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Epicor DMT: Data Management Tool Tips & Tricks

Epicor DMT: Data Management Tool Tips & Tricks

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The Magic of Epicor DMT Licensing

 

A common user challenge over the years with Epicor’s Data Management Tool (DMT) relates to the licensing of the actual module. Epicor DMT came from a very different evolutionary thread than the main application, and when trying to bind these threads, things often become tangled.

 

Licensing can be especially twisted, and more than a few us have felt the frustration of figuring out just who to send the license request to. Then remembering that we needed to cull the list of Company IDs from the database to be licensed. Then anxiously waiting for the returned file to arrive, hoping that we weren’t going to receive, by accident, a license file configured for a manufacturer of manure spreaders, headquartered in Glasgow.

 

But fear not, dear users. Epicor provides us a DMT remedy. For versions less than 10.02.5xx, you will still need to send Epicor a list of your Company IDs so that they can generate the appropriate license file for your use. But for versions 10.02.5xx and above, the DMT license is now included as part of your E10 license and is no longer reliant on your Company IDs.

 

As you can see below, DMT can now be licensed through Epicor’s standard license, which removes the need to drop individual DMT license files in user client folders. This greatly simplifies the deployment of the Epicor DMT application.

 

Epicor DMT Data Management Tool Tips and Tricks

 

That said, there are a couple of related tricks that can help you separate the forks from the sporks in your Epicor kitchen. One way to identify your DMT licensing from the DMT application itself is to utilize the settings icon at the bottom of the application and open the “DMT License Info”:

 

 

Epicor Data Management Tool

This will raise a properties window, providing details about the DMT license:

Epicor DMT License Information

 

DMT is a client-based application. Therefore, much of the magic behind the DMT module is to be found in the application’s client folder.  This includes licensing. Going back to our talk about license, it’s important to understand that for a DMT client to function correctly, one of the following must be the case:

 

• DMT must be licensed in Epicor’s Standard License file, which is installed on the application server.
• A traditional DMT .lic file must be deployed in the user’s client folder, where the DMT application normally resides.

 

Let us, as an example, assume we’re in a situation in which DMT is not licensed through the Admin Console license file. In lieu of the main license, a DMT-specific .lic file will need to reside in the client folder:

 
Epicor Search Client

 

Were I to remove the .lic file from the client folder…

 

EstesGroup Client Screen

 

…upon my attempt to log into DMT, I will receive a licensing error:

 

Module License Configuration

 

As such, if you don’t have the DMT module licensed through the Admin Console, you’ll need to make sure you’re still planting the company-specific license file in the appropriate client folders. If you think about it in the sense of a cooking motif, you can think of it as a situation in which the pantry is emptier than Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, the grocery store delivery is still a day out, and your mask is at the bottom of the laundry basket. Sometimes you need to cook with only what’s already in your house. Just like your dinner occasionally falls together as a tasty combination of tomato soup and wanton noodles, you’ll sometimes need to get a company-configured license file and stick it in your client folder. With these steps, you can get the Epicor DMT program to run.

 

 

DMT is great in an E10 Upgrade.

EternalBlue Hacks & Tales from the Unpatched (Video)

EternalBlue Hacks & Tales from the Unpatched (Video)

EternalBlue Hacking Tools

EternalBlue, which is an ancient set of hacks — ancient: going back three years — is still applicable, especially in regard to some of the technology and vulnerabilities that we are seeing today. EternalBlue is a software that the NSA developed to hack Windows machines. The goal was to break into a computer (without telling the owner “someone’s there”) — and then run a software of choice. Windows contains more than two millions lines of code, so nobody, even at Microsoft, really knows what it’s all doing, and vulnerabilities are found every day. EternalBlue hacks targeted some of those vulnerabilities.

