Reliability of Passwords | |
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Many people tend to use very easy passwords for many of their accounts because
they find simple passwords much easier to remember. What they don't know is that
these simple passwords put their computer at risk, and allow for hackers to access
their financial and personal information. Here is a list of some of
the world's most popular passwords: There were many major data breaches in 2016 in which people's login
details were leaked online. Security experts suggest that people use a different
password for each service or website they have an account with. That way if one of your
accounts are compromised, the others will remain safe. The way to create a password that
will be hard for others to guess is by using characters that nobody could think of. Using
capitals, numbers, symbols, etc. is the best way to create a safe password.
[1] |
Identity Theft | |
.jpg) | Identity theft can
also be known as identity fraud, which is a crime in which an imposter obtains key pieces
of personally identifiable information, such as Social Security or driver's license numbers,
in order to impersonate someone else for financial or legal purposes. The 2017 Identity Fraud Study, released by Javelin Strategy & Research, found that $16 billion
was stolen from 15.4 million U.S. consumers in 2016, compared with $15.3 billion and
13.1 million victims a year earlier. Identity theft has been a major issue in Canada,
but an even bigger issue in the United States. In 2016, 13% of all complaints were
related to identity theft. Identity theft complaints were the third most reported to
the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Identity theft complaints had increased a
significant amount from 2013-2015. Some ways that identity can be stolen are listed
below:
[2]- Stealing your mail
- Looking for personal documents in your trash
- Tampering with ATMs or card machines in shops to steal your banking information
- Taking personal information through public sources (e.g. phone books and
social media)
[3]
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Network Security | |
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Network security is any activity designed to protect the usability and integrity
of your network and data. It includes both hardware and software technologies. Effective
network security controls access to the network. It pinpoints a variety of threats
and prevents them from entering your network. There are many types of network securities that are available to us such as: Access control,
Firewalls, and VPN which most of us are quite familiar with.- Access Control:
There is a process called network access control, which allows users to keep out potential attackers.
In order to keep out potential attackers, it is necessary to recognize each user and each device.
- Firewalls: Firewalls put up a barrier between your trusted internal network and
untrusted outside networks, such as the internet. A firewall can be hardware, software, or both.
- VPN: VPN stands for a virtual private network. A VPN encrypts the connection from an endpoint
to a network, often over the internet. Typically, a remote-access VPN uses IPsec or Secure Sockets Layer
to authenticate the communication between device and network.
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