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Category: Our Ideas

Security Questions to Ask Your Hosting Providers

 

Your suppliers and agency partners are also your business partners. At the very least, they should earn your trust. As service providers, your suppliers should think like you, and should value your business they way you do – and your hosting provider is not an exemption in the list.

The truth is, not all hosting providers are made equal, and definitely, not all of them can empathize with you. To make sure you are getting what you exactly need, below are the things you need to ask your hosting provider in terms of your hosting security.

Asking your hosting provider about security feature that will fend-off most malware and virus attack is mandatory. Also, it is in your best interest to ask them about how they handle such events and making sure that your data is protected.

However, as a client, you also need to closely monitor your company email users and their activities, as it will hit your server hard. Usually, malicious files are sent via unscrupulous emails that can sometimes pass through the spam filters. This thing should be dealt with utmost supervision on your end.

Hosting providers that give you support in this case is a plus point. That means that they care for your business.

  • Security Against Digital Attacks

As what we’ve previously mentioned in our former blog entry, hackers work harder to find ways on how to mine important data from various websites that they want to attack. Your server security should work as hard these hackers to safeguard your important business information stored in your database.

But in times, when securities can no longer keep hackers at bay, ask your provider if they have protocols that can help you salvage all files in your database, so as not to hamper your business operations.

It is a plus point if your provider has regular backups of your site to make the impact of the attack bearable for you as a client.

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This may not very a security feature, but this will be helpful for you. A hosting service provider with 24/7 support (either by chat or phone) is a must. The reason is that; perpetrators of malicious activities online are web inhabitants who work round the clock. There are chances that you might get caught in the middle of the night or during the wee hours when most of your IT personnel are off to bed or either out in the office with friends and their families.

The thing is, a 24/7 support feature gives you some sort of insurance that your provider is there to give you support when you need it the most – be it emergency cases of minuscule glitches.

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These are the main things that should be of your concern regarding your business. Other nitty-gritty can be handled by your IT team. If you don’t have one, you can rely on some companies you can provide you consultancy or even the service to keep your IT needs and concern on the check.

iManila is a trusted provider of both reliable hosting services and tech support service that surely covers small and medium businesses IT concerns. Our lines are open 24/7 and our sales executives are available Mondays to Fridays to assist you with your web, IT, and digital marketing queries.

Emails: [email protected] / [email protected] / [email protected] / [email protected]

Telephone numbers: (02) 490-0000, 01, 03 or at (02) 959-4807

Mobile number: (+63) 917-8476005

Website Hosting Features You Should Know

 

We have mentioned it many times, and we think, we became very repetitive about it – your hosting service needs tighter security because your primary online presence depends on it.

Imagine your website that took a lifetime to load, or sections of your websites that are vulnerable to attacks and malware – are these the kind of situation that will give you peace of mind? NO, it is not, and it never will. Everything your company owns online is your digital assets. These are the building blocks that you need to mobilize and protect, to keep your digital marketing going.

Now, to kick start your website hosting security feature knowledge, below are the basic web server features you need to be familiar with:

The truth is, your website is potentially under attack 24/7. And as your business flourishes and keeps on growing online, you are becoming an attractive prey to lurking malicious online criminals. With a malware detector feature, you get to secure your website by putting a reliable line of defense against security breaches and attacks.

iManila’s web hosting service provides a malware detector that monitors your website 24/7 for vulnerabilities and attacks. When we say monitors, that means that it screens every aspect of your web presence daily to identify security gaps. It not only checks your website, email, and applications, but also search engine blacklists and spam filters. It doesn’t just monitor; it also notifies your IT personnel about the findings with corresponding fixes to boost your security. That is one less burden on your back, enabling you to focus more on pressing matters concerning your business and the day to day operations.

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Securities are your first line of defenses. But as businesses like yours evolve, so are the hackers. Day by day, these people are working as hard as your online security to find fault and gaps that they can breach. And I mind you, they never stop, and probably they never will.

So iManila is integrating website backup feature to secure the latest backup version of your website. In this way, when your security features couldn’t keep up with these hackers, you can easily restore your website the way it is before the hacking incident.

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You and your company are working round the clock, so should your hosting server. We in iManila understands the worries and pains of businesses like yours – because we are also like you – driven to serve clients and grow as an organization. And all these things in mind will surely stretch you thin.