Running Windows makes you vulnerable by default. Linux, Mac, Android, iPhone — they’re all vulnerable because we’ve reached the state of complexity in the operating systems that we choose to run that it’s just a matter of time before new ways are found to break into these systems. Online trickery happens, and people download malware thinking they’re getting a good piece of software. For example, there was once a program called Whack-a-Mole. It was known to have a Trojan in it, so if hackers were able to convince you “hey, this is the coolest game in town,” then your machine would be infected. When hackers are trying to break into a machine, whether through a means like Whack-a-Mole or through an EternalBlue hack, they’re trying to do it surreptitiously, invisibly. They don’t want you to know because, if you knew, you might do something like reboot. This led the hackers to ratchet up what we call the “persistence” of malware, so that maybe it could survive a reboot.

If you’ve ever had a browser toolbar appear in Internet Explorer, or Chrome or Firefox or Edge, or any other browser, that toolbar probably has the rights to see wherever you’re surfing and modify the webpages that you get back, and can even interact with you. A toolbar is a very visual indicator that “you’ve been hacked.” Is that toolbar interested in stealing your passwords and learning your PayPal login and modifying what you visit and how you see it? Maybe, maybe not. But it’s an indication that you’re running untrusted software. Going out to the web and downloading a piece of software because it looks interesting is almost a guaranteed way to get hacked.

 

EternalBlue Hacker

 

WannaCry

 

Malware programmers write apps, publish them and they get downloaded, and in the background there’s a malware stealing passwords, modifying webpages, looking at your identity — those are all activities I would consider hacks — and that’s what EternalBlue is. In short, it leverages a vulnerability that the NSA found in the Microsoft SMB protocol. They found that if they hurled a packet that was the right size in the right shape, it would shove a square peg into a round hole, and the round hole wouldn’t know what to do, and so it would execute a buffer overflow attack. Windows wasn’t expecting a square peg in a round hole, so it would trip, fall down, and execute code of the attacker’s choice. EternalBlue hacks took advantage of a “round” Server Message Block (SMB) hole, and as that SMB failed, it could run a Trojan, or blue screen a computer, or download a piece of malware.

 

Less than thirty days after EternalBlue got into the hands of cybercriminals, a nasty bug called WannaCry was released to the world. It made you want to cry because it was ransomware. It used EternalBlue as the delivery exploit, so as soon as WannaCry got a foothold inside a corporate network, it would jump from machine to machine to machine and ransom. By the next year, EternalBlue hacks had cost companies and industries billions of dollars, and 65 countries have fallen to EternalBlue’s vulnerability and have been ransomed or hacked in some fashion. Why? Because even after Microsoft released a patch, millions of computers were unprotected because people didn’t patch.

 

 

Patching… and more than patching

 

Cybercriminals are continually waiting for time, opportunity, and tools to be able to successfully hack into your system. To prevent it, we do a number of things. We patch our machines, we turn on our firewalls, and we don’t let people be local administrators. We make sure our antivirus is current. But we need more than antivirus because hackers now have toolkits to program custom malware. They don’t have to know about EternalBlue hacks if they have a malware toolkit. These toolkits change malware by a byte or two bytes, which changes the signature of the program. As a result, the antivirus software, which is looking for signatures, can’t detect the malware. This designer malware is specifically written for a particular company. The malware is one-of-a-kind and still does the same EternalBlue exploit. Because of this dark web exchange of malware toolkits and designer ransomware, more robust cybersecurity measures, like endpoint security, are needed to keep our businesses safe.

 

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In-House, Web-Based or Private Cloud Solutions

In-House, Web-Based or Private Cloud Solutions

If only purchasing software for business enablement could be as simple as tapping a button in an app — click once for on-premise installation, twice for web-based deployment, thrice for private cloud solutions. When considering software, users normally think about features and capabilities intuitively — making big decisions seem easy at first. This stems from the hope that core data and program logic is consistent across platforms.

Server virtualization, the World Wide Web and cloud computing have changed the dynamics of software development, acquisition, installation and deployment.

 

However, new technology often becomes a point of stagnancy, or even complacency, for businesses. This can sometimes result from hesitancy, but it’s often caused by oblivion.

private cloud solutions

 

How Will You Know What You Don’t Know?

