The Most Popular Brand of 2026 is Microsoft (But Only for Scammers)

 If you check your spam folder right now, it is almost guaranteed what you’ll see: an "urgent" alert from Microsoft. Maybe it says your storage is full, your password expired, or there was a "suspicious login" from another country.

According to the latest Q4 data from Check Point Research, Microsoft is once again the most impersonated brand in the world, accounting for 22% of all phishing attempts globally.

Well, this does not come as a shock. Microsoft and Google (which took second place at 13%) aren't just tech companies, they are the "keys to the kingdom." If a scammer gets your Microsoft login, they don’t just get your email—they get your files, your company’s internal directory, and your identity.

Why These Scams are Actually Working

It’s easy to joke that nobody falls for these, but the reality is that today's attacks are polished, psychological, and incredibly sneaky.

1. The "Lookalike" Trap

One of the sneakiest tactics right now involves "lookalike" domains. Scammers register websites using characters from different alphabets that look identical to the original website. To a computer, a Cyrillic "а" is completely different from a Latin "a," but to your eyes in an address bar, micrоsoft.com looks exactly like the real thing. 

2. Targeting the Kids

One of the most concerning trends we’re seeing is scammers targeting younger audiences through platforms like Roblox. They create fake game pages (like the recent "Skibidi" themed scams) that look identical to the real platform. If they can trick a child into "logging in" to a fake page, they’ve stolen a family's credentials before the parents even know what happened.

3. Exploiting Busy Season

Amazon jumped to the #3 spot recently, fueled by the holiday shopping rush. Scammers know when you’re busy, distracted, and expecting a delivery notification. That’s when they strike.

How to Protect Your Team 

We tell our clients that while software helps, the best defense is a healthy dose of skepticism. Here’s how to stay safe:

• Stop the "Urgency" Reflex: If an email screams that your account will be "deleted in 24 hours," it’s almost certainly a scam. Legitimate companies rarely use that kind of aggressive pressure.
• Look at the Sender, Not the Name: Anyone can change their "Display Name" to say "Microsoft Support." Click on the name to see the actual email address behind it. If it’s support@microsft-security-update.net, delete it.
• Go to the Source: If you’re worried about your account, don't click the link in the email. Open your browser, type office.com or google.com yourself, and log in there. If there's a real problem, you'll see a notification in your dashboard.
• Use an Authenticator App: SMS-based codes are better than nothing, but they can be intercepted. Use an app like Bitwarden or Microsoft Authenticator for a much higher level of security.

Stopping "Spoofing" with DMARC

While training your team to spot these red flags is vital, there is a powerful technical shield that many businesses are still missing: DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance).

Without DMARC, an attacker with enough skill can send an email that literally appears to come from your address. This is called "spoofing." Imagine a vendor or customer receiving an email from your real address asking them to update their payment details to a new, fraudulent account. Even though you didn't send it, the damage to your reputation and business relationships can be irreparable.

By implementing DMARC, we ensure that:

• Spoofing is Neutralized: Any unauthorized use of your domain is clearly marked, so it gets filtered out before it ever reaches your clients or vendors.
• Deliverability is Guaranteed: Major services like Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo are increasingly blocking emails from domains that don't have these security protocols in place.
• You Get Insight: DMARC generates reports showing exactly who is sending mail on your behalf—identifying both legitimate tools and illegitimate attackers.

The Bottom Line

Phishing works because it exploits our familiarity with the brands we use every day. Our goal at Interlock IT is to build the technical barriers, like DMARC, that keep these threats out—while also arming your team with the knowledge to spot the one or two that inevitably slip through the cracks.

Is your team ready to spot a homoglyph attack? And is your domain protected against spoofing? We specialize in DMARC implementations and securing digital identities. 

Reach out to us for a comprehensive security checkup today.

Finally! You Can Soon Fix That Professional "Identity Crisis" on Gmail

We’ve all seen them—and maybe some of us still own them. Email addresses created in high school or during a weekend whim that seemed like a good idea at the time, but now look a bit out of place in a professional setting.

For years, if you wanted to change your @gmail.com address, you were stuck between a rock and a hard place. You either lived with the embarrassing name or went through the absolute nightmare of creating a new account and manually migrating years of emails, photos, and app integrations.

According to a recent update from Google’s support pages, that’s finally about to change.

What’s Changing?

