Small firms prove 'easy to hack'

Surveys suggest many small businesses would not notice a cyber-security breach Continue reading the main storyRelated StoriesHackers crack corporate computersMI5 issues cyber-attacks warningSmall firms 'easy targets' for cyber crime Small businesses - those employing a few hundred people or less - are increasingly becoming the target of hackers.

They may not think they have any data worth stealing but even the smallest company can be custodian to information that represents hard cash to criminal gangs: credit card details, customers' names and addresses, or the designs vital to an innovative start-up - all have a ready criminal market.

When attention grabbing headlines such as "UK suffering 1,000 attacks an hour" are reported there is a tendency to assume this as an issue only for the larger enterprises; household names that we think of as the powerhouse of our economy.

However, that is a dangerous mistake to make.

There is mounting evidence that small businesses could be our Achilles heel when it comes to cyber-security. And, it is these small businesses which are the foundations upon which our economy rests: destabilise them and everything else comes crashing down.

Weak protection

Over the past 12 months a number of surveys have emerged which suggest that in excess of 60% of these small businesses have suffered some form of successful malware attack.

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Nexus 4 Is a Great Value With Small Improvements

The Nexus 4’s Photo Sphere feature shows a 360-degree image, in which you can pan around to see up and down as well as side to side. Blue dots guide the photo taker.

And the Nexus 4 is missing two important features: The ability to use LTE, the most consistently speedy 4G network in the U.S.; and a memory capacity greater than 16 gigabytes, the amount most smartphones start with. The new phone also lacks a memory-expansion slot. The phone’s most touted new capability, the ability to capture 360-degree pictures, worked poorly in my tests.

Otherwise, I found the latest Nexus to be a solid, reliable, phone and a good value. On Nov. 13, Google will begin selling it starting at $299 for an unlocked version — one that has no carrier plan or contract — with a puny 8GB of internal storage. A 16 gigabyte unlocked version will cost $349. You’ll have to add the cost of a contract or prepaid plan from T-Mobile, AT&T or carriers that use the same network technology to those prices (the phone won’t work on Verizon or Sprint). T-Mobile will be offering the 16GB version for $199 with a two-year contract. To grasp how inexpensive the Nexus 4 is, consider that Samsung’s popular Galaxy SIII is about $550 unlocked, $199 with a two-year contract.

The Nexus 4, built for Google by LG of Korea, has a large 4.7-inch screen with high resolution, higher than Apple’s 4-inch Retina display on the iPhone 5, though with slightly fewer pixels per inch because it’s spread over a larger display. The new Nexus is 20 percent thicker than the iPhone 5 and 24 percent heavier. But its curved rear edges made it feel comfortable in my hand.

It’s made of plastic, but is clad in relatively sturdy Gorilla Glass 2 on both front and back. There’s a 1.3-megapixel camera on the front and an 8-megapixel camera on the back. These cameras took sharp, vivid pictures and videos and you can apply filters to snapshots.

While I didn’t do a formal battery test, the Nexus 4 lasted a full workday in mixed use, including Web surfing, lots of app use, email, texting, viewing of short videos, occasional music playback and voice calling.

A new feature in the Nexus 4 allows you to charge the battery, which is sealed inside, without plugging in an adapter, by merely placing it on a charging pad plugged into the wall. These pads, which Google doesn’t sell, must comply with an industry standard called Qi. I had mixed results trying this. I tested it on two Qi pads and only one worked with the Nexus 4.

Instead of LTE, the Nexus 4 relies on a 4G standard called HSPA

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