Recently I have seen a rise in hacking, both corporate (M&S, Co-op) and personal, and even some websites etc. I host/admin. Now one thing is clear, money is tight around the world with the UK inflation rate jumping to 3.5% again and seeing a few people saying budgets with me will be reduced again, whilst in the last 2 weeks I have literally seen 2 long established websites decide to fold and go to “free” ways to do what they have used a website for for over 25 years…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2xx4n1xx0o
Now – this is just another wave of higher costs hitting things – there have been massive changes recently to how people seem to use the tinternet in general, with social media for a lot taking a back seat and most tinternet use worldwide is now streaming video/tv/movies and music. I don’t know many people who don’t stream the majority of their tv nowadays, I mean we only watch live sports really now – the rest of our tv watching is either recorded (to skip the ads) or streamed (to skip the ads). These changes mean that security is again seeing a shift in focus. The amount of people who have had long standing accounts on social media seeing their accounts hacked is astounding – Meta I’m looking at your pretty much useless track record here with Facebook a massive source of attacks and hacks – I’d go as far as to say that for most of my “friends” online Facebook is responsible for 80-90% of hacks these days! Pretty much no week goes by without someone I know saying they’ve been hacked, or attempted to be hacked, and one quick look at all those cloned FB profiles should tell you this is a huge issue. But a lot of these problems is that people are just cutting back, spending less, and this includes their internet security and just other practices that allow them to be targeted. I mean the days of dodgy streaming seem to be pretty limited as copyright owners target those streaming things (think about streaming premiership football, that is bound to get you caught fairly quickly) and films are not available in any way like the numbers of dodgy copies like before, because the chances are you will get caught sooner or later! But using “free” services and giving them full access to your FB profile – that’s just as likely to get you hacked, and many people gave multiple games and silly apps access years ago, and forgot about it. Security IS better these days, but the legacy of people keeping the same password and using it for EVERYTHING for years still looms large (I recently came across someone who had used the password “PASSWORD” for 30 years and wondered why they were continually losing data/being hacked/money lost). When money is tight, the financial rewards for a half decent hack are so much larger. Ask M&S who are being widely quoted that their online business will suffer for a whole financial quarter and that the losses will probably hit £300 million! That could be a business ending hack right there…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c93llkg4n51o
So enough of the talk about security, what can WE do about it? Well it goes without saying that you shouldn’t use the same password for multiple services, and you should change the password often. Use a password generator or your browsers/apps method to generate a random password as well, and then save it somewhere protected with some other security. I mean banking apps and many mobile browsers will protect your passwords with your fingerprint or another method so use them! I still have a couple of friends who have no security on their phones yet leave them on tables perfect to be snatched. That is like handing the keys to your house over and saying I’m out tonight take what you want! You could also see if your details (most likely your email address) is in the databases of leaked/hacked/sold details. For a free check then the below website is a start – paying will usually give you more details too. My email address shows up in 21 breaches, but I don’t use any of those passwords any longer and have taken the steps to make sure that the accounts are secure…
You could consider using a VPN – but be aware that many free or cheap VPN systems don’t actually make you any safer online or really hide you at all. They also pretty much slow down your tinternet access a lot as well…
So in summary, as I didn’t want this to be a mahoosive post – security is a big issue right now. Take some time to make sure you are protected, keep your passwords safe (various methods available from password manager though they have been hacked as well, to your browser saving them) and change them often. Also remember that good old saying – if something appears too good to be true then it usually is… and just be aware that scams/hacks/attacks are on the rise again. Putting some work in now could save you a fortune in the future!
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