Google is quietly rolling out a feature that allows users to replace their existing Gmail address with a new one while keeping every single piece of data intact. This isn’t just adding a nickname or a simple alias; it’s a full account transition that doesn't require you to start from scratch.

The Highlights:

• Your data stays put: Your Google Photos, Drive files, and even your YouTube watch history move over automatically. No manual migrations required.
• The "Safety Net" alias: Your old address doesn't just vanish. It stays active as an alias, so if a client emails your old name, it still lands in your new, professional inbox.
• No login headaches: You can still use the original address to sign into your account if you forget the new one.

Why This Matters for Your Professional Brand

In business, your email is often the first thing a person notices. While we always suggest getting a custom domain (like name@yourcompany.com) for the best branding, we know plenty of freelancers and small business owners who run everything through Gmail.

Being able to "professionalize" an old account without losing a decade of archived data is a massive win for productivity.  It saves you what we call the "migration tax"—those three or four hours of tedious labor usually spent trying to move data between accounts without breaking anything.

The Catch (And There's Always a Catch)

Before you go hunting through your settings, keep two things in mind:

First, this is a slow rollout. It first appeared on Google's Hindi support pages, which usually means they are testing it in specific markets before a global launch. If you don't see the option yet, just sit tight—it’s coming.

Second, Google is enforcing a 12-month rule. Once you pick a new address, you are locked in for a full year. You won't be able to change it again during that time, and you can't delete the new address once it's set.

The Interlock Take

At Interlock IT, we love seeing these kinds of updates because they remove a "friction point" that has annoyed users for nearly twenty years.

If you’ve been dreading an email cleanup because you were scared of losing your data, your window is finally opening. Keep an eye on your account settings, and once this hits our region, we highly recommend taking ten minutes to finally retire that old handle for good.

Need a hand managing your team’s email or moving to a more secure, professional setup? Reach out to us—we handle the technical heavy lifting so you don’t have to.

Your Whole Business is Held Hostage by One Login

 

It’s Not the Smart Hackers. It’s the Simple Mistake.

We often spend our time tackling big IT challenges—server migrations, disaster recovery, and network overhauls. We fix big IT problems every day, but the worst disasters aren't caused by tricky computer attacks. They are caused by one thing that is terrifyingly simple: a mistake by a person that locks you out of your own business.

This all comes down to your Domain Name Registration. That small, yearly bill is the main key to everything you do online. If you lose control of that login, your whole digital business goes silent. Your website, all your emails, your sales system—they all stop because of a missed payment or a password one person forgot.

This is the Small Mistake, Big Bill—the minimum cost of fixing a total emergency that should never, ever happen.

One Forgotten Password = Zero Business Days.

Everything your business does online is tied to one single login for your domain company. If only one person has that key, your business is one forgotten phone or one day off away from a complete and sudden shutdown.

This single point of failure is terrifyingly common:

• The Worker Who Quit and Locked the Doors: We once watched a massive transportation client spend two agonizing days completely offline because the employee who managed the domain registrar account had quit. They had no backup, and recovering the account was a grueling process of proving ownership—a scenario that had the CEO talking about insurance claims.

• The Single User Trap: We recently dealt with a real estate firm that suddenly went dark. Their website vanished, their email stopped cold. The culprit? A basic credit card renewal for their domain registration failed, and the only person who could log in to fix the payment was gone. Whether it's a departed employee or just an inaccessible one, relying on one person's phone or memory for critical system access means your business is always one missed call away from absolute crisis.

Getting control of a domain back means a long, stressful process of proving ownership to the domain company—a delay that no business can afford.

Our Plan is to Make Your Digital Setup Team-Safe

Our job is to create systems that make these total lockouts impossible. This means we stop relying on just one person and set up a strong, team-based access that cannot be broken by a simple human error.

1. Cloudflare = Safe Sharing

We move your important domain setup to safe, flexible tools like Cloudflare.

• Less Risk: Most normal domain companies make you share your main password with any vendor who needs access—a huge safety risk. We remove that danger.

• Team Control: Cloudflare lets you safely share access. This means we can manage your DNS and fix urgent issues like a failed payment without needing the main password to your account.

We also use this move to put complicated setups (like having your domain and your DNS in two different places) onto one safe tool. This makes fixing problems much easier.

