Cyber Security:Cloud Technology and Digital Data
As technology continues to develop, cyber security is experiencing threats never before seen. With so much personal and business information at stake, it is important to stay on top of cyber security threats. Cloud technology has opened the digital door to a new level of productivity and freedom than ever before. With it though, have come new doors for hackers to steal identities and scam people out of hard earned money. With the proper protection, you can keep conducting business as usual and snuff out cyber-attacks before they can happen.
The Corporate Climate
Security breaches are aimed at corporations. Most often these methods are most preventable by employee training and cloud antivirus software. The most common approach to infiltrating high profile accounts is through exploiting employees. Skillful hackers can find the smallest crevices in corporate security systems and gain immediate access to safeguarded files with sensitive data. These crevices are often in employees inadvertently opening carefully disguised emails that appear to be from a boss or coworker asking for sensitive data. This method is called spear phishing because it uses familiar names.
By advancing the amount of training employees receive, a greater level of understanding can help protect corporations (and its employees) from losing precious information, public confidence, and money paid in credit monitoring restitutions. Having good cloud based malware removal program in place is also needed on a corporate level as most corporations use cloud technology in conjunction with on-site programs.
Wise Up Your Smartphone
The generation of flip phones is over. According to the latest research, two-thirds of all Americans are smartphone owners. This is an almost 100% increase from just four years ago when only 35% of people had one. Smartphones are a point of access to the World Wide Web, various apps, games, email, and well, pretty much anywhere a computer or laptop can take you. And hackers know this.
Smartphones hold much more sensitive information than the former flip phone models. Did you know that according to the same research study, 57% of people with a smartphone have accessed their online banking account through their phone? With shared networks everywhere, hiding this information is often done with just a simple and hackable password. Because of this, hackers are able to tap into a network and potentially access, and steal, your valuable information before you even know what happened.
Cyber security threats over shared and private networks bypass traditional hard drives and navigate cloud communication systems. This allows threats to come from virtually anywhere. And it also presents a new need for cloud based antivirus software that can be used anywhere just like your smartphone. Cloud technology based malware removal application also protects anyone by filtering the information on your network.
Social Media and Phishing
In the last few years, social media has been a hotbed for cyber criminals. Not only to hack sensitive information, but to also track where you are… and where you are not. Do you know the apps that allow you to “check in” at certain locations? That information is available to absolutely anyone. It’s kind of scary when you stop long enough to think about it.
Identity theft isn’t just through a hacked corporation you made a purchase at a few months ago. Hackers are able to get into your social media accounts through any network. From there, they can access your personal profiles and take information such as your birth date, phone numbers, email addresses, and even your hometown with your family members. They can then use this information to hack your email addresses and steal even more valuable information.
Before you go ditching your social media accounts, rest assured that the most common way cyber criminals steal your identity is through disguised schemes for you to “verify” your password. Or pop ups that lead you down a trail of download where you ‘accidentally’ download harmful malware.
Cloud technology has enriched our lives to the point where we can sit at home on our couch and order a pizza without getting up. We can check in with friends and send them birthday gifts with the tap of a finger. Corporations keep personal data on file in clouds and technology continues to rapidly evolve. As new developments are made, new hacking abilities are implemented. The good news is that cloud based protection continues to keep ahead of cyber criminals. Free software programs aim at keeping you and your valuable information out of the way from viruses, worms, bots and Trojans.
So much of our lives can be computed into digital data. How confident are you in your protection against cyber-criminal attacks?