Social networking posts and photos can come back to haunt you in a job search. Litigation or criminal investigations can result in a subpoena that gives others full access to your computer – letting the world see incriminating or embarrassing details from your past. Once information shows up on the internet it is almost impossible to get rid of it.
Can you make information ’self-destruct’ on schedule? That’s the promise of Vanish, a free web-based system created by a research team at the University of Washington.
Recent news stories suggest the social security number (SSN) has been ‘decoded’ and that this ‘discovery’ increases your risk of identity theft. It’s mostly hype and exaggeration. Still, there are precautions you can take.
Your social security number is often a gateway to your private life. Bank records, medical records, etc all rely on those magic nine digits. If your number is compromised, it’s much easier to get to your private life.
The Wall Street Journal reported “a new study says that mundane information like birth dates and hometowns on social-networking profiles can be used to accurately predict a user’s Social Security number, a key to identity theft.” According to the article, “researchers correctly guessed the first five digits of a person’s Social Security number about 40% of the time, just by knowing his or her hometown and birth date.”
Last April I wrote about a free program, Secunia Personal Software Inspector (PSI), that lets you identify – and in most cases – fix problems that otherwise let hackers into your home computer. Once they’re in, they can use your computer for their own (often illegal) purposes.
For years the best security for home computers has been anti-virus programs and personal firewalls. But that doesn’t take care of the whole problem. Some software programs have holes that let the bad guys in. Your computer is not protected until you plug those holes.
Everyone has heard about phishing and malware. You’ve seen them in email links that take you places you really don’t want to go. After looking at a PowerPoint by Michael Kassner, I began to wonder how much the bad guys have affected our use of email – and if it’s time to call out the sheriff like we did in the old west and run the bad guys out of town.
Bet you didn’t know just how easy it is to become a bona fide criminal. You can do it from your home computer and hardly break a sweat. Here are some ways to make it easier for you. Or, if you’re so inclined, here’s how you can keep yourself on the right side of the law by knowing what not to do.
There are two reasons to read this article. The first is so that the next time you tread close to the line, you can step back and keep yourself out of jail. The second is so you can ask yourself if, as a society, we’re starting to go overboard.