Important things like your hosting servers should always be secured even if you are not focusing on it all the time. That is why we at iManila has made it easy for businesses to secure the most important data and information in their websites by integrating these security features on our hosting services.

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Need some help? Contact Us right now!

Want some good news? If you do website revamp and transfer your hosting to us, your first year of hosting service is free with these security features.

Sounds good to you? Go ahead and email us at [email protected]

The Hidden Benefits of Dedicated Hosting Service

 

When you are working in a marketing department or most especially in the IT department, you heard about your web or email server a lot of times. You would probably hear the term dedicated hosting service too. During the days when you are having massive marketing campaigns online, you’ll probably make it your default process to make your website as the primary landing page. And in the midst of the campaign, you will definitely experience some unwanted glitches. Two of these glitches are slow loading time of the website and inaccessibility for a certain period of time. If your company website and even emails are hosted on a shared environment, then this occurrence is expected. These things are all related to your hosting server.

Below is a perfect example of a similar situation that can be possibly be attributed to hosting server issue.

Scenario 1

One best scenario that would also describe this kind of difficulty is the booking website of a known LCC (low-cost carriers) airlines here in the Philippines. This airline, which is famous for its super low flight price promo, runs Piso-fare which is an annual flight sale. You can book flights that are incredibly cheap in advance. When this happens, a lot of consumers who are also into booking cheap flights are complaining about the inaccessibility of the website. Some may have encountered booking a slot but are having a hard time processing the payment or worse, experiencing an expired session, prompting them to start booking again.

This is really frustrating for visitors and often leads to poor traffic and conversion.

The fault may not be solely due to the server – because the coding and programming quality are also factors to consider – but the hosting server holds a large portion of the responsibility for this matter.

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Scenario 2

Probably the most epic of all are the government websites. In some corporate documents and presentation, government data is very important in setting the road for strategic directions. And oftentimes, government websites failed us the time we need them the most.

However, there are government websites that are hands-on in managing and optimizing their websites. The office of the president and the vice president, the Philippine Statistical Authority, and the Department of Science and Technology are some of the offices that have tidy and performing websites.

Verdict

There are two potential reasons for this kind of scenarios:

Firstly, they could be using a shared hosting environment and haven’t anticipated the surging visits to their websites – hence the problem of downtime and slow loading time.

Secondly, they could be using a dedicated hosting environment, but not solely dedicated to their websites. It is possible that even the webmails and other intra-agency files that eat the buffer space that should be used, in times of surging web visits.

Dedicated Hosting Server for your Website

The thing is, before signing a contract or allocating server space for your website, you need to have a background of your industry’s competition first. If you are catering to end consumer with built-in product catalog, you might want to consider a dedicated server for your website.

Why?

Because, catering to end consumer means, capturing a larger audience than those of the companies who deal with businesses. And usually, tangible products which are fast-moving are much prone to bloating web visits. Another consideration is if you’re a publisher. Publishers experience doubled the traffic of FMCGs. If you are either of the two, you need to go for a dedicated web hosting.

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Hidden Benefits

Sometimes we take things at face value. When it’s pricey, we turn it down. When it is a little cheaper, we go for it. The truth is, things that are priced cheap are often limited or capped. Those that are expensive will last longer and are flexible, and the same thing goes for hosting services.

Shared hosting environment is practically affordable because it is meant for website owners that are not into online commerce of publishing. An info site that is made as a reference site for the company, won’t consume much. That is why shared hosting server will do – even with email hosting in it.

  • Greater security and flexibility

Compared with shared hosting server, the dedicated server gives webmasters and web owners the flexibility that they need. Dedicated Hosting also comes with a better security because you don’t need to worry about other tenants that you are sharing the server with. In short, you have the full control of the server.

Dedicated hosting services usually come with support too. When you are having troubles managing the environment, you can contact your provider and seek some help. We at iManila, we don’t just provide support, we provide 24/7 support to make sure our hosting clients are well taken care of.

Since you are using the entire environment for your own benefit, that means the resources are all yours to use. That means that even when there are unexpected surges of web visits, your website is still up and running. Here in iManila, our servers guarantee a 99.95% uptime.

This is the best part. Since dedicated servers are flexible, you have enough room to scale-up your environment should the need for it arises. Will all the evolution of media consumption, the trend is always going up. People are more demanding in terms of content. Gone are the days of text and images, as people are starting to get accustomed to rich media such as plotagraphs, GIF animation, motion graphic and videos. These file formats are seriously eating up spaces, and once you are compelled to use them, a scalable dedicated server is your only choice.

