Yes, really! Paint is downright useful now. Like many, I’ve been using generative AI (genAI) systems for about two years. Nothing has quite triggered my imagination like Microsoft Paint’s Cocreator capability. The concept is straightforward: You can doodle using Paint, describe what you want, and genAI will create an image to your specifications. I can’t shake the feeling that this way of working is going to shape the future of collaboration in enterprises. We can see this actively unfolding, coming to more apps you use thanks to AI being included in more basic licenses. Microsoft is enabling Copilot Chat in all enterprise accounts, Google Workspace is including Gemini in its business, and enterprise plans of Zoom include Zoom AI Companion in paid licenses. Embedded cocreating AI is increasingly available, and Paint provides a preview of what interacting with these systems may look like. How Paint Cocreator workflows change modern work As with all genAI systems, showing is better than telling. Let’s walk through the workflow process with visuals on how AI-enhanced Paint with Cocreator changes today’s modern work, workforce dynamics, and productivity. Below is a very poor, very quick rendering of a butterfly using the marker tool:   The panel to the right is Cocreator and its suggestion:   Taking that suggestion, I can place it in the canvas and directly annotate. For example, let’s push the wings to be a bit bluer by painting over them with a marker:   Here, I took the generated image and doodled over it with the pen. The colors are much closer to what I want. Here’s what it looks like, a bit more realistic, turning off the stylization:   But the scene is kind of boring — butterflies deserve flowers. Let’s put it in a field of them:   Scribbling broadly over the background allows me to generate something a lot more detailed:   Further markup allows me to create the broad shape of my vision, but I’m still limited by my own inability to be effective with a trackpad. So I’m cutting Cocreator loose and telling it to run wild creatively with the creativity slider:   Here’s the end result:   I started with this:   All I used was a combination of text prompts and Paint’s marker tool to adjust. This is the new Microsoft Paint: the universal design app on every PC. The system isn’t without some major flaws — like resolution, inability to generate accurate living creatures, some truly upsetting accidental generations, and all generations suffer from the “AI bloom” issue. But Paint is fun to use again. I feel like I’m back in my elementary school computer lab, realizing that on the computer, I could draw anything I wanted. Why does this matter for businesses? In embedding genAI into established application interfaces, Microsoft has proven the AI value proposition in ways many organizations still struggle to do. It provides the ability to go from vague draft to fleshed-out concept in minutes — massively accelerating cycle time, allowing me to directly tweak specific generation components to better meet what I’m trying to accomplish directly in the GUI. And the outputs are transferable. Try it as soon as you can. Some of my favorite generations so far:       You’ll note that the model doesn’t generate text well yet. Have questions? Schedule an inquiry with me. (Access to Paint Cocreator was provided courtesy of Microsoft for testing.) source

Phishing takes advantage of the weakest link in any organization’s cybersecurity system — human behavior. Phishing attacks are generally launched via email, although some opening salvos have begun using text messaging or phone calls. In the most common scenario, an email arrives purporting to be from HR or IT, for example. It looks just like any other company email. It advises viewers to update their personal information or IT profile by clicking on a link or opening an attachment. When the person does so, they are told to enter personally identifiable information, such as their date of birth, full name, social security number, and passwords. This enables a bad actor to take over their account and steal their identity, and it can also be the initial stage in a ransomware attack that locks the entire company out of IT systems. According to KnowBe4’s 2024 Global Phishing By Industry Benchmarking Report, one in three employees, or 34.3% of an organization’s workforce, are likely to interact with a malicious phishing email. After 90 days of training against phishing scams, 18.9% are still expected to fail a simulated phishing test. After a full year of phishing and security training, this number falls to 4.6% or around 5%. In other words, it is unlikely that any organization can completely eliminate intrusions caused by phishing attempts. This makes it abundantly clear why every organization needs to institute multi-factor authentication. NordLayer Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Small (50-249 Employees), Medium (250-999 Employees), Large (1,000-4,999 Employees), Enterprise (5,000+ Employees) Small, Medium, Large, Enterprise Semperis Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Small (50-249 Employees), Medium (250-999 Employees), Large (1,000-4,999 Employees), Enterprise (5,000+ Employees) Small, Medium, Large, Enterprise Features