Five ways to protect data and information
More and more data around the world is stored on digital media and servers, but the most important thing is that this information must be preserved. Hackers steal credit card numbers, bank accounts, and even a person's identity on a daily basis, it's almost as easy to do as learning to drive a car. According to some reports, you won't be able to do anything about it.
For example, if your bank's server is hacked, you can't do anything about them stealing your account number and withdrawing money. Luckily, if this happens to a big company, they take the brunt and help you save your money.
How to protect information
If you store information on your personal computer or on an external device, make sure that sensitive information is not stored on it, and if it is stored, then it is well protected. In this article, I will share five steps that will help you protect yourself and your data from hackers and scammers.
I wrote this article back in 2007, but nothing has changed now. She talks about how to encrypt your hard drive using TrueCrypt, which is a free and popular data encryption program. What about flash drive encryption? I wrote about this three years ago. You can also use TrueCrypt to encrypt data on flash drives and external storage devices. Encryption is necessary so that if someone uses your computer, flash drive, or external storage device, no one can see your files. Without knowing your password, they will not be able to log in and will not be able to access any files and data stored on the drive. This brings us to the next step.
Step 1 - Data Encryption
You hear about data encryption almost every day, but it seems that no one uses it. I asked my friends if they use data encryption and none of them encrypt data on their computers and external hard drives. And these are people who do everything online: from ordering a taxi and ordering food to reading newspapers. The only thing you can do is encrypt the data. This is hard enough to do on Windows or Mac, but if you do it once, you won't have to do anything else.
Step 2 - Use strong passwords
Of course, encryption is worth nothing if anyone can just turn on your computer and attack your system until they guess the correct password. Use only a strong password that consists of a combination of numbers, symbols, and letters, as it will be harder to guess. There are, of course, ways to get around any questions, but there are things that will help you get around this problem, about them a little later.
I previously wrote about free online tools that you can use to generate strong passwords. Also, read my five tips for creating strong passwords. Many people tell me that they don't use complex passwords because they are very difficult to remember and therefore have to be reset all the time. I agree that this is a serious problem. That's why I use the LastPass tool, it's an online and offline secure password manager. With it, you can store passwords from all your sites, bank cards, and accounts, and you can access them from your smartphone.
Step 3 - Two Factor Authentication
So, the problem of encryption and complex passwords can still be cracked as long as we send them over the Internet. For example, in a cafe you use wireless Internet and go to a site that does not use the SSL protocol, that is, HTTPS in the address bar, at which time a hacker can easily intercept your password via a Wi-fi network.
How can you protect yourself in such a situation? First, do not work on an insecure wireless network or on a public Wi-Fi network. This is very risky. Secondly, two authentication factors can be used. Basically, this means that you need to create two types of information and two passwords to enter the sites and use the services. The Google system has two verification systems, and that's great. Even if someone knows your complex password from Google, he will not be able to access your data until he enters the six-digit code that comes to your smartphone.
In essence, in order to log in, they will need not only your password but also a smartphone. Such protection reduces your chances of being hacked. LastPass also works with Google Authenticator so you don't have to worry about your passwords. You will have one password and access code, which will be available only to you. In order to log into the Facebook system, you will receive an SMS on your phone with a code that must be entered along with your password. Now your Facebook account will be hard to hack.
Please use Paypal. There is a special security key. His concept is this: you need to send an SMS with a code,
to login. What about a WordPress blog? It can also use Google Authenticator to protect the site from hackers. Two-factor authentication is good because it is easy to use and is the most reliable system for protecting your data. Check your favorite sites for two-factor authentication.
Step 4- Secure your network
Another aspect of security is the network you use to communicate with the outside world. Is this your home wireless network? Are you using WEP or WPA or WPA2? Do you use an insecure network in hotels, airports or cafes? The first thing you want to do is shut down your secure network since you spend most of your time on your computer. You want to protect yourself and choose the highest possible degree of security. Check out my previous article which talks about encryption of a wireless Wi-Fi network.
There are many other things that can be done:
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Disable SSID broadcast
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Enable MAC Address Filtering
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Enabling AP Isolation
On the Internet, you can read about this and other types of security. The second thing you want to do (maybe the first, actually) is to change the username and password that is used to access your wireless router. It's great if you set up WPA2 with AES, but if someone uses your router's IP address, i.e. hacks your username and password, they can block you from your own router.
Fortunately, you can always restore access to your router, but this is a very risky business because someone can log into your router and then gain access to your network. Logging into the router will allow you to see all the clients that are connected to the router and their IP addresses. Buying a new wireless router and connecting to it for the first time is not a good idea. Be sure to enable the firewall on the router and on the computer. This will prevent various applications from entering certain ports on your computer when communicating.
Step 5 - Antivirus Software
Computer protected by antivirus
If a virus or malware gets on your computer, then all your previous actions will be useless. Someone can control the virus and transfer your data to their server. Today, antivirus is a necessity, as is the good habit of inspecting your computer. I recommend Microsoft Security Essentials antivirus for Windows, it's free and does an excellent job of detecting viruses and malware. If you think there is something on your computer, then read my previous article on eliminating malware and spyware.
Implementing these five steps greatly reduces your chances of being hacked. There are many ways for hackers to bypass all secure networks and encryption, but even for them it is a difficult task. What are your thoughts? How can you protect your digital data?