ICT Solutions News Desk

Recently, we have seen successful phishing attacks at a number Norfolk schools and we would like to remind you to remain vigilant over the summer holiday period. Cyber security is frequently in the news and there have been a number of high-profile ones in recent months impacting M & S, Co-op and Harrods.

Phishing is when attackers attempt to trick users into doing 'the wrong thing', such as clicking a bad link that will download malware or direct them to a suspicious website. Attacks can install ransomware, sabotage systems, or steal intellectual property and money.

It can be conducted via a text message, social media, or by phone, but the term 'phishing' is mainly used to describe attacks that arrive by email. These types of emails can reach millions of users directly and hide amongst the huge number of emails that busy users receive. 

If something doesn’t feel right, it’s usually because it isn’t. Please think before you click!

We would like to ask schools to refrain from turning off the power to the core networking equipment over the forthcoming summer holiday period. Core networking equipment includes routers, switches and servers, often in a wall or floor cabinet. These devices are monitored by ourselves and Rydal/Schools Broadband and turning off the power results in false alarms. This could potentially result in your school incurring a charge for an engineer visit.

If there is no alternative to powering off the communications cabinet and core equipment, because of planned work, for example, please advise us in advance.

Please can we also kindly ask those sites who house LoRaWAN gateways to leave these powered on over the holidays, as they serve the community as a whole. 

For more information, please contact the Service Desk on 01603 475603 or ict@norfolk.gov.uk

We have been notified by Google that support for legacy Google Meet (formerly Google Duo) calling features will officially end in September 2025. It will impact all Google Workspace users who use legacy Google Meet features, including NSIX accounts and those sites who have their own Google Workspaces.

What’s Changing?

Google is transitioning all users to the new Meet calling experience, which includes enhanced features such as:

• In-call chat
• Live captions
• Screen sharing
• Stackable visual effects
• Cloud encryption
• Improved layouts for tablets and foldables

As a result, the following legacy features will be discontinued:

• Family mode
• Knock Knock
• Moments (screenshot capture during calls)
• Mirror mode
• Emoji reactions from the pre-call screen

What do I need to do if I’m affected?

To ensure you don’t lose any important information, we recommend exporting your call history and messages before September 30^th, 2025.

To export your messages:

1. Open the Google Meet app
2. Go to Settings > Message settings > Export messages

To export your call history:

1. Open the Google Meet app
2. Navigate to Settings > Calling settings (Legacy) > Manage legacy calling history > Export legacy call history.

For more information, please contact the Service Desk on 01603 475603 or ict@norfolk.gov.uk

AVCO will be carrying out an upgrade to AnyComms plus during the summer holiday period. On Tuesday, August 5th, between 10:30 and 15:30 hours, the service will be unavailable.

We apologise in advance for any inconvenience caused.

For more information, please contact the Service Desk on 01603 475603 or ict@norfolk.gov.uk

Through our partnership with Secure Schools, we are pleased to re-share their ‘cyber score’ service, a free-to-use, global framework for cybersecurity in education.

Cyber score is designed to help schools benchmark, improve, and better protect against common cybersecurity threats by answering simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ statements to calculate their cyber score, built around leading cybersecurity standards.

As the first dedicated cybersecurity scoring system tailored specifically for schools globally, cyber score provides:

• Progress benchmarking – Using set parameters, you can review your cybersecurity posture and see your score change as you take more actions to reduce risk.
• Guidance tailored to regional and national standards – Ensuring that you can align your efforts with the requirements of your local, regional and national standards and guidelines.
• Actionable insights – Highlight the most important steps you can take to reduce risk, in a self-paced and incremental manner.

Building on years of experience conducting audits with hundreds of educational institutions worldwide, Secure Schools have developed cyber score as a more effective, efficient, and engaging way to benchmark, improve, and protect you from cyber threats.

What is cyber score?

Cyber score gives you a structured, self-paced, modular journey to reduce cybersecurity risk.

With cyber score’s guided statements, expectations and achievements, you can take ownership of your cybersecurity, breaking the process into manageable steps, benchmarking against national averages, and specific guidance based on national requirements.

The statements you'll answer through cyber score are mapped to specific standards and guidelines. You can benchmark your school's cybersecurity posture against the DfE cyber security standards and the RPA.

Cyber score provides straightforward, actionable guidance that makes cybersecurity accessible for everyone.

To get started - all you have to do is sign-up to the Secure Schools platform for free - https://partner.secureschools.com/norfolk-ict-solutions

Are you prepared for the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) switch off?

If you haven’t started planning, you might want to think about your telephony service, in preparation for the PSTN switch off in 2027.

