Archives for November 2018

Social engineering is the act of manipulating someone into releasing sensitive information or providing them access to your network. For example, a social engineer could pose as an IT specialist and try to trick an employee into divulging their login credentials. The following are some of the most common social engineering tactics.

Pretexting
Pretexting is the use of a ploy to capture a victim’s attention. Once the story catches the person’s interest, the scammer tries to trick the victim into providing sensitive information. For example, you may receive an email naming you as the beneficiary of a will, which requests your personal information to prove your identity so you can receive your inheritance.

Baiting
Baiting means presenting something to a victim so they take an action (not unlike how a fish would react to a worm on a hook). For example, a cyber criminal may label a flash drive loaded with malware something like “Confidential” or “Q1 Layoff Plan” and leave it in plain view for someone to find. Someone who takes the bait would investigate the flash drive by plugging it into their computer.

Scareware
In the case of “scareware,” a victim becomes bombarded with false alarms and fake threats. The victim is deceived to believe their system is infected with malware, and that they must install a program – which is actually malware itself – to remove it. Never download ransomware protection that is not from a trusted source.

If you travel often, public Wi-Fi can prove to be especially convenient. It saves on mobile data, is typically free, and can provide for faster speeds when it comes to downloading. However, as convenient as using public Wi-Fi may be for us, it has proven to be equally convenient for hackers – just for different reasons. To prevent hackers from gaining access to your information while you use a public connection, consider the following tips from our cyber security solution providers.

Enable Two-Factor Authentication
For all your web services such as email, social networks, and your website’s CMS, turn on two-factor authentication. This means that to log in to a service, in addition to your existing credentials, you must also enter a unique code that is delivered to your phone via text message. This way, even if a hacker obtains your password, they cannot access your account.

Use a VPN service
A VPN (a virtual private network) will encrypt your browsing traffic and data, thus making it nearly impossible for someone else to access it. With encryption, a hacker spying on the public network’s traffic will only see garbled data passing between your device and the VPN server. Thus, it may be wise if you take the help of good VPN services like Norton vpn or others similar to them. This could be extremely useful if you are exchanging sensitive work-related files over the Internet.

However, you have to keep in mind that a VPN might affect your internet. As it is public Wi-Fi is usually spread pretty thin, and if you add a VPN to that, you might not even be able to load simple pages. So if you’re wondering about the reasons internet is slow for you in public spaces, it might have something to do with the VPN. Usually, having a premium subscription solves this problem.
Use a Tethered Internet Connection Instead
If you have a decent data plan, consider tethering your connection from your mobile device rather than using a public Wi-Fi network while you’re on the go. This private connection will be much more difficult for a hacker to break into.