Advanced Attacks Detection, Advanced Automation, Anywhere Recovery, and more ESET PROTECT Advanced Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Any Company Size Any Company Size Features Advanced Threat Defense, Full Disk Encryption , Modern Endpoint Protection, and more How multi-factor authentication works One of the best defenses against credential-stealing phishing attacks is MFA. This imposes an additional step that individuals must take to be allowed access. Thus, even if cybercriminals compromise an account, they are blocked from causing harm as they should lack the additional item needed to gain entry. MFA introduces several extra security factors in the authentication process, including: Something you know: a password or a PIN. Something you have: a phone, USB drive, or email to receive a code. Something you are: a fingerprint or facial recognition. By having a secondary code-sharing device or a biometric tool for authentication, MFA makes it harder for credential thieves to get past those security factors. If someone clicks a malicious link and credentials are stolen, MFA offers another point of verification that the threat actor cannot access, whether it’s SMS, email verification, or via an authenticator app. For the end user, this means that they will have to either provide a biometric identifier on their device or laptop, or be sent a code by text or an authenticator app on their phone. This typically only takes a few seconds. The only hassle might be when there is a delay in the arrival of the code. Note, however, that threat actors have stepped up their game by finding ways to compromise MFA credentials. According to an alert from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency: “[I]n a widely used phishing technique, a threat actor sends an email to a target that convinces the user to visit a threat actor-controlled website that mimics a company’s legitimate login portal. The user submits their username, password, and the 6-digit code from their mobile phone’s authenticator app.” CISA recommends using phishing-resistant MFA as a way to improve overall cloud security against phishing attacks. There are several ways that this can be accomplished. More cloud security coverage Choosing the best MFA solution for your business Any type of MFA will help protect data in the cloud from a phishing attack. Consumer-grade MFA uses a code sent by text. However, threat actors have figured out ways to trick users into sharing those codes. Further, users may leave themselves vulnerable by not setting up MFA across all of their applications and devices or by turning off MFA completely. Therefore, organizations must favor phishing-resistant MFA and include two or more layers of authentication to achieve a high level of protection against cyberattacks. Here are some of the features to look for in MFA candidates: Code sharing Code sharing operates by sending a text to a mobile phone or a code to an authenticator app on that device. Although code sharing is not enough, it is a good start. Fast ID Online Fast ID Online (FIDO) leverages asymmetric cryptography, where separate keys encrypt and decrypt data. FIDO authentication works in one of two ways: through separate physical tokens or authenticators that are embedded into laptops or mobile devices. NFC NFC stands for near-field communication, which employs a short-range wireless technology embedded into a physical security key such as a phone, a USB device, or a fob. Some methods also use a security chip embedded into a smart card. SEE: Securing Linux Policy (TechRepublic Premium) Recommended MFA solutions There are several enterprise-grade MFA solutions available. PingOne MFA Image: Ping Identity Along with standard MFA features such as one-time passwords and biometrics, PingOne MFA utilizes dynamic policies that IT can use to optimize the authentication process and integrate authentication into business applications. As a cloud-based MFA service, PingOne MFA can provide stronger authentication by requiring a combination of factors — such as requiring a user to scan their biometric fingerprint specifically on their smartphone. Cisco Duo Image: Cisco Duo Cisco Secure Access by Duo offers many out-of-the-box integrations, a simple enrollment process, and convenient push authentication features. It is one of the most widely deployed MFA applications and offers a healthy balance between ease of use and overall

By Bryan Koenig ( February 7, 2025, 8:21 PM EST) — A trio of tractor manufacturers asked an Illinois federal judge Friday to impose stringent safeguards for sensitive business information they turned over to the Federal Trade Commission in the run-up to its right-to-repair lawsuit against their “primary competitor,” John Deere…. Law360 is on it, so you are, too. A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions. A Law360 subscription includes features such as Daily newsletters Expert analysis Mobile app Advanced search Judge information Real-time alerts 450K+ searchable archived articles And more! Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial. source

