Initial It

Initial It Making IT simple, secure, and personal for professional services firms. No jargon, no hassle, just friendly support that lets you focus on your business

Initial IT is a Lichfield-based IT company supporting UK businesses with 10 to 100 staff. Since 2007, we've helped solicitors, accountants, surveyors and family-owned firms across Staffordshire and the West Midlands stay productive, secure and audit-ready. Services: managed IT support, cyber security, Microsoft 365, Teams Phone, IT consultancy, Copilot rollouts and digital dictation. UK helpdesk.

Senior engineers on every account. Plain English, not acronym soup. Cyber Essentials accredited. Microsoft Partner. 2025 Global Recognition Award winner. 5.0 stars from 53+ Google reviews. Covering Lichfield, Birmingham, Tamworth, Cannock, Sutton Coldfield, Walsall, Burton upon Trent and Derby.

Windows 10 still feels fine.Until October.Extended Security Updates buy you time. They are not a strategy. From October ...
27/05/2026

Windows 10 still feels fine.

Until October.

Extended Security Updates buy you time. They are not a strategy. From October 2026, Windows 10 stops getting patches for good.

For most UK SMBs of 5 to 100 staff, the answer is a calm Windows 11 upgrade plan over the next few months, not a panicked weekend in autumn.

I have written the plain English version of what to do, who is affected, and how to plan the upgrade waves without the drama.

Read it here: https://initialit.co.uk/post/windows-10-extended-support-ending-uk/


https://initialit.co.uk/post/windows-10-extended-support-ending-uk/

If you receive a message saying a large Apple Pay payment has been blocked and you need to call a number urgently… STOP ...
26/05/2026

If you receive a message saying a large Apple Pay payment has been blocked and you need to call a number urgently…

STOP 🚩

There’s a new scam circulating that targets Apple users, and it’s very convincing.

The email or text usually claims that a high-value purchase has been attempted using your Apple Pay details.

It might mention suspicious activity, a blocked transaction, or even a fake case number. The branding looks polished. The formatting feels official.

Really? The phone number in the message connects you directly to scammers.

The tactic is simple.

Create anxiety about losing a significant amount of money, then offer a quick solution 😱

When people believe their account is under threat, they’re more likely to act without double-checking.

Once on the phone, the criminals typically try to gather your Apple ID login details, verification codes sent to your device, or card information.

With that, they can attempt to take control of your account ⚠️

Here are a few important facts:

Apple does not send fraud alerts asking you to call a number included in an email or text message.

It also doesn’t use aggressive language suggesting your account will be locked if you don’t respond immediately.

That kind of urgency is a common phishing technique 🎣

If you ever receive something like this, check the sender’s email address carefully.

It may look genuine at first glance, but small spelling errors or unusual domain names often give it away.

Generic greetings li

Some businesses feel like they’re constantly dealing with IT problems.A system slows down or something stops working. Pe...
25/05/2026

Some businesses feel like they’re constantly dealing with IT problems.

A system slows down or something stops working. People report it, wait for it to be fixed, and then carry on until the next issue appears.

But others rarely seem to have those disruptions.

What’s the difference?

It comes down to the way they approach their IT…

Do you use an Android phone for work? 📱 Security researchers have uncovered a new piece of Android malware that c...
24/05/2026

Do you use an Android phone for work? 📱

Security researchers have uncovered a new piece of Android malware that can track almost everything you do on it.

And I don’t mean basic tracking.

We’re talking:

👉 PIN entries�
👉 Login credentials�
👉 Messages�
👉 Banking app activity

The clever (and worrying) part is how it spreads 🦠

The app is called TrustBastion.

It pretends to be a security tool. Victims see pop-ups or adverts claiming their phone is infected with malware or scam messages.

The “solution”? Install this app to clean things up.

That fear tactic works more often than you’d think 😱

At first glance, the app looks harmless. But it’s what’s known as a dropper.

That means the app itself doesn’t contain the malicious code straight away. Instead, it downloads it after installation.

Once installed, it shows a fake “update” screen that looks very similar to official Android or Google Play messages.

If you agree, a manipulated APK file (that’s the installation package format Android uses) is downloaded in the background.

But the download doesn’t come from some obviously shady server. It comes from Hugging Face, a well-known developer and AI platform with a strong reputation.

