Client: James G. Dades & Co. | Industry: Accounting
James G. Dades & Co., a Midwestern accounting and CPA firm in business for 25 years, was running IT operations that had barely changed since the 1990s — leaving them unprepared for current FTC and PII compliance requirements.
The Challenge
- Decades-old systems and processes needed a full overhaul without disrupting a staff used to simple, familiar tools.
- No formal cybersecurity, compliance, or breach-notification program existed.
- On-premise mail server needed modernizing without a rocky transition.
The Solution
- Ran a Cybersecurity Risk Assessment and presented the findings to the whole team.
- Migrated the on-prem mail server to Office 365 Hosted Exchange and enabled 2FA on every email account.
- Deployed RMM agents for encryption, patching, and monitoring, and updated every machine to Windows 11 and the server to Windows Server 2022.
- Set up PII data monitoring, on-site and off-site backups (including a colo backup server), and wrote employee and consultant handbooks with signed Business Associate Agreements.
- Deployed a CATO cloud firewall and 24×7 SOC-monitored endpoint detection, and rolled out Privilege Access Management for software installs.
The Results
Once convinced by industry breach headlines and their own risk assessment, Dades & Co. adopted proactive cybersecurity measures that lowered their breach risk, added a real disaster recovery plan, and brought every core operation under proper coverage.