Who is R&R Security Partners L.L.C. and what are we trying to accomplish?

Who are we?

My name is Anthony and I started R&R Security Partners with my long time friend, and colleague, Kyle. We grew up in the small, Orange County town of pine bush, both graduating Pine Bush High School in 2008. We both pursued our Associates at OCCC, participating in Computer Science and technology classes. It was in middle school that Kyle introduced me to his, and later my, love of computers. Helping me build my first computer when we were in high school.

After high school, I worked with my mom and step dad closely on their own small business renovating hotels and residential homes. I learned a lot of the ins and outs of finances, long hours of hard work, and lessons in working with clients. Further developing customer service through customer facing jobs at Verizon Wireless and Time Warner Cable/Spectrum as Tier III Internet Support. I found more of my calling working contracts for New York Presbyterian, installing data cable, switches and access points (the small devices you usually see on the ceiling used for wifi). I moved from there to system administration and network engineering at West Point for Keller Army Hospital while I pursued my Bachelors in Cyber and Data Security Technology, before becoming a network security engineer. I have worked to increase my knowledge with various certifications from Cisco and CompTIA, and am currently pursuing my Masters in Cybersecurity at Georgia Tech. Now, I have founded R&R Security Partners L.L.C. with Kyle to help bring our skills, experience and knowledge to small businesses and residents of the Hudson Valley.

What sets is apart from other consultants in the area that offer cybersecurity services?

While I started my first full positions in sales environments, such as commission only for a Verizon wireless retailer, I was never very good at being a proper salesman. Rather than throwing services and products at people, I found I would much rather get to know them and if I found something that worked for them as a solution then great! If not, I was more than happy to help with an issue they had and just fix things to make their day a little bit easier. For a time in my early twenties I was a personal trainer, before it became the popular thing to do on instagram, and focused on helping people. Creating support groups, facebook groups for team motivation. I charged a small fee for training services, the groups, support and feedback were always free. I only wanted to help people make a better change in their lives.

Over the years I have also helped and worked with other businesses. One most notable business is Newburgh Brewery. I have hosted Trivia over the years, helped with tasting's and events, Paul, one of the owners, is quite an inspiration for me to help local businesses. I have seen the community he has created amongst residents of the Hudson Valley and the support he has fostered for small, local businesses, and is something I greatly admire and want to support. (If you haven't been to Newburgh Brewing I highly recommend a visit!)

What are we trying to accomplish?

Over the years I have seen big businesses fall prey to cyberattacks, fines, data breaches, and a range of other issues. They always were able to recover and come out unscathed because they are million, if not billion, dollar corporations with funds, resources, and a lot of stockholders. They can afford these issues, and to keep on doing business. To pay their marketing and PR departments to restore their image, and hire a few more cybersecurity engineers to increase their ranks before a large round of layoffs at the end of the year to save a few bucks.

What about small businesses? If you read our "Why Our Services?" Section, you know the stats that drive us to help small businesses. If not, that's ok! the short version is that attacks are on the rise for small businesses. Whether it be ransomware attacks (someone encrypts your data and requests money to unlock and restore it) or denial of service (which can take vital services offline preventing business operations), small businesses are becoming the target a greater percentage of the time. With this, cybersecurity insurance has gone up, and the average small business does not have the funds or resources to handle or payoff a ransomware attack. If they did, it would be so detrimental financially that they may not recover as most small businesses go out of businesses within 6 months following a cyber attack.

What we want to accomplish, is helping to give Hudson Valley businesses the means to increase their security and be able to prevent, respond or stop an attack while also ensuring your company is following industry best practices, configured to any compliance (such as PCI-DSS if you charge consumer debit or credit cards) and a range of other security services. We want your business to have access to resources, experience, and the ability to respond and adapt to threats, the same as these large corporations because we know you will be affected much more than these companies will. We want to be here as a small businesses, helping to secure small businesses as part of the Hudson Valley business community. We want to secure the Hudson Valley, one business at a time.