2. Guard the Key For the Whole Team

If a main password must be used, we make sure it is protected from being lost:

• Better Security Codes (2FA): We get rid of the unsafe security codes sent by text message (called 2FA) and move the access to secure apps that the whole team can use, like Bitwarden. This means the keys are held by the support team, not just by one person's cell phone.

Safety Is Better Than Stress

This is not a cost; it is the cheapest, best insurance policy you can buy.

The minimum cost to fix a locked domain and get service back is about $250 in labor for Interlock IT. By spending that small amount before a crisis hits, you stop the huge, unrecoverable costs of two days of lost sales, losing customer trust, and the pain of a business shutdown.

At Interlock IT, we make sure the safety of your domain—the most important small detail of your whole online business—is perfect. Because the most important work in IT is often the work you never even notice.

Ask yourself now: If the person who set up your company’s domain could not be reached, could your IT team log in and fix a payment problem?If the answer is "No," your business is in danger, and it's not a question of if, but when, you will shut down.

Contact us today.

The Last 20%: Why Interlock IT Sweats the Small Stuff (Like Your Domain Name Security)

 We often spend our time tackling big IT challenges—server migrations, disaster recovery, and email flow. However, we know that in business, just like in any complex project, it’s the last 20% of the work, the small, often-overlooked details, that truly defines quality and earns client trust.

And one of the most critical, yet frequently neglected, "small details" is the security and management of your domain name.

What’s in a Domain Name?

Your domain name—like yourcompany.com—is the internet's front door. When a client types that address, a crucial, silent process known as DNS (Domain Name Service) begins. DNS is the internet's directory; it translates the name into a numerical address (IP address) so browsers can find your server.

The Technical Insight

When analyzing domains, we look at who manages what. For example, for interlock.ws, the registration is with GoDaddy.com, but the name servers are with Cloudflare. This is a great demonstration of a key rule: you can choose a separate, specialized provider to manage your name servers for better performance and security, even if your domain is registered elsewhere.

Since the entire internet relies on it, your DNS is a prime target for hacking, where criminals try to redirect your customers to a malicious, fake website. This is why we focus heavily on two things: Secure Access and Reliable Providers.

Security Tip: Cloudflare Advantage

Our experience has shown the value of specialized DNS providers like Cloudflare:

• Free Protection: They offer essential basic DNS services for free, including high-level security like DNSSEC. DNSSEC (Domain Name System Security Extensions) is a suite of extensions that uses digital signatures to verify that the DNS data you receive is authentic and hasn't been tampered with. This effectively protects your clients from spoofing and cache poisoning attacks.

• The Secure Access Problem: Many standard registrars often require you to give a vendor (like us!) your primary domain account login to manage your records. This is a massive security risk. Cloudflare solves this by letting us manage the DNS records securely without ever touching or compromising your main, high-value domain account login.

The High Cost of Lost Access

Here’s a common, costly scenario we frequently see:

1. Lost Credentials: Clients often lose access to their domain registrar and DNS accounts due to staff turnover or poor documentation.

2. Failure to pay the renewal invoice on time leading to a shut down 

3. Crisis Mode: When access is lost, you can't fix mission-critical problems like email outages (affecting Google Workspace/Microsoft 365) or major website downtime.

4. The Fix-It Fee: Recovering or migrating a domain from scratch is complex, stressful, and expensive. Even a standard migration fix typically costs $250 for two hours of labor, with complex cases (like those involving numerous domains) costing significantly more.

By proactively ensuring your credentials are secure and your DNS is on a flexible, stable platform, we prevent this expensive headache before it even starts.

It’s the Last 20% That Earns Your Referral

The philosophy guiding our service is simple: customer satisfaction isn't just about handling a big emergency; it’s about flawless execution.

• Preventing Painful Moments: We know that a client remembers the pain of an unpatched hole in the ceiling or a small defect left unfixed. In IT, that means saving you from the $250 migration fee because we proactively set up a robust, easy-to-manage domain infrastructure.

• Driving Trust: By eliminating these small, painful moments and ensuring all systems are secure and documented, we earn not just your business, but your referral.

That attention to the "last 20%" of detail—including the technical security of your domain—is the Interlock IT difference.

Do you know who has access to your domain registrar? If you’re not sure, let us perform a quick, no-obligation check—it can save you significant time and money down the road. Contact us today.

Why Our Team Loves a Truly Smart Home

 At Interlock IT, our team is constantly solving problems. We deal with complicated systems every day, so we know that the best technology is always the simplest. That belief isn't limited to our client work—it's how we run our lives.