 

Technology changes quickly, and the evolutions now, more often than not, push web-based and private cloud solutions away from the realm of preference and into the world of necessity. When I first entered the business field in the 90s, I never would have imagined that I could license a software application on a subscription service, much like I do a newspaper or magazine. My mind hadn’t even conceptualized the idea that a software application could be accessed entirely through the World Wide Web. Back in the day, we were just trying to make it through Y2K in one piece. But as the technology advanced, the options and opportunities presented themselves, and now more than two decades later, I increasingly work with companies engaging software in a cloud context.

 

 

IT Symbiosis

 

The industry shift to public and private cloud solutions has not only changed the very way in which applications are deployed, it has also leveled the playing field. Your company can now outsource some or all of your IT needs, allowing for growth within a predictable technology budget. A partnership with a managed services firm provides updates, compliance, security, training — all from a specialized team built specifically to adapt 24/7 to the volatile growth inherent to IT. Companies no longer need to house their own elaborate, expensive IT departments to keep up with the times. In light of recent cybercrime upswings, this is a critical time to focus on the survival of small and midsize businesses, which often face closure upon ransomware or other security breaches.

 

Since technology evolves on a daily basis, it’s always time for your team to consider new possibilities to protect the future of your business. If your architecture is outdated, or you’re overdue for a security audit, it might be time to get a full analysis of your IT infrastructure. Moving from on-premise servers to hosted, cloud-based environments can be one way to ensure business continuity. That said, “the cloud” might not be the right fit for your business, so let’s look more closely at business enablement through three common deliveries, which can be infinitely customized into hybrid forms.

 

 

The Basics

 

The deployment of an application normally takes on one of the following forms:

  • On-Premise: In an on-premise installation, the application is installed on an on-premise, in-house server. It can be like having a furnace closet or an underground mad scientist laboratory, depending on the size of the company and the specific technology burden.
  • Cloud-Hosted: Cloud-hosted applications are installed on a virtual server, which means they are hosted in the cloud. Hosted solutions often replicate an on-premise architecture. Ease of backups, cybersecurity, updates and compliance are common reasons businesses choose cloud-based solutions. This option allows organizations to leverage 100% of the application features that are available in an on-premise install.
  • Web-Based: A web-based deployment foregoes installation entirely — it’s based on subscribing to an application that is already installed, deployed, and interacting with the application through web-based protocols.

 

A common trope of cloud computing with regard to on-premise installations has to do with the limits in physical contact that it presents — you can’t go down the hall and hug your servers. I’ve never actually tried to hug a server, but I think it would feel rather strange to do so. This hug-ability factor speaks to the level of control that companies possess when they install an application on their in-house server stack. There might be problems with this approach, but at least the company owns the problems and their resolutions. Moreover, when it comes to hugging, data is a much more recognizable object of affection. I can think of countless times that I have tried to “get my arms around the data” when working on a project. Access to the data layer is often an important feature, especially when performing custom reporting, and in some cases, the abstraction of the data layer present in web-based applications may make it hard to understand just what is happening to the data itself, making reporting a challenge.

 

Purely web-based versions of an application provide the core capabilities, but the features and functionalities available in a web-based version tend to be limited when compared to their on-premise counterparts. Consider Microsoft’s Office 365 suite. While highly similar to a client install, there are some limitations to the things we can accomplish in the web version of Excel, for instance, when compared to its client-based counterpart. Working with ERP systems, I’ve found this trend to be consistent — if you’re leveraging a web-version of an application, expect to be privy to a subset of the overall functionality available with an on-premise version. And if you’re utilizing a version that is entirely web-based, tailor your expectations accordingly.