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With the fast evolving online community obsolescence is the only constant word to describe it. Megabytes are now just a child’s play, and who knows? The terabytes might be the next end users’ USB making hosting servers much bigger than they are now. With dedicated hosting, you have the power to scale up anytime you want, and with the support and security that comes with it, you can be sure that your website can meet the demands of the coming years.

For inquiries about web and email hosting service, you can call iManila at (02) 490-0000 or through the direct landline of our tech support guys at (02) 959-4807. You can also send us a direct mail at [email protected] or fill-out our contact forms through this LINK.

 

 

POP or IMAP: Which one’s best for you?

 

One thing is certain for most of us, we read our email as often as how we read our social media notifications. It is the culture of always being connected that brings almost all of us to stick with our devices whenever wherever. And in the spirit of the modern connectivity, it is common for most corporate employees to access their emails in almost all of the device that they are using. This has blurred the lines between work and personal lives for corporate workers and even to some professionals.

And the truth that is just lying in front of us is that our lives are now entangled with our email addresses – with our emails – whether we like it or not. The modern world compelled us to be reliant on our email addresses in almost all of our activities online. It houses some of the most important information about us such as log-in details to other accounts, mobile banking, e-commerce, and even with government-related transactions.

And in dealing with your emails, you might have encountered the terms POP and IMAP a lot of times, especially when setting up your remote email server. Using a Mac book? You’ve probably done this to your Mac Mail. Or are you a windows user? You surely did this to your Outlook too. The same thing goes for Gmail client app for Android and iCloud email for iPhones.

If you are wondering what the terminologies like POP and IMAP, refer to backgrounder below.

History of POP

Post Office Protocol or what we know as POP was developed as a simple means of accessing emails remotely back in 1984. This release required login usual login credentials like username and password to download all the email at once. In 1985, POP2 was released which has provided a greater and better range of commands and replies compared to the first POP release.  POP2 also allowed users to choose to read only one message instead of downloading their entire email inbox at the same time. Lastly, in 1988, the release of POP3 has made accommodations of the easy and efficient way of retrieving emails on their personal computers. In was noted that since 1998, no updates of changes have been made to POP marking 14 years of stagnancy which somewhat equates to obsolescence in today’s fast-evolving online community.

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History of IMAP

On the other hand, Stanford Computer Scientist Mark Crispin developed the first IMAP at the Stanford Knowledge Systems Laboratory.  This protocol served as an alternative to POP by bringing in a two-way protocol that provides greater functionality for users.

Shortly after its first release, another release was launched carrying the revision made to the first IMAP. The next revision was released in the 1990s known as IMAP2bis. This was provided for the use of Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME), which allowed an increase in the number of functions used in managing mailboxes.

Email and password encryption made the last revision of IMAP as IMAP4 rev1 has been released in 1996.

So which one is best for me?

Since we’ve gone through histories, which is admittedly a little boring, let’s get down to business. In this era of connectivity, the efficient way of managing mailboxes is an imperative. And speaking of efficiently managing mailboxes. IMAP is the appropriate setup.

Why?

IMAP has the ability to synchronously update mailboxes remotely. And for people who are using multiple devices, IMAP is the way to go. Since updates are done synchronously, managing your mailboxes doesn’t take so much effort.

POP, on the other hand, relies on downloading the entire mailboxes remotely. This protocol won’t allow synchronous updates making it confusing and difficult to manage multiple mailboxes.

Worry not, because modern devices use IMAP as the default set-up for their email apps. And if by chance you’re still caught up in an old email client server, here are the following signs that would tell you that you’re using a POP configuration:

Sign 1: If I create folders on one of my devices, they are not replicated on others

Sign 2: If I read an email on one of my devices, I see it as unread on others

Sign 3: If I delete an email on one of my devices, I still see it on others

Once you have determined that you’re in POP setup, you need to call the attention of your IT personnel to set up to IMAP. Remember, you need some assistance from the tech guys to make sure your mailboxes are intact as you migrate to another protocol.

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And if by chance you’re looking for competent IT guys to help you out troubleshoot this kind of dilemmas, call us at (02) 490-0000. You can also send us an email via [email protected].

 

 

 

Reference: pop2imap.com

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