A word of warning for business owners and managers

I’ve now had two separate incidents this year where a communications provider (most recently BT) has replaced a company’s internet connection without giving any heads-up to the IT support team.

Each time, the provider reassured the client that it was “a simple change” and that there was “no need to involve IT.”

Each time, that decision caused significant disruption.

In one recent case, the incoming fibre broadband cable had been plugged directly into the LAN instead of through the WAN connection on the firewall. Having little knowledge of the customers infrastructure, to get to the bottom of it, I had to:

🔹 Map all the cabling to understand the physical layout as there was no documentation.
🔹 Log into the firewall and network switches to trace VLAN configurations
🔹 Identify that the incoming fibre was mis-patched into the internal network

It’s a simple error but one that left the business offline and could have been avoided entirely if IT support had been informed.

Even more concerning, I’ve seen configurations left in legacy ADSL mode or external IP addresses changed without warning both of which can break remote access, VPNs, and critical services.

Takeaway: Always insist that your IT provider is notified before any broadband, fibre, or router replacement takes place. What may look like a plug-and-play upgrade to the communications company can easily take your business offline.

#ITSupport #NetworkSecurity #BusinessContinuity #Cloud9Computing #BT#Broadband #Fibre #Networking #CyberResilience