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More Cognida.ai, a Chicago-based AI company, has raised $15 million in Series A funding to help enterprises move beyond AI pilots to production-grade solutions that deliver measurable business impact. The funding round was led by Nexus Venture Partners. The investment comes at a critical time when enterprises are struggling to transform AI experiments into operational solutions. While 87% of enterprises are investing in AI, only 20% successfully deploy solutions into production, according to Cognida. “Enterprise AI adoption has reached its tipping point,” Feroze Mohammed, founder and CEO of Cognida, said in an exclusive interview with VentureBeat. “The biggest challenges enterprises face isn’t just building AI models — it’s getting them to work in production.” How Zunō platform cuts AI implementation time from 8 months to 12 weeks Mohammed, who previously led Hitachi Vantara as COO, identified three major barriers to enterprise AI adoption: data readiness, integration challenges with existing business processes and lack of AI expertise within organizations. To address these challenges, Cognida has developed Zunō, a platform that includes accelerators for predictive modeling, intelligent document processing and advanced graph-based solutions. The company claims its approach reduces typical AI implementation times from 6 to 8 months to 10 to 12 weeks. “Most conventional approaches require long lead times of doing consulting projects, doing a lot of change management with long timelines and long upfront investments,” Anup Gupta, managing director at Nexus Venture Partners, said in an interview with VentureBeat. “Cognida is one of the first times we have come across a business that can talk about demonstrable use cases across various industries.” The company has already deployed solutions at more than 30 enterprises. In one case, Cognida helped a major garage door manufacturer transform its catalog generation process from a six-month cycle to just weeks using generative AI. The solution allows the manufacturer to create virtual door designs and render them in different settings, enabling rapid testing with dealers. Other successful implementations include a 70% improvement in invoice processing speed and a one percent reduction in customer churn for SaaS clients — metrics that translate to significant revenue impact for large enterprises. The future of enterprise software: Every stack is being rewritten with AI The funding will support three primary initiatives: market expansion, intellectual property development and capability building. Mohammed envisions Cognida becoming “the practical AI company for the enterprise” within five years. “Every software stack is being rewritten leveraging AI,” said Gupta. “In the next few years, every workflow in all enterprises will have a lot more AI than is being used today.” This investment reflects a broader trend in enterprise AI, where focus is shifting from experimental projects to practical implementations that deliver clear return on investment. As businesses seek to operationalize AI while maintaining existing systems, Cognida’s approach of building solutions that integrate with current workflows appears particularly timely. The company plans to expand its AI solution library, advance its Zunō platform and grow its implementation teams to meet increasing enterprise demand. With offices in Chicago, Silicon Valley and Hyderabad, India, Cognida serves clients across manufacturing, healthcare, finance and technology sectors. Industry analysts suggest this funding round could signal a new phase in enterprise AI adoption, where practical implementation and measurable outcomes take precedence over experimental pilots. As organizations continue to grapple with AI integration challenges, solutions that can demonstrate concrete business impact while working within existing systems may find increasing traction in the market. source

During many major tech conferences and events in 2024, talk of implementing artificial intelligence was a common theme as IT leaders are tasked with creating new GenAI tools for business. But a common refrain was the need to prepare data for machine learning. That need for clean data may slow AI launch efforts and add to costs. A recent Salesforce report found CIOs are spending a median of 20% of their budgets on data infrastructure and management and only 5% on AI. A lack of trusted data ranked high on the list of CIOs’ main AI fears. In another report, research firm International Data Corporation (IDC) says worldwide spending on AI will reach $632 Billion in 2028. The industry was caught off guard as OpenAI’s ChatGPT quickly launched the GenAI arms race two years ago — many companies are faced with juggling data needs with getting that data AI-ready. Spending on data preparation could be a significant upstart cost for AI, varying with the size and maturity of different businesses and organizations. Preparing data for AI is a tricky and potentially costly task. IT leaders must consider several factors, including quality, volume, complexity of data, along with preparing for costs associated with data collection, cleaning, labeling, and conversion suitable for an AI model. When added on top of needs for new hardware, software, and labor costs associated with GenAI adoption, and the bills add up quickly. Related:How CIOs