The infrastructure looks legitimate, so many security tools don’t immediately flag it as suspicious. The attackers hide behind a trusted name.

After installation, the malware requests extensive permissions and pretends to be a system component called “Phone Security”.

It then

If you spend a big chunk of your week inside Microsoft Teams, small changes can make a surprisingly big difference.There...
23/05/2026

If you spend a big chunk of your week inside Microsoft Teams, small changes can make a surprisingly big difference.

There are a few new features on the way that are worth knowing about, especially if meetings and collaboration are part of your daily routine.

Let’s start with the one I think many people will love 💛

You’ll soon be able to hide the entire meeting control toolbar.

You know the bar at the top or bottom of a Teams meeting with mute, camera, share screen, leave, and so on?

That can now be completely hidden, giving you more screen space during meetings.

If you’re presenting, reviewing a spreadsheet, or looking at detailed content, that extra space matters. It feels cleaner and less cluttered.

And this isn’t just a one-time setting. If you choose to hide it, that preference sticks across meetings.

Worried you’ll lose control?

You won’t.

You can bring the toolbar back instantly by hovering your mouse or pressing the Tab key.

Keyboard shortcuts for things like mute still work whether the bar is visible or not.

It’s a small tweak, but it makes Teams feel less intrusive and more focused.

There’s also an upgrade coming to the image viewer 🔎

If someone shares multiple images in a chat, you’ll be able to scroll through all of them in one place.

Even better, the viewer will show the original message header so you can jump straight back to where that image was posted.

If you’ve ever scrolled endlessly trying to find that screenshot from last week, this will

The Start menu is one of those things people don’t often think about, unless it changes 😄Windows 11 has rolled out a red...
22/05/2026

The Start menu is one of those things people don’t often think about, unless it changes 😄

Windows 11 has rolled out a redesigned Start menu, and more devices are now seeing it automatically.

If it hasn’t appeared on yours yet, it likely will soon.

But this isn’t a radical overhaul. It’s more of a tidy-up than a revolution 😅

Microsoft says it wanted to keep the original “Start” promise: A place where you begin your work. But it also wanted it to feel quicker, calmer, and more personal.

So what’s different?

At the top, you still have a search bar. That’s intentional. Microsoft wants search to be the fastest way to jump straight to an app, file, or setting.

Below that, you’ve got your pinned apps, the shortcuts you choose to keep there.

Then comes the part people have strong opinions about… the Recommended section.

This shows suggested files and apps based on what you’ve been working on. Microsoft says it added this because people wanted smarter suggestions that learn in real time.

But you can now turn it off 🚫

If you don’t like the Recommended feed, you can disable it in: Settings > Personalisation > Start.

There’s a toggle for showing recommended files and recent items.

The catch is that this also switches off recent items in File Explorer and in the taskbar’s right-click menus. It’s not completely isolated.

Another noticeable change is how all your apps are displayed.

Instead of digging into a long alphabetical list and scrolling endlessly, there’s no

Have you ever gone into Windows settings to check your storage… and been hit with one of those “Do you want to allow thi...
17/05/2026

Have you ever gone into Windows settings to check your storage… and been hit with one of those “Do you want to allow this?” pop-ups?

That’s not random 😱

Windows 11 has introduced a security change that affects the Storage section inside Settings.

Now, when you open Settings → System → Storage, Windows triggers a User Account Control (UAC) prompt.

UAC is the security pop-up that asks for permission before allowing changes that could affect the system.

If you’re using an admin account, you click “Yes” and carry on as normal.

But if you’re not an admin, and on a business machine where staff have standard user accounts you may not be, you’ll be blocked from accessing the Storage panel unless you enter the admin password.

In simple terms, Windows is putting a small lock on the storage controls 🔐

Storage settings allow you to delete files, manage drives, and remove system data.

If someone with limited access decided to start “cleaning up” without understanding what they were deleting, it could cause problems.

It also adds a minor extra hurdle if an unauthorised person gains access to the machine locally.

It’s not going to stop a determined attacker on its own, but layered security is about reducing easy wins.

From a business perspective, this is sensible.

In most companies, staff shouldn’t have full control over system storage anyway. Limiting access to more sensitive settings reduces accidental damage.

The only slightly awkward part is that this change arrived wi

If I asked you where your biggest security risks sit, you’d probably say email, passwords, or maybe remote access, right...
16/05/2026

If I asked you where your biggest security risks sit, you’d probably say email, passwords, or maybe remote access, right?

