The explosion of the Internet and computer networks allows individuals, businesses, and governments to find and store valuable information, communicate to one another, and enjoy the unique methods of making their lives easier. However, this also makes it possible for anyone to perform illegal actions and misuse the powerful technology through a variety of means.
There are many dangers induced through the privacy of social networks.They can include: Identity Theft, —Employment risks, Sexual Predators, and Stalking.
People give out LARGE amounts of unnecessary information about themselves on social networking sites, not being safe with online banking and posting things that could be threatening to their jobs. Doing these things allows people to try and steal your information and from then on your "privacy" is not longer private and in the hands of someone that can do whatever they want with that information. These hackers and identity thieves use many ways to lour you in and getting your information without many people even know that its happening. Some techniques they use are: Baiting, —Pharming, Click-Jacking, Cross-Site Scripting, —Doxing, Elicitation—, Phishing, —Phreaking, Scams and Spoofing. To define a couple of these more familiar ones for you...
Baiting is when Someone gives you a USB or other electronic media that is preloaded with malware and they hope you will use the device which enables them to hack your computer.
Click-jacking is Concealing hyperlink/s beneath legitimate clickable content which. many of these are now uprising on social media sites and have started to use “Like” and “Share” buttons to get you to click them.
Doxing is when someone publicly releases someones identifying information such as name, date of birth, address, and pictures which are almost all the time taken from that individuals social networking profiles.
Phishing is usually an email that makes itself looks like it is from a legitimate organization or person, but is not and contains a link or file with malware.
as an example:
"In March 2011, hackers sent two spear phishing emails to a small group of employees at security firm, RSA. They only needed one employee to open an infected file and launch the malware. The malware downloaded information from RSA that then helped the hackers learn how to defeat RSA’s security token. In May and June 2011, a number of defense contractors’ networks were breached via the compromised RSA token." (FBI.gov)
Scams, which are those annoying things that fill up most peoples inbox, are fake deals that trick people into providing money, information, or service in exchange for the deal.
If it sounds too good to be true, it is most likely a scam.
Click-jacking is Concealing hyperlink/s beneath legitimate clickable content which. many of these are now uprising on social media sites and have started to use “Like” and “Share” buttons to get you to click them.
Doxing is when someone publicly releases someones identifying information such as name, date of birth, address, and pictures which are almost all the time taken from that individuals social networking profiles.
Phishing is usually an email that makes itself looks like it is from a legitimate organization or person, but is not and contains a link or file with malware.
as an example:
"In March 2011, hackers sent two spear phishing emails to a small group of employees at security firm, RSA. They only needed one employee to open an infected file and launch the malware. The malware downloaded information from RSA that then helped the hackers learn how to defeat RSA’s security token. In May and June 2011, a number of defense contractors’ networks were breached via the compromised RSA token." (FBI.gov)
Scams, which are those annoying things that fill up most peoples inbox, are fake deals that trick people into providing money, information, or service in exchange for the deal.
If it sounds too good to be true, it is most likely a scam.
A Couple Ways To Help Protect Yourself
1) Be careful what you download.
2) Try to avoid using public computers, use your own computer if possible.
3) Do not click on or respond to email requesting personal information or saying that you have won a prize, as these are most of the time fake.
4) Be smart about your password, renew your password pretty often and never use the same password for all accounts.
5) Use extra caution when using wireless connection.
6) Make sure you log off of everything when done using the website or account.
7) Strengthen your security. Reinforce your firewalls and security packages.
Citations
Images:
http://www.altonpolice.com/html/images/identitytheft.jpg
http://blogs.e-rockford.com/applesauce/2011/07/19/the-hackers-get-hacked/
Information:
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/counterintelligence/internet-social-networking-risks#content
Video:
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PlofmoUu8s
