Cybersecurity

According to a study by CBT Nuggets, those who call themselves tech-saavy and who have high levels of education are more likely to be victims of identity theft. "Knowing about cybersecurity, understanding the risks, yet thinking that your tech smarts are enough is a recipe for a security disaster," writes Sue Marquette Poremba in a blog post. It turns out that people, including kids, do not use what they have learned about staying safe online for reasons cited as being too lazy, not wanting to be inconvenienced, or just not caring.

It’s not an uncommon sight as you’re scrolling through your Facebook news feed: a friend shares a heartbreaking photo, accompanied by a post that pleads with users to “like,” “comment” or “share” in order to raise money or awareness for a person in need. But scammers who use “like-farming” tactics can take advantage of a Facebook user’s interaction to either collect and sell information about that user or use it as a gateway to collecting more personal information — like passwords or credit card numbers.

Though it’s sometimes difficult to determine which posts are real and which are fake, there are a few simple clues that these “like-farming” posts have in common:

• They claim someone has cancer or another serious disease and needs money for surgery.
• They claim Facebook “has decided to help” by donating a certain amount of money for “likes,” “comments” or “shares.”
• They typically ask a Facebook user to comment “Amen” at the end of the post.

So, next time you see a post with a heart-wrenching photo that catches your eye, look for these signs before responding. And if you suspect the post is a scam, report it to Facebook immediately.

Identity theft has been called the “crime of the 21^st century.” When your identity is stolen, there are so many potential issues to deal with (changing passwords, closing accounts, dealing with fraudulent charges, placing fraud alerts with the credit bureaus) that you may forget about potential tax fraud. Armed with your personal information, identity thieves can file a fraudulent tax return in your name and receive a refund before you realize your information has been compromised. Sometimes taxpayers are unaware of the breach until they have problems filing their taxes. What do you do if you fall victim to tax-related identity theft? There are several steps to follow in