Identity theft is a quite prevalent form of online crime that has become more sophisticated and complex these days. When a hacker gets access to your personal information, such as name, password, social security number (SSN), credit card or bank account details, he can use it for a myriad of malicious purposes. These may include breaching your online banking account, committing online frauds in your name or selling your credentials further.

In order to protect yourself from identity theft, it is important to understand the different ways in which the attack is generally carried out.

• Keylogging: This type of identity theft involves installing a malware on the target user’s computer system. Whenever the user logs into an online account or carries out financial transactions, the malware records the keystrokes and transmits them to the hacker.
• Phishing: The hacker may send a fake email to the user or display pop-up advertizements while browsing the internet. The email is spoofed to have come from a credible organization, such as a bank, and requires the user to take an immediate action. This may include downloading a software, visiting a website or filling out an online form.
• Data Breach: Identity theft may also occur when hacker gains unauthorized access to the sensitive information while it is being shared over the internet, particularly unsecure networks. Packet sniffers may be used to view and steal the user’s financial information. Apart from this, spying, denial-of-service attacks, man-in-the-middle attacks and other such techniques may be used. 

Tips To Prevent Identity Theft

• Install Security Software: Make sure you install anti-malware, anti-spyware and other security software in your computer as well as mobile devices. These will help to identify and delete the malicious programs or files from the system. You should also enable firewall to monitor and block any suspicious traffic from accessing your network.
• Follow Proper Security Measures: You should follow the best security practices while accessing the internet, particularly on public Wi-Fi networks. Do not log in to your banking and email accounts or shop online when connected to an unsecure network.
• Guard Against Phishing Attempts: Do not open or download attachments from emails that come from an unknown sender. Also, you should not share your personal or financial information or click on a link embedded in such emails.

For more tips on protecting yourself against online identity theft, you can contact Centex Technologies at (972) 375 – 9654.

IT security is a pre-requisite for successful business operations. The present day online attacks are very sophisticated, hard to detect and can cause serious damage to the computers on your corporate network. Besides malware and virus infection, there are many other security threats, such as Denial of Service (DoS), spyware, ransomware, man-in-the-middle attack etc. Therefore, regardless of the size and type of your organization, it is important to take the necessary network security steps to protect your data from cybercriminals.

Discussed below are a few fundamental tips to keep your network safe:

Delete Unused Accounts

Email or social networking accounts that are not active should be deleted. Since these accounts do not have updated security settings, they are quite easy to be hacked. Make sure you timely review all your official accounts and identify as well as delete the ones that are no longer required. You can either perform this task manually or use a software to remove unused accounts.

Keep VPN Secured

If you use a virtual private network (VPN), you should keep it completely secure to prevent unauthorized access to your company’s internal network. Use the most advanced authentication and encryption protocols to monitor as well as regulate the network’s usage. You can even consider accessing the internet remotely so that your browsing details are not saved.

Be Proactive With System Updates

Cybercriminals are always on the lookout for security flaws in obsolete web browsers, plug-ins, software applications and operating systems that can be exploited for malicious purposes. It is therefore, important to update all the computer systems on your network on a regular basis. Software vendors frequently release patches and updates to fix the bugs as well as improve functionality of the applications. The IT staff should either enable automatic updates or download and install the latest versions from trusted sources.

Secure Your Router

Make sure that you change the default name and password of your router. The default credentials are quite common and can easily be decoded by the hackers. Create a strong and lengthy password as well as a unique username. Also, change the security level from WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) to WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) or WPA2 so that only the authorized users have access to the corporate network.

We, at Centex Technologies, offer complete network security solutions to business firms in Dallas, TX. For more information, feel free to call us at (972) 375 – 9654.