 

Speaking of tailoring, the ability to alter an application to fit your company’s needs also tends to be greatly reduced in web-based applications when compared to on-premise counterparts. By tailoring, I am referring to the ability to insert user-defined data or business logic into your application and have this custom functionality work in conjunction with the application’s standard behavior. In some ways this limitation is a good thing, as I’ve certainly seen companies entangle themselves in their own tailored threads. Conversely, a little tailoring can yield big gains in efficiency and effectiveness. As it is, a company purchasing web-based software out-of-the-box should understand what is in the box and only in the box, and that the box can’t be easily repurposed.

 

Depending on the application in question and the needs of the business, I‘ve found private cloud solutions to be a nice midpoint between the two poles of on-premise and web-based architectures. Cloud hosting specifically allows companies to possess fully-featured applications in the cloud, avoiding the problems associated with on-premise installations. This affords a measure of control unavailable with pure web-based applications. Moreover, it creates the levels of functionality and customizability that allow companies to do more than the basics. And should the company need assistance in the management of their application stack, we can cleanly pull in additional resources to lend a hand. Hosted applications also offer a variety of administration options — from in-house talent to partnered resources — and can adapt efficiently to new technology.

 

Dark Web Protection: Assessment, Awareness & Actualization

Dark Web Protection: Assessment, Awareness & Actualization

Deep Web

Business owners, especially those who have been through the challenges involved in a data breach, often hope the dark web goes completely dark — as in nonexistent. Wouldn’t it be nice if trending IT services, like advanced web scans and security audits, go out with the times? For now, the illegal realm of the dark web makes history every day, so companies must work nonstop to predict cyber threats and stay a step ahead of the hackers.

 

Dark Exposure

 

The dark web is an encrypted network of criminal intent. The deep web, conversely, provides a safe haven for your private information. By law, you need to keep most of your business data hidden from public view. You don’t want your financial information or your employees’ social security numbers exposed, and neither does the government. Whether you’re a manufacturing company in the heart of Denver, Colorado, or a distribution business with hubs across the country, you need hidden security — call it “dark web” protection — for massive amounts of corporate data. This means you’ll need to keep your real-time data and your backups in the deep web and out of the dark web.

 

The deep web is essential to privacy, compliance, safety and security. Like the illegal areas of the web, it’s built from non-indexed pages. Your company’s network is not revealed to random viewers because it’s kept hidden in the deep web — unless you suffer a data breach that exposes your information to malcontents.

 

 

To Breach Their Own

 

People feel vulnerable online and are somewhat aware that cyber danger is lurking. However, data breaches often originate in too much trust or in lack of communication surrounding network trust issues. Your users trust an email and get phished, or they trust “12345” as a solid password. Could the problem be that your users trust the company to protect them? Does your team assume that strong security solutions are already in place? Here are some of the common reasons, stemming from the trust factor, that your business could suffer cyber attacks:

  • spam email
  • weak passwords
  • unprotected mobile devices
  • delayed software updates

Mix these with user oblivion (or trust) and flimsy (or outdated) policies, and your company is at high risk for a cyber attack.

 

 

“A” for Security

 

Let’s now look at 3 “Easy A” ways you can create safe deep web data:

  • Assessment: A security audit is an excellent way to surface your network’s weak points. You can immediately see vulnerabilities and close openings that could bring in hacker traffic.
  • Awareness: Users often trust the system. Cybersecurity awareness training, such as a fire drill phishing attack, can educate users about current cyber risks and prepare them for real-time attacks.
  • Actualization: Enriching and enforcing security policies, updating hardware and software, advancing network protection measures — there are hundreds of ways to make advanced security a reality for your company.

 

When was the last time you had a security audit? Have you ever clicked on a suspicious link because of mental fatigue or, the opposite, heightened curiosity? When did you last test your backups? Install updates? Scan the dark web for your private data? Did you ever turn off multi-factor authentication because it was annoying? If you assess your system and close obvious gaps, train the users accessing your corporate network, and actualize things like security in the cloud and advanced endpoint security, you can leave the hacker chapter out of your company’s history books.

 

 

 

Are you ready to protect your business from the hackers?

Our team can help you with assessment, awareness and actualization.