Beyond the office: are you concerned with the security of your personal information?

Talking about information security may sound complicated, but think about it: have you ever wanted to tell someone a secret but were afraid that the person would tell everyone else? If so, you already know the basics of this art well – to ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information (i.e. ensuring that it is stored safely, that it is available whenever you need it, and that is only known only to those who are duly authorized).

Many employees regard awareness campaigns and information security training programs as corporate obligations, and only use this knowledge during working hours. This is a terrible mistake! Information security is something that should also be part of our personal and family environments, and be part of your life no matter where you are (and ideally including your family relations as well).

We live in an increasingly digital world. Directly or indirectly, everything we do depends on the Internet: making a purchase, engaging in financial transactions, communicating with friends or relatives... And, unlike you might imagine, cybercriminals not have their sights on companies, but also on individuals. After all, cybercriminals know that individuals are the least prepared to deal with threats on the web – and thus are easy targets.

Less is more 

But what exactly does it mean to care for information security in your personal life? First, the most classic of all protections: strong passwords and additional authentication factors (two-factor authentication). This prevents a criminal from getting into your social network profiles, including WhatsApp; if your app gets compromised the scammer can get in touch with your contacts posing as you, asking for loans or collecting more personal information.

Phishing and smishing scams are other classics. Be very careful with emails that invite you to click on suspicious links or to download attachments with excuses such as "check your invoice", "update your payment details" or "track your court summons". These are social engineering techniques designed to create a sense of fear and urgency, which can infect you with malware or lead you to provide credit card information. Always check the subject of the email directly with the organization or service that sent it.

It is also crucial to be careful with what you share on social media. We often post images that seem innocent enough, but they can reveal a lot about our habits or details, and may end up being the source of more complex targeted scams. Over-exposing your personal life on the internet means giving scammers more material to perform social engineering - remember that this is exactly why most platforms provide configuration panels to optimize your privacy.

What about hardware and software? 

So far, of course, we have only talked about the “theoretical” part and about social engineering. However, we also need to emphasize the importance of keeping your equipment always up-to-date. Never neglect an update to your operating system or application; these new versions are provided precisely to correct security gaps that are being used by criminals to break into computers and cell phones.

Not trusting public Wi-Fi networks is another essential tip to avoid becoming a victim of man-in-the-middle attacks - that is, having your data traffic intercepted by a malicious agent.

Always remember that information security is not a corporate issue, but a lifelong concern. With data leaks becoming more and more common and the increasing creativity of scammers, once can never be too careful to avoid having personal and financial information stolen – which can lead to false identity scams or even credit card cloning.