How to Avoid Online Scams this Holiday Season

Written by WesTec on November 21, 2019. Posted in Passwords, Security

This holiday season, experts expect cyberattacks to rise by 60 percent. Retailers and consumers will see a spike in cybersecurity alerts on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, with heightened risk for the remainder of the year. Below are practices WesTec recommends to avoid online scams this Christmas.

Analyze Email Advertisements and Deals

Most attacks are a result of commodity malware. Scammers send phishing emails, often posing as your favorite brand, to try and steal your financial information. These emails often include misspelled words and misused grammar. If you suspect any email you receive is a scam, avoid clicking any URLs. This is how scammers steal your data or install malware on your computer. Instead, to verify the email came from the true brand, visit their website and see if they are offering the same deal.

Shop from Established Brands

Sometimes deals look too good to pass up. If an unknown website is offering a seemingly impossible deal, you could be looking at an online scam designed to steal your credit card information. Shoppers can look for the https in a retailer’s site URL, compared to http. The ‘s’ stands for secure and ensures all communications between the browser and website are encrypted.

Avoid Public WiFi

If you plan to shop online, avoid purchasing on public WiFi. These networks are often unsecured, meaning anyone with a computer acumen can view what you are browsing and steal your personal information.

Use a Credit Card

Pay with a credit card when making gift purchases. A credit card offers the best liability protection against potential fraud, unlike debit cards. If scammers gained access to your debit card information, they could drain your accounts.

Make Sure All Passwords are Unique

It’s easier to use the same password for all accounts. But is it safer? If a hacker discovered your login credentials, they could easily hack into other accounts and steal your information. To best protect yourself, your data, and your financial information, make sure each account has a random and unique password. For more information about password security, visit our recent blog post. With the holiday season quickly approaching, be proactive in identifying online scams. For more information about cybersecurity and avoiding attacks from scammers, contact us.

Hack the Hackers with Password Security

Written by WesTec on November 7, 2019. Posted in Cybersecurity, Data Protection, IT, Management and Consulting, Network, Passwords, Security

Have you ever been the victim of a cyber attack? Do you use the same password for all of your accounts? Follow our guide to outsmart the hackers with increased password security.

How Hackers Get Your Passwords

Before you can better protect your accounts, you must understand how cybercriminals access steal your information. Typically, a hacker will compromise your account in one of three ways.

Personal attack: Hackers target your account specifically. They will typically guess your email password and use password recovery options to access other accounts.
Brute-Force attack: Hackers systematically check all possible passwords until the correct one is found.
Data Breach: Hackers attack large companies, resulting in millions of compromised accounts.

What Makes a Good Password?

Ideally, your password should be at least 16 letters and contain a combination of numbers, symbols, uppercase and lowercase letters. Passwords should not include any repetition, dictionary words, usernames, pronouns or IDs. Make a strong password by thinking of a phrase and then use the initials of each word, as well as the numbers and symbols, to combat potential attacks. For example, if your phrase is “Do you think a hacker will guess my 16 character password for Facebook?!”, your password might be: Dytahwgm16cp4F?!

Enable Two-Step Authentication When Possible

If any sites or accounts offer two-factor authentication, take advantage of it. This system works to limit hacking attempts by making a user authenticate their identity with a second method of verification. Check out our recent blog post about two-factor authentication for more information.

Use a Password Manager

The best thing you can do for your accounts is have a different password for each one. However, if you follow this one cardinal rule of password security, keeping up with all passwords can be difficult. Using a password manager allows you to save all of your passwords in a secure spot with a strong master password. WesTec offers consulting for any individuals or businesses wanting more information about password security, network installation, or managed IT services. Contact us for more information.