As a reminder, we have a telephony framework available for Schools/Academies to purchase from to give you confidence in upgrading your telephone system.

Each supplier will have had due diligence carried out on them and met certain standards for technical, financial, health and safety and pricing. 

If you would like to learn more, please visit the Telephony framework webpage or contact us on 01603 475603.

We have been notified of the following by Microsoft and only affects Outlook for Mac users.

After October 2025, Microsoft 365 subscriptions associated with a Microsoft 365 account (personal, work, or school) will no longer be able to use legacy Microsoft Outlook for Mac. This transition marks a significant step towards a more robust, feature-rich, and secure email experience for all users.

The latest version of Outlook for Mac has been part of the Microsoft 365 suite for the last four years. More than 95% of Microsoft 365 users have already moved from legacy Outlook for Mac to the new version.

Users will no longer be able to switch back to legacy Outlook for Mac after this change is implemented.

Police Eastern Region Special Operations Unit (ERSOU) are running a series of free to attend education sector webinars for School Leaders, Governors, School staff and Parents. Details and more information are below: 

1) Cyber Security and introduction to Cyber Choices session for UK Education Staff

This is a 1 hour webinar repeated six times until Jan 2026, this session would be useful for anyone working with / in schools or with young people who have not seen one of the cyber inputs previously or want a refresh.

The session will:

• Highlight current trends and provide actionable steps that attendees can take.
• Highlight nationally approved resources like those created for the education sector by the National Cyber Security Centre.
• Introduce the National Crime Agency's Cyber Choices Programme.
• Highlight free local and national Police resources that can support the school further in this area.

This event is free, and tickets can be book directly via:

2) Cyber Security Awareness Session for UK School Governors / Senior Leaders

This is a 2 hour webinar focusing on highlighting the need for cyber resilience in schools it is aimed at school’s governors/leaders and will be repeated six times until Jan 2026. This has had significant changes from our previous offering, and we would suggest that attendees attend the one-hour staff awareness session prior to this.

The session will:

• Highlight cyber security threats that the education sector face
• Raise awareness of the schools' duties around cyber security
• Inform the attendees around the questions to ask to ensure schools are fulfilling their duties.
• Highlight free local and national Police resources that can support the school further in this area.

The event is free, and tickets can be book directly via:

3) Parents / Carers Cyber Choices and Online Safety Events

Please note there are two parts to the parent events, and you will need to register for each independently. Each session will be repeated 8 times until December 2025. Both are 1 hour sessions and are suitable for parents/carers of children in Year 5 (age 9) and above. This is an opportunity to learn and ask questions regarding your child’s online world.

Parents Event – Part 1 - Introduction to Cyber Choices and Online Risks

This session will introduce you to the Cyber Choices programme and will provide:

• An overview to parents and carers on what cybercrime is. 
• What the risks to young people are.
• How the Cyber Choices programme supports at-risk individuals. 
• How you can refer a young person into Cyber Choices.
   

You will also receive an overview of:

• Some of the potential risks that children and young people may experience online.
• Advice to support parents to make informed decisions and keep their children safer online. 

The event is free, and tickets can be book directly via:

Parents Event – Part 2 - Tools and techniques to improve the cyber security of your family

This session will:

• Provide advice on how to improve your personal cyber security.
• Help you to identify and protect your (and your children's) key accounts.
• Identify threats and techniques that cyber criminals may use to target you / your family.
• Highlight the benefits of family accounts.
• Identify parental controls on your router.
• Signposting to useful resources.
   

Advice and guidance from the session will be in line with the Government's Stop! Think Fraud and the National Cyber Security Centres CyberAware campaign.

The event is free, and tickets can be book directly via:

Support for Office 2016 and Office 2019 will end on October 14th, 2025. After that date, no further updates, security fixes, or technical support will be available for these versions of Office. While the applications may continue to function, using unsupported software could lead to potential security risks and other issues. Because migrations can take time, we recommend starting to upgrade any remaining devices your organization has running Office 2016 or Office 2019 to a supported version as soon as possible.

For more information, please contact the Service Desk on 01603 475603 or ict@norfolk.gov.uk

After October 14th, 2025, Microsoft will no longer provide security updates or technical support for Windows 10.  Without regular updates, your device will be more susceptible to malware, viruses, and other cyber threats.

Staying on an unsupported OS (Operating System) may lead to compliance issues with industry standards and regulations. Some applications may also no longer work due to the increased security risk.

Plan your upgrade to Windows 11 today! More details can be found at the following link - Windows 11 upgrade information