Can Prepare for Generative AI in Network Operations CIOs and other tech leaders are faced with presenting AI as a potential value creator and possible revenue generator. But many companies face an uphill battle when it comes to ROI on new GenAI programs, the time and cost to prepare data often doesn’t lead to immediate returns. Spending Money on Data to Make Money with AI Barb Wixom, author and principal research scientist at MIT’s Center for Information Systems Research (MIT CISR), says leaders can point to specific successes at other companies that have more mature AI rollouts. Those companies, she says, have built strong data value through forward-looking governance. “AI has to be viewed, not as AI, but as a part of the data value creation or data realization,” she tells InformationWeek in a phone interview. “I call it data monetization … converting data to money. If organizations and especially leaders just consistently think about AI in that context, you won’t have a problem … if an organization is trying to reduce its cost structure by a certain percentage, or trying to increase sales in some way, or increase service growth — whatever the objective is — that’s often big money. Even if you have an extraordinary investment in AI, the outcome could be orders of magnitude greater.” Related:It Takes a Village: New Infrastructure Costs for AI — Utility Bills With tech budgets tightening in the face of macroeconomic woes, IT leaders need to convince non-technical members of the C-suite that data preparation is a worthwhile investment. Wixom points to success stories in the financial services industry where IT leaders had strong credibility within their executive team. One such leader, she says, used an internal consulting group to accumulate use cases to present a more traditional business plan to executives. “They road-mapped how they were going to build out over four years — they were able to deliver that,” Wixom says. But other organizations may not be as mature in their data governance as a major financial institution. In those cases, an incremental, bottom-up approach can be effective as well. “You don’t have to start with the vision of all that’s going to be done … but by taking an incremental approach that builds capability, where you learn along the way and establish not silos, but a growing enterprise resource.” The next step: Finding the right architecture to align with your AI goals. Data mesh and data fabric are two competing modern data architecture frontrunners that are similar but have key differences. Related:Digital Mindset: The Secret to Bottom-Up GenAI Productivity Mesh or Fabric? Modern Data Architectures In the pre-GenAI era, data governance was relatively straightforward. Many companies pooled data into “data lakes” that stored large amounts of raw data. For AI use, that generalized architecture can create bottlenecks that hinder productivity. Data fabric and data mesh architectures are becoming the new industry standards when it comes to GenAI implementation. That’s because these modern architectures integrate data from multiple sources into a unified view, simplifying data maintenance, and reducing time and costs. Data Mesh: Using a data mesh architecture can be a good option for those looking to empower separate business units with data ownership. Data Fabric: Data fabric offers centralized architecture, integrating data across an organization. This method allows a unified data structure with a central governance. But those new architectures come with a price. Higher startup costs and ongoing maintenance fees can pose significant barriers to entries for some enterprises, depending on the size and current state of data governance. Data mesh will likely have higher up front costs. Data fabric has lower implementation costs but will likely cost more to maintain. So, it’s important to understand potential use cases to justify the spend and to understand which architecture is right for your organization, experts say. Inna Tokarev Sela, chief executive officer and founder of data fabric firm Illumex, points to specific use cases that can most benefit from modern data architectures. She says organizations that can most benefit from data fabric include those “which aspire to create a degree of automation, self-service access to data analytics by business users, workflow automation, and process automation.” She says businesses with disparate teams who need to use data to build analytics and collaborate can benefit from a data fabric architecture. “Data fabric and data mesh are like the Montagues and Capulets, or the Hatfields and McCoys,” says Kendall Clark, co-founder and CEO of data firm Stardog. “It’s like a frenemy rivalry … they are so similar that nobody can tell them apart,

