Choosing the right IT partner

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has recently published some useful guidance on choosing a Managed Service Provider (MSP), and much of it comes down to something quite simple: trust.

Your MSP potentially has access to some of the most important parts of your business, so they should look after your systems with the same care they would their own.

That means getting the basics right: using multi-factor authentication, keeping clear audit logs, limiting administrative access and making sure systems are properly patched and maintained. Just as importantly, your MSP should be proactive, spotting potential problems before they become outages or security incidents and responding quickly when something does go wrong.

A good MSP should feel less like an external supplier and more like an extension of your team: approachable, dependable and genuinely interested in keeping your business running safely.

The NCSC also points businesses towards Microsoft’s security best-practice guidance for Microsoft 365. Apollo can review your Microsoft 365 environment against these recommendations and help implement the appropriate changes.

Not every recommended security feature is included with every Microsoft 365 licence, so we’ll also identify where additional licensing may be worthwhile, rather than simply recommending upgrades unnecessarily.

One area we would add to Microsoft’s guidance is independent Microsoft 365 backup. Microsoft provides resilience and retention features, but we recommend a separate backup service to give businesses an additional layer of protection against accidental deletion, malicious activity and data loss.

The aim is simple: sensible security, appropriate protection and no unnecessary complexity.