It wouldn’t be wrong to say that our lives would be incomplete without Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, and many more social networking sites. Most of us have also created a virtual world for ourselves where we love spending almost every minute of our waking hours. These social networking sites are fun, entertaining, and enable us to connect with a lot of people absolutely hassle-free. But the online world can be a dangerous place especially when people can get easy access to all our personal information. The Week spoke to Pradeep Kandel, Microsoft MVP, who briefed us about the quickly and constantly evolving cyber security risks and gave us pointers to keep ourselves safe online.
The need to keep personal information private on social media
Personal information such as birthdays, permanent or temporary address, email address and phone number should be kept private on social media as revealing them can be extremely dangerous. Remember, displaying these information makes it easier for cybercriminal to access your banking information and make unauthorized withdrawals and transfers. Also, posting vacation updates on social media sounds extremely exciting. But you must avoid it as it leaves your house doors open for robberies and you may be exposed to various other crimes.
You must customize your security settings and restrict your personal information to just your close friends and acquaintances. You should also take out time to explore the privacy settings of your social media platform and use it efficiently. For example, Facebook and Twitter allow you to customize a list of people who will be allowed to view specific posts.
Another dangerous aspect of social media is that it has a lot of unnecessary content. The youth especially tend to kill their precious time daily on social media. It is important to not let social media rule your lives.
Nepal European Union Film Festival to begin virtually
Online banking and electronic wallets
Online banking and electronic wallets are certainly the future of banking. In fact, in many countries online money transactions have become an unavoidable part of their day-to-day life. However, there are certain things that one must keep in mind while using internet banking and online transaction services.
Remember, fraudsters get your user ID and password information from a fake website that resembles your bank website. So you must be extremely careful while opening your bank website. Make sure the URL of your bank website is genuine and not a fake one. To keep yourself a lot safer, it is advisable to change your password at least once a month.
Banks will never ask you to fill a form or call you up asking for your user ID card number and password. Be aware of these thefts. Also, if you have several bank accounts, do not use the same online banking passwords for all because if a cybercriminal has access to one of your accounts, he might be able to access all the other accounts using your password.
You should also use virtual or onscreen keyboard while entering important credit/debit card details. This will reduce the risk of password theft from ‘Spywares’ and ‘Torjan Programs’.
The importance of strong passwords
These days, a lot of emails and banks insist on having complicated password. This has been done for the right reasons as it is extremely important to prevent theft. A determined and experienced hacker may run a brute-force attack on a website. This means a cyber criminal may try a series of passwords, phrases, and numbers so that they can steal someone’s password. If the passwords are complex and longer, these brute-force attacks can be prevented.
A strong password must comprise of lowercase letters, uppercase letters, numbers, and if possible other characters. This makes your password almost impossible to break and ensures that your account is well defended. It is also advisable to keep longer passwords because it is much harder to guess longer passwords.
Password such as Nepal@123 or kathmandu01 are extremely easy to guess. So, if you have a hard time remembering complicated passwords, make them long. For example, thecityoftempleskathmandu01 is a complicated password and cannot be guessed easily.
Being smart with your smartphone
The most important step is to keep your data safe on your smartphone. If you do a lot of official work on your phone, you must utilize apps such as iCloud, Dropbox and OneDrive. These apps will help keep your data secure in case of system cracks.
There are also some security loopholes in popular apps such as Instagram and Facebook that you must be careful about. Make sure you never switch on your GPS while uploading a Snapchat or Instagram story.
You must also be cautious while downloading new apps. Especially if the app looks similar to popular games such as Candy Crush and Pokémon Go, it is a good idea to google and check the developer’s website to check if it is fake.
Also, avoid using mobile wallets when you are connected to a public Wi-Fi. And lastly, it is important to create a unique password for your mobile wallet and you must update the password regularly.
Securing your network
Anti-virus software certainly work and help you to a great extent in keeping your computer safe. Modern anti-virus software are extremely sophisticated but there are a few things you need to keep in mind while buying one. If you are using a genuine operating system, be it iOS or windows, there are less chances for your computer to be hacked or catch virus. But if your operating system is not genuine, even a good anti-virus software may not work.
Actually, there is no need for you to buy antivirus software if you are using an original operating system. Frequently updating your device with latest updates is enough to keep your computer secure. New updates often rectify security glitches that your computer software may be facing. So it is important to download these new updates in order to keep your computer secure.
Viruses can also easily be transferred through emails. It is better to delete an unknown or suspicious email to keep your phone or computer safe. This is also called phishing where the hackers try to obtain your private and essential information primarily through emails.