Browser extensions have been under the spotlight in enterprise security news recently due to the wave of OAuth attacks on Chrome extension developers and data exfiltration attacks. However, until now, due to the limitations browser vendors place on the extension subsystem and extensions, it was thought to be impossible for extensions to gain full control of the browser, much less the device. SquareX researchers Dakshitaa Babu, Arpit Gupta, Sunkugari Tejeswara Reddy and Pankaj Sharma debunked this belief by demonstrating how attackers can use malicious extensions to escalate privileges to conduct a full browser and device takeover, all with minimal user interaction. Critically, the malicious extension only requires read/write capabilities present in the majority of browser extensions on the Chrome Store, including common productivity tools like Grammarly, Calendly and Loom, desensitizing users from granting these permissions. This revelation suggests that virtually any browser extension could potentially serve as an attack vector if created or taken over by an attacker. To the best of our understanding, extensions submitted to the Chrome Store requesting these capabilities are not put through additional security scrutiny at the time of this writing. The browser syncjacking attack can be broken up into three parts: how the extension silently adds a profile managed by the attacker, hijacks the browser and eventually gains full control of the device. Profile Hijacking The attack begins with an employee installing any browser extension – this could involve publishing one that masquerades as an AI tool or taking over existing popular extensions that may have up to millions of installations in aggregate. The extension then “silently” authenticates the victim into a Chrome profile managed by the attacker’s Google Workspace. This is all done in an automated manner in a background window, making the whole process almost imperceptible to the victim. Once this authentication occurs, the attacker has full control over the newly managed profile in the victim’s browser, allowing them to push automated policies such as disabling safe browsing and other security features. Using a very clever social engineering attack that exploits trusted domains, the adversary can then further escalate the profile hijacking attack to steal passwords from the victim’s browser. For example, the malicious extension can open and modify Google’s official support page on how to sync user accounts to prompt the victim to perform the sync with just a few clicks. Once the profile is synced, attackers have full access to all credentials and browsing history stored locally. As this attack only leverages legitimate sites and has no visible sign that it has been modified by the extension, it will not trigger any alarm bells in any security solutions monitoring the network traffic. Browser Takeover To achieve a full browser takeover, the attacker essentially needs to convert the victim’s Chrome browser into a managed browser. The same extension monitors and intercepts a legitimate download, such as a Zoom update, and replaces it with the attacker’s executable, which contains an enrollment token and registry entry to turn the victim’s Chrome browser into a managed browser. Thinking that they downloaded a Zoom updater, the victim executes the file, which ends up installing a registry entry that instructs the browser to become managed by the attacker’s Google Workspace. This allows the attacker to gain full control over the victim’s browser to disable security features, install additional malicious extensions, exfiltrate data and even silently redirect users to phishing sites. This attack is extremely potent as there is no visual difference between a managed and unmanaged browser. For a regular user, there is no telltale sign that a privilege escalation has occurred unless the victim is highly security aware and goes out of their way to regularly inspect their browser settings and look for associations with an unfamiliar Google Workspace account. Device Hijacking With the same downloaded file above, the attacker can additionally insert registry entries required for the malicious extension to message native apps. This allows the extension to directly interact with local apps without further authentication. Once the connection is established, attackers can use the extension in conjunction with the local shell and other available native applications to secretly turn on the device camera, capture audio, record screens and install malicious software – essentially providing full access to all applications and confidential data on the device. The browser syncjacking attack exposes a fundamental flaw in the way remote-managed profiles and browsers are managed. Today, anyone can create a managed workspace account tied to a new domain and a browser extension without any form of identity verification, making it impossible to attribute these attacks. Unfortunately, most enterprises currently have zero visibility into the browser – most do not have managed browsers or profiles, nor any visibility to the extensions employees are installing often based on trending tools and social media recommendations. What makes this attack particularly dangerous is that it operates with minimal permissions and nearly no user interaction, requiring only a subtle social engineering step using trusted websites – making it almost impossible for employees to detect. While recent incidents like the Cyberhaven breach have already compromised hundreds, if not thousands of organizations, those attacks required relatively complex social engineering to operate. The devastatingly subtle nature of this attack – with an extremely low threshold of user