Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) and Thought Media Operations in Canada
We know that organizations and individuals within Canada, and around the world depend on Thought Media and our networks. We’re checking-in to let you know how Thought Media in Toronto Canada is dealing with the Coronavirus outbreak (COVID-19).
Following advice from Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, by 11:59 p.m. Saturday, April 4, 2020, businesses that are not identified on this Essential Businesses list must close their physical locations. Thought Media falls under the following category of essential businesses:
Telecommunications and IT infrastructure/service providers
- Information Technology (IT) services, including online services, software products and the facilities necessary for their operation and delivery.
- Telecommunications providers and services (phone, internet, radio, cell phones etc.) and facilities necessary for their operation and delivery.
- Newspapers, radio and television broadcasting.
With this in mind we of course have still gradually (throughout March) taken measures to ensure the safety of our staff, customers, and the general public. As such we initially had significantly reduced our physical office hours with only our receptionists working on site for a maximum of 3 hours daily, and now our entire team is working virtually. This is no challenge for us as it’s the nature of our business, and much of our operations over the past 8-10 years has shifted to virtual as we continue to expand as a global service provider. Additionally we utilise the latest technologies internally allowing for rapid digital communication between our directors, project managers, creative, development, and marketing teams.
What you can expect from Thought Media is that general operations will remain unchanged in terms of phone system services, website hosting, web development, and all related IT Support services. We’re honoured to continue to serve our customers and the general public.
Below is the article/statement from Thought Media global
ThoughtMedia.com Statement MARCH 13, 2020:
First, the health and safety of our employees and customers is our top priority. We have implemented a number of sensible policies to this end, including encouraging many employees to work from home. This, however, hasn’t slowed our operations. Our network & security operations center, and customer support teams will remain fully operational and can do their jobs entirely remote as needed. In fact as a company we generally encourage our team to work from home as it’s not efficient for high level developers and designers to commute in Toronto or New York traffic. As the populations of major cities continue to increase, it’s in the best interest of our pipeline to focus on quality of work and delivery.
Second, we are tracking Internet usage patterns globally. As more people work from home, peak traffic in impacted regions has increased, on average, approximately 10%. In Italy, which has imposed a nationwide quarantine, peak Internet traffic is up 30%. Traffic patterns have also shifted so peak traffic is occurring earlier in the day in impacted regions. None of these traffic changes raise any concern for us. Thought Media’s network and partners are well provisioned to handle significant spikes in traffic. We have not seen, and do not anticipate, any impact to our network’s performance, reliability, or security globally.
Third, we are monitoring for any changes in cyberthreats. While we have seen more phishing attacks using the Coronavirus as a lure, we have not seen any significant increase in attack traffic or new threats. Again, our network remains fully operational and is continuously monitoring for any new security threats that may emerge.
Thank you for being a Thought Media customer. These are challenging times but we want you to know that we stand ready to help however we can. We understand the critical role we play in the functioning of many Internet based businesses and we are continually humbled by the trust you place in us.