We recently got an exciting look at the highly organized home setup of one of our company leaders. It’s a perfect example of how complex technology can be made completely effortless.

The Problem We All Face: Too Many Apps

Most of us have great smart devices—maybe a Nest thermostat, a Ring doorbell, or Lutron light switches. They all work, but they rarely work together. They live in "tech silos," forcing you to manage them individually.

The Single Hub

The genius of this Interlock IT leader's home is that everything is connected to one main brain: the Google Home app.

Instead of switching between multiple programs, the user controls everything from one screen:

• Security: Locking the garage and checking the front door camera.

• Lights: Turning off all lights in the house, even if they are from different brands.

• Climate: Adjusting the temperature from the same dashboard.

This unified control means the home works as a single team. When the system is armed, the house knows to automatically turn off the lights.

Even the everyday chores get simplified. The Wi-Fi connected washing machine sends an alert straight to a watch when the cycle is done. This isn't just a gadget; it's a way to save time and mental energy throughout the day.

What This Means for Interlock IT Clients

Why do we share a story about a smart home?

Because the skill required to make dozens of different products from various companies work perfectly together is the exact skill Interlock IT uses to solve your business challenges.

Our team has a passion for:

1. Eliminating Clutter: Getting rid of unnecessary steps, apps, and confusion.

2. Seamless Integration: Making sure new and old systems talk to each other reliably.

When our tech experts invest this much time and effort into making their personal lives run smoothly, you can be confident that expertise will translate into the simplest, most efficient IT solutions for your company.

Let Interlock IT give your business the advantage of truly interlocked systems.

Tired of DIY IT? Why Your Small Business Needs a Full IT Team (Without the Full-Time Price Tag)

 

As a small or medium-sized business owner, you're constantly juggling priorities. You know technology is critical, but the thought of hiring a full-time IT expert? It often feels like a luxury you just can't afford. The salary, benefits, training...it adds up fast.

So, you end up with a revolving door of tech support "fixes," or worse, you're trying to figure out complex network issues yourself (and losing valuable time in the process).

But what if you could have an entire team of certified IT specialists at your disposal for less than the cost of one mid-level employee?

The "One-Person IT Shop" Dilemma

Let's be honest: one person, no matter how brilliant, can't be an expert in everything. They can't simultaneously be:

• A Cybersecurity Guru: Staying ahead of ransomware, phishing, and the latest threats.

• A Cloud Architect: Optimizing your Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, setting up secure cloud storage.

• A Data Backup Specialist: Designing and managing a bulletproof system to protect your most valuable information.

• Help Desk Support: Handling every password reset and software glitch.

• A Strategic Advisor: Planning for future tech needs and budget.

It's simply too much for one individual. This often leaves critical areas vulnerable or neglected until a crisis hits.

Your Business Deserves an IT Team (Without Breaking the Bank)

Instead of hiring one person, you gain an entire roster of specialists:

1. On-Demand Expertise: Need help with a complex server migration? There's a specialist for that. Worried about your data's security? A cybersecurity expert is on the case. Their team brings collective knowledge and experience across every facet of IT.

2. Proactive Problem Solvers: Interlock IT doesn't just fix things when they break. We proactively monitor your systems 24/7, identify potential issues before they become problems, and perform routine maintenance to keep everything running smoothly. This means less downtime for your staff. For clients focused on advanced email security and brand protection, we also offer comprehensive DMARC reports and management as an add-on service, ensuring your email ecosystem is durable against spoofing and phishing attempts.

3. Instant, Expert Support for Your Staff: Your employees will get instant, knowledgeable help for any tech issue – from a simple password reset to resolving a software crash. This keeps them productive, reduces frustration, and allows them to focus on their core job functions, rather than waiting for IT fixes.

More Expertise and Less Expense with Interlock IT

When you partner with Interlock IT, you're not just getting "tech support." You're gaining a strategic partner that ensures your technology is sturdy, secure, and always working for you. You unlock:

• Predictable IT Costs: Say goodbye to unexpected repair bills.

• Enhanced Security: Peace of mind knowing your data is protected by experts.

• Increased Productivity: Empowered employees with reliable tech and instant support.

Stop struggling with your IT. It's time to equip your business with the expert team it deserves, without the prohibitive cost of building one in-house.

Contact Interlock IT today.