250,000 different kinds of exams. She worried that without security in the testing centers, the tests would be disrupted, causing a very serious problem. "If we have things disrupting our classes it costs us money. It also costs students the ability to complete their work. Having viruses attack us would be catastrophic for us."

Goins points out that Norton Small Business also helps protect confidential information. "As a school, we're required to protect the identity of our students and a lot of their demographic information," she said.

Smooth Transition will continue to work throughout the Inland Empire to provide flexible training and resources for those who don't fit the traditional education model. Though it faces many challenges in providing students with real, relevant work tools and skills, its staff is relieved, knowing that its systems and data are protected.




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Keep Your Data Safe: The Joy of Locking Your Computer

Here's a simple way to keep your data safe from potential bad actors in one easy step. Are you ready? Here it is: Log out and lock your computer whenever you're not in front of it.

That's right, it's so simple it can almost be seen as an analog approach to cybersecurity. But make no mistake, all those in-depth disk encryption efforts can be rendered pointless. If you step away from your computer while it's on and unlocked, anyone passing by can access it.

Working Remotely Promotes Data Vulnerability

What's perhaps most insidious about someone gaining physical access to your computer is the fact that the attacker doesn't need any advanced technical know-how to steal sensitive information. A momentary lapse in vigilance at work or a coffee shop can result in a data breach of epic proportions.

Let's say you're working remotely at your favorite café down the street from your apartment and you get up to put in an order for a late breakfast, forgetting to lock your laptop. During that brief moment, a low-key cybervillian could easily stick a USB drive into your computer and copy any sensitive files about you — or your organization — and leave undetected.

Furthermore, if you were logged in to Gmail, your medical records, or your bank account, that malefactor could wreak havoc on your personal and professional life in a matter of minutes.

Tips for Protecting Yourself

The good news about all of this is that warding off these types of would-be data plunderers is really, really easy — it's simply a matter of using your operating system's screen locking functionality. If you don't want to do this, then at the very least you should log out of any sensitive online accounts whenever you step away from your machine.

For each of the following options, be sure you are aware of the password connected to your user login before locking yourself (or anyone else) out.

Screen Locking in Microsoft Windows

  • Press Ctrl+Alt+Delete and select Lock this computer
  • Press Windows+L

Either of these will lock your computer and require a password to log back in. You can choose Control Panel > Personalization > Screen Saver Settings and set up a screen saver that provides a login screen to get back in once it's been initiated.

Screen Locking in macOS

  • On an external keyboard or older laptops, press Ctrl+Shift+Eject
  • On a MacBook Air or Pro Retina, press Ctrl+Shift+Power

You can also go to System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General and select Require password immediately after sleep or screen saver begins (provided you have already set up a screen saver by clicking System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver).

Additional Cybersecurity Resources

Get more security tips from the National Cyber Security Alliance. National Cyber Security Awareness Month — observed every October — was created as a collaborative effort between government and industry to ensure that all Americans have the resources they need to stay safer and more secure online. Find out how you can get involved.

Image: National Cyber Security Alliance




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