interaction – not only makes this attack extremely potent, but also sheds light on the terrifying possibility that adversaries are already using this technique to compromise enterprises today. Unless an organization chooses to completely block browser extensions via managed browsers, the browser syncjacking attack will completely bypass existing blacklists and permissions-based policies. SquareX’s founder Vivek Ramachandran says “This research exposes a critical blind spot in enterprise security. Traditional security tools simply can’t see or stop these sophisticated browser-based attacks. What makes this discovery particularly alarming is how it weaponizes seemingly innocent browser extensions into complete device takeover tools, all while flying under the radar of conventional security measures like EDRs and SASE/SSE Secure Web Gateways. A Browser Detection-Response solution isn’t just an option anymore – it’s

By Tom Zanki ( February 6, 2025, 2:34 PM EST) — Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc. is considering relocating its legal residence to Texas, while cryptocurrency exchange Bullish is moving forward on an initial public offering, and Unilever PLC is eyeing New York as a listing destination for its ice cream business…. Law360 is on it, so you are, too. A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions. A Law360 subscription includes features such as Daily newsletters Expert analysis Mobile app Advanced search Judge information Real-time alerts 450K+ searchable archived articles And more! Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial. source

A group of objectors urged the Ninth Circuit on Friday to vacate Meta Platform Inc.’s $725 million settlement resolving privacy claims over the Cambridge Analytica data harvesting scandal, arguing the trial judge failed to fully consider the minimum $250 billion statutory damages award that could have been awarded if class counsel won at trial. source

“Strategy without tactics is the slowest path to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” — Sun Tzu, “The Art of War” Customer success (CS) practitioners often talk to me about postsale strategy and tactics. What I’ve noticed from those conversations is that those terms are being used interchangeably despite being different, though complementary, concepts. In Forrester’s State Of Customer Engagement Survey, 2024, however, we found that CS teams over-rotate on the tactical. Our data overview report on B2B customer success responsibilities shows that only about a quarter of CS practitioner activities are strategic. Only three strategic CS responsibilities — customer segmentation, establishing strong relationships with decision-makers and key stakeholders, and determining overall strategy for the customer’s postsale experience — rose to the top 12 customer success remits. The other nine responsibilities in the top 12 are tactical. Tracking goals and sharing progress toward customer outcomes — joint customer success plans — barely registered. If the long-term goal of CS is to positively influence retention, customer outcomes should be near the top of the list. If any of this resonates, reassess your CS strategy. To succeed, CS must have the right charter, investment, alignment with the business, and ability to manage the customer journey. If you haven’t revisited your strategy in a while, now is the time to do so. Your CS strategy must evolve to ensure that it’s in lockstep with the company’s goals and the changing needs of your market. To read more about where customer success teams spend their time and other challenges they’re facing, dig into our data overview report, 2024 Data Shows Customer Success As Less Reactive But Still Tactical. And if you’d like to assess your own customer success strategy, reach out to your account team to schedule a guidance session with us. source

North One North One is a financial technology company and not a bank. Banking services are provided by The Bancorp Bank, N.A; Member FDIC.  is a financial technology (fintech) company that offers small business owners savings from typical account fees by charging no monthly fees and having no minimum balance requirements. It also has various business tools through integration with popular software, QuickBooks, Expensify, Shopify, and more. Additionally, you can streamline your fund allocation through its budgeting feature, Envelopes. North One’s fast facts Our rating: 4.33 out of 5 Starting price: $50 opening deposit. Key features for North One Standard Account: No monthly fees or balance minimums. Physical and virtual cards. Over 50 integrations including QuickBooks, Wave, Patriot Accounting, and Zoho. Links with popular ecommerce sites. Budgeting tool, Envelopes. North One perks include discounts and free trials of software and productivity tools. Image: North One North One’s Business Checking account is a perfect fit for small businesses, especially eCommerce establishments seeking to maximize the powerful integrations offered by this provider. Businesses that often use ACH can choose its higher tier plan to access fee-free same-day ACH services. In addition, North One helps small businesses manage their funds better using its convenient budgeting system, Envelopes. Let’s