October is National Cyber Security Month. How will you celebrate?
Seattle IT put together some simple, proactive steps to protect personal, medical, financial, and other sensitive information online.
Take these steps to prevent misuse, abuse, and unauthorized disclosure of your information.
• Regularly review and set security and privacy settings for online accounts to your comfort level. Be aware how much you are sharing and with whom. Be sure to do the same for accounts of children and vulnerable family members.
• Keep application, system, and firmware up to date on all PCs, smartphones, and tablets. Software patches and updates often include bug fixes and enhancements to protect against viruses and vulnerabilities.
• Install anti-virus/malware software on all devices, and keep it updated.
• Enforce the use of strong passwords, passphrases, or PINs to access all accounts, devices, and access points. Many devices and online accounts offer additional authentication options (such as Gmail, Hotmail, Facebook, and others) where, in addition to your password, a second authentication step can be used as an added layer of security (such as sending an access code via text message, a biometric check such as fingerprint, or a hardware token).
