Practice Safe Net: Why Internet Security Should Matter to You

Internet security. Sure, we all know it’s important. Maybe Your IT department has sent memos time again about the importance of complex passwords, or perhaps you’ve been the unsuspecting victim of a computer virus. The truth of the matter is that internet security is incredibly vital to the overall functioning of any business where computers are connected to a network, and utilizing these same rules on your home computer is just good habit.

Know Safe Email & Browsing Practices

Have a secure password. Your cat’s name is not a good password. Neither is Password. The key to a strong password is to make it complex, change it frequently, and utilize a different password for every site. My husband (an IT guy) uses two sentences from his favorite book as his banking password because length trumps complexity – the longer the password, the harder it is to break. (Try this to find out how long it will take to break yours.) Worried you won’t remember them all? Encrypted password “vaults” like Dashlane and Keepass will be the brain for your passwords and keep them safe from phishing eyes.

Use two-step verification. If it’s available through a site that has any sensitive information of yours, opt in to two-step verification. One of my Gmail account was hacked a few years ago and not only do I utilize this practice for all my personal accounts, I also have Google email me an account summary at the end of each month so I can see if an account has been accessed from an unauthorized IP address.

Recognize Phishing. Phishing is an attempt to gain sensitive information from a user by concealing oneself as a trusted site. In the ‘90s these came as emails from princes requesting your bank account and routing numbers. These days, phishers utilize more complex methods and create entire sites mimicking pages like Facebook or Twitter, and even the FBI and CIA. It is easy to recognize phishing if you know what to look for.

Get in the habit of knowing your sender Make sure you check the domain name of any email asking you for your login information. If you want to go to the site, most browsers will show you where you’re headed if you hover over a link. Should you click through, make sure you’re being directed to the correct page. Check the host’s name – if it’s not the site you’re being asked to login to, DON’T DO IT!

Be suspicious of popup sites Popup ads have often been used as an easy way to phish. More frequently, popups telling you your system or device is infected are appearing. If this message comes through a popup ad, this is probably not the case. Try closing the tab or your browser first. If this doesn’t work, reboot your machine. DO NOT run anything from one of these sites that might automatically download to your computer.

Backup! Backup! Backup!

I cannot stress enough the importance of having a backup system. It doesn’t matter how many documents you have. If any of them are important – BACKUP! Storage is cheap and you’ll kick yourself for not doing it. I have witnessed companies unwilling to pay lose unspeakable amounts of customer information because they didn’t want to shell out for backup data storage.

Online backups are good. If you’re developing content, it is good practice to save your documents in multiple places while you’re working – just in case! An online backup system is visible to the computer at all times. This means that while the newest version of your design project will be safe if your computer crashes, it is still susceptible to malware that reaches through a system to find available data to capture.

Offline backups are better. External hard drives are fairly affordable to have at home, and there is absolutely no excuse for a business to not have an offline backup system. This kind of system is only visible at certain times, such as when you physically plug a hard drive into your computer. Most people can transfer files to this kind of backup system by hand. At home we bring one of our hard drives online from time to time to copy documents over.

Having backups is vital to the recovery of your information should your system be infected with a virus. In recent months, the virus wreaking havoc and getting its fair share of media fame is Cryptowall, a form of cryptogenic extortion malware or Ransomware. An Ars Technica article aptly describes Ransomware as “a strange hybrid of digital mugging and commercial-grade coding.” Ransomware essentially takes documents accessible from the infected computer “hostage” by locking the files and then demanding ransom within a given timeframe from the owner, often in the form of Bitcoins, to release a key to access the encrypted data. Cryptowall has proven impossible to break. Other malware will simply steal data from your system and then sift through it later for anything valuable like credit card numbers.

Get Some Relief

Install a good antivirus software. Simply put, every time an antivirus software runs it’s like a check-up for your computer. You can set your software to scan your system from top to bottom at scheduled intervals throughout the day. Past that, such software monitors incoming data for suspicious activity 24/7 so you don’t have to stress as much over, “Should I or should I not click that?” With good antivirus software available for free, there is absolutely no excuse to not have this installed on every operating machine. Windows 8 comes with a great antivirus already built-in. Two of my favorite free options are Avast, which is available for both Mac and PC, and Malwarebytes, which is available for PC and which I also run on my Android devices.

While these may sound like simple tips – and you may be saying, “I know these things already” – knowing and doing are two different practices. Internet security is about protecting yourself first so you don’t have to beat yourself up later when you’ve lost client information, sensitive documents, or gobs of money. Take the time to put this advice into action. Your IT department will thank you, and you’ll probably get a pat on the back from your boss, as well.

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