I chose the theme for Octagon’s September Newsletter – Microsoft 365. Other members of the team have produced articles looking at some of the tools and features – me I want to look at a fundamental element of Microsoft 365, that is very often overlooked by clients until I undertake an IT and Cyber Security review for them – their domain.
Why look at your Microsoft 365 Domain?
I had no sooner decided that we would write about Microsoft 365 this month, than one of the team from the current organisation I am working with, casually mentioned an email they had received the day before. This email explained that the payment for the domain had failed and unless payment was made within seven days the domain registration would fail.
The Consequences
Once upon a time organisations got a domain to get their organisation, products and services on the internet and to send and receive email. It was easy and quick and someone took care of it. For most small organisations that was the website designer, who bought and registered the domain, created a website and set-up some email addresses. Website and email changes went through the web designers, or if the organisation took their IT seriously the IT support team took care of the email side of things.
Then things got serious…
The main reason Octagon Technology got into managing domains for clients was that those same clients started having issues with web designers who let them down over supporting their email or indeed small web companies were going out of business, leaving clients high and dry over their email, website and, what’s worse, domain ownership. We still occasionally come across it now – a domain is registered to the web company or an inappropriate individual within an organisation, rather than to the organisation itself.
We register the domain to the client and provide full details of where the domain is registered and how it is paid for – usually we pre-bill the client as we have set-up auto-payments from our account for them.
More serious…
Then Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace came along* and you could associate your domain to these services to empower your organisation’s IT, collaboration, communications, cyber security, hybrid working, etc., etc..
Now managing your domain becomes even more important.
Take responsibility for your domain
In the example I mentioned above, I understood the importance of renewing the domain but it took the client nearly 24 hours to sort through and find out the required details to authorise themselves with the domain hosting company and then change their bank details so the domain could be paid for.
A number of things had happened to cause this problem:
- The original person who registered the domain had left and their successor had also left.
- The organisation changed their bank account.
- The original email used for the domain registration was a “shared” Google account, which now forwarded to several people, none of whom were responsible for managing the domain.
- Records were not kept in a manner that prevented organisational knowledge being lost.
- These people are excellent at what they do, some have reasonable technical ability but none of them are IT experts.
However, taking responsibility for your domain does not mean “doing-it-yourself”. Our domain management covers the above eventualities and still leaves our clients in control.
Some Questions about Your Domain
I’ll leave you with a few questions to think about:
Do you know who manages your domain for you?
Are you in control?
Would you like to talk to us about how we can help you be in control again?
Clive Catton MSc (Cyber Security) – by-line and other articles
* I know they both had other names at the beginning!!!
Further Reading
Photo by Christina Morillo
