Stories by: Becky Waring

While no one questions the need to properly scan laptops when going through airport security, the requirement to remove them from their protective cases is a different story. "Naked" notebooks can easily get dropped, damaged, forgotten and even stolen outright. One study done for Dell estimated that about 12,000 laptops are lost in US airports every week -- a claim that has been challenged by the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA). Whatever the numbers are, you don't want your machine, with all its precious data, to become a statistic.

Network security can be a thorny issue for small businesses because they generally lack pricey equipment and dedicated IT people who have the expertise to lock down a local area network. But addressing security is nevertheless essential: Just one customer data breach could easily wipe out a small business, and constantly battling viruses, spyware, and spam can sap employee productivity.