Media Bytes – Issue 18

Sac City Tech Media Bytes
September 27, 2019

Exclusive Hints, Tips, Special Offers and More!

Thanks again to those that provided feedback I asked for a few mailings back. I’m continuing to tweak the Media Bytes format and topics and your feedback is always welcome and helpful.

One of the suggestions was more about security. So in this issue I will highlight the main concerns everyone needs to be aware of for computer and data security. If you have any questions, you are welcome to shoot me an email and I’ll do my best to answer your questions. With that said, always remember that Google can be your friend when you need more information about something. But do your research and don’t just take the first thing Google comes up with as absolute truth.

Security topics to be concerned with:

– Data: Regardless of what’s stored on your computer and other devices, you need to protect it from loss. BACKUP, BACKUP, BACKUP!!! And do it often.

– Privacy: Your computers and devices allow passwords for a reason, use them! Don’t turn off the password requirement or set things to automatically log in. This just invites people to go through your stuff. If you loose your phone and it has no password, the person that finds it could go through all of your personal info, contacts, etc.

– Malware/Spyware/Ransomeware/Viruses: Each of these have their own negative impact on us. Prevention and protection are the best solutions. A good solid backup can get you back up and running when the worst happens.

– Access Control: Passwords, Login IDs, etc. These features help us control who can get to and/or use our stuff! If at all possible, don’t share your passwords and login info. Don’t use the same password for everything. And by all means, don’t use the common passwords that make it easy for someone to guess or figure out. Things like family and friends names, pets names and other obvious easy to remember words, etc. And avoid words that would appear in a dictionary, some hackers will try the brute force approach throwing every word in a list to attempt breaking in. Do a quick Google search for “Most common passwords”, if you’ve never done this, you will be amazed. If you want easy to remember passwords, pick a word but misspell it, use special characters and numbers, etc. The longer your password is, the harder it will be to crack if it’s not in the dictionary. If you have a good, strong password, it’s highly unlikely someone will “Crack” it. Keeping it secret, making sure people don’t see it, and not falling for schemes to trick you into revealing it is your best defense.