Very few business owners would point at Excel or PowerPoint.

And yet, Office apps are one of the most common entry points attackers use ☠️

That’s why Microsoft has released an updated security baseline for Microsoft 365 Office apps.

It’s a tightening of the screws behind the scenes 🪛

In simple terms, a security baseline is Microsoft’s recommended “secure settings template”.

IT admins can apply it to make Word, Excel, PowerPoint and the rest more resistant to modern attack methods.

This latest version focuses heavily on reducing the risk created by older components and external connections.

Take Excel, for example. If a spreadsheet contains a link to pull in data from an external source, and that source is blocked under your security rules, Excel will now refuse to refresh it.

You will see an error instead.

Attackers often hide malicious data connections inside spreadsheets.

If Excel automatically reaches out to an untrusted source, that can create an opportunity for compromise.

Stopping that automatic refresh removes a potential weakness.

In PowerPoint, Microsoft is disabling OLE content.

OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) is a long-standing technology that allows content from other applications to be embedded into files.

It has legitimate uses, but it has also been exploited in the past. Reducing reliance on older embedding mechanis

Confidence in business technology often comes down to whether you know what’s happening behind the scenes.Could you answ...
15/05/2026

Confidence in business technology often comes down to whether you know what’s happening behind the scenes.

Could you answer a few simple questions about your backups, security settings, and how quickly systems could recover if something went wrong?

If you’ve ever logged into SharePoint late at night to fix something quickly, you’ll understand this one 😅Microsoft is a...
10/05/2026

If you’ve ever logged into SharePoint late at night to fix something quickly, you’ll understand this one 😅

Microsoft is adding dark mode to the SharePoint admin centre.

Now, before you think this is just a cosmetic tweak, hear me out 👂

For years, most of the Microsoft 365 admin portals have supported dark mode. Exchange. Teams. The main Microsoft 365 admin centre.

But SharePoint? Bright white screen.

Every time.

If you prefer dark mode (and a lot of people do), jumping into SharePoint always felt a bit… jarring.

That’s finally being fixed 🎉

Admins will now be able to switch between light and dark themes inside the SharePoint admin centre.

It’s optional. Nothing is being forced on anyone.

And importantly:

• This doesn’t change any settings�
• It doesn’t affect end users
• It doesn’t require any preparation
• It’s purely about visual comfort and accessibility

Dark mode reduces the amount of bright light your screen emits. For people working long hours, or logging in during the evening to deal with an issue, it can reduce eye strain and make the experience more comfortable 🌙

It’s not going to revolutionise your business, but small quality-of-life improvements matter more than people think.

There’s also a consistency benefit here.

If you’ve already chosen dark mode across other Microsoft 365 portals, SharePoint will now align with that preference instead of standing out like a floodlight.

Switching it on is simple: Open the SharePoint admin centre from

One of the most common frustrations I see inside growing businesses isn’t technical, it’s this:“Who in the company knows...
09/05/2026

One of the most common frustrations I see inside growing businesses isn’t technical, it’s this:

“Who in the company knows how to do this?” 🤔

You’ve got 15, 30, maybe 80 people. Talent everywhere.

But when a specific task pops up, data protection question, Power BI report, client onboarding process tweak, you’re not always sure who’s best placed to handle it.

Microsoft Teams is about to make that easier.

A new feature is being added that lets people list their skills directly on their Microsoft 365 profile card inside Teams.

When you click on someone’s name in Teams, you’ll be able to see what they’re good at, not just their job title.

Say goodbye to “Accounts Manager” or “IT Technician.”

Say hello to skills like:

📍 Contract negotiation�
📍 Cyber security audits�
📍 Excel automation�
📍 Client presentations�
📍 HR compliance

It means managers can quickly see who’s suited to a project. Colleagues can discover hidden expertise. And individuals can manage how they’re perceived inside the business.

Microsoft describes it as making it easier to learn about colleagues and build meaningful connections within the everyday flow of work.

I like that.

Because in most businesses the knowledge already exists. It’s just buried.

This update will be available for Teams on Windows and Mac, and it fits into a broader push to make Teams more practical day-to-day.

As companies grow, informal knowledge sharing breaks down. In a small team of five, everyone knows who does what. I

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