check out North One Business Checking’s standout features and pricing structure to see how it compares with other financial providers. North One Business Checking Reviews: What Users Think of North One 4.30/5 On Trustpilot, North One received a rating of 4.4 from about 200 reviews and 4.2 from around 50-plus reviews on Product Hunt. Customer feedback has been mostly positive. Many praised its excellent customer service and user-friendly platform. Reviewers mentioned that the support team was knowledgeable and professional, and provided timely responses. Some also appreciated the QuickBooks integration and free and cheap ACH and wire options. Specific North One Business banking reviews were unavailable. However, several users appreciated its Envelopes feature and said the system helps them organize their funds and simplify fund allocation for regular business expenses. One reviewer commented that North One understands the needs of small businesses by offering efficient, reliable, and innovative banking solutions. The negative feedback came from users with suspended or closed accounts. North One Business Checking Pricing Structure 3.82/5 Like many fintech companies, North One offers no monthly fees or balance minimums. An initial $50 deposit is required, but the minimal fees and transparency help small business owners save and anticipate potential account costs. North One Business Checking account: No monthly fees or required balances. $50 opening deposit. Unlimited transactions. Unlimited incoming domestic wires and ACH deposits. $20 outgoing domestic wires. 1.5% fee for same-day ACH. $1 minimum, $15 maximum $4.95 per cash deposit at Green Dot locations. Aside from its standard account, North One offers a higher-tier product, North One Plus, with a monthly fee of $20. The benefits include fee-free same-day ACH and lower domestic incoming wire transfer fees ($15) for those who regularly use these services. North One Business Checking Key Features 4.4/5 North One offers several advantageous features to its customers, especially its budgeting tool, Envelopes. Let’s check its features to see how it gains a competitive edge over other providers. Key features for North One Business Checking: No monthly fees or balance requirements. Same-day ACH. Budgeting tool. Robust integrations. Customer perks. No Monthly Fees and Balance RequirementsWith a North One checking account, you can save on monthly maintenance fees without meeting a minimum balance. You also get unlimited transactions, domestic wires, and ACH deposits, which can contribute to more savings for small businesses. Same-day ACHOnly same-day ACH is available with your North One business account. You will be charged 1.5% of the total transfer amount. However, if you subscribe to the paid plan, North One Plus you can send free ACH payments. Businesses that regularly need to perform same-day ACH can sign up for the higher-tier product for more savings. Budgeting ToolThrough Envelopes, North One’s budgeting feature, you can set aside parts of your funds for specific business expenses like taxes and payroll. You can create unlimited envelopes and set up custom rules. This helps businesses manage their funds better by allocating money for specific spending. Robust IntegrationsWith over 50 software integrations for accounting, financial management, invoicing, payments, POS & eCommerce, payroll, and productivity, you can link your business checking account with your daily tools. This streamlines payment processing and data sharing, leading to more business efficiency. Customer PerksYour North One account lets you access plenty of perks, such as discounts to free trials of popular business products like QuickBooks, Gusto, Stripe, Adobe, Intuit TurboTax, Microsoft Advertising, Zoho, and more. It leads to more savings while you build and grow your business. Would Our Expert Use North One Business Checking? 4.8/5 Small business owners looking for a cost-saving checking account will find North One invaluable. I recommend it for its multiple software integrations, allowing seamless connection with the business platforms you use daily. You will not need to pay for standard monthly and transaction fees. At the same time, you can take advantage of its unlimited domestic wire and ACH deposits. Another distinctive feature I appreciate is its robust eCommerce integrations, like Shopify, Square, and Stripe. Online store owners, Amazon sellers, and dropshippers can easily access customer payments through these platforms. That’s why I included North One in our list of the best banks for eCommerce businesses. Another top feature is its budgeting tool, Envelopes, which makes fund allocation decisions easy. The few drawbacks, however, are that North One is not for cash-reliant businesses. You can deposit cash at Green Dot retail locations, but a fee of up to $4.95 per transaction applies. Your account won’t also earn any interest. Alternatively, you can opt for a traditional provider like U.S. Bank for branch access or Bluevine for interest-earning checking accounts. Before opening an account, see our article on how to open a business bank account to learn the step-by-step process. North One Business Checking Pros Fee-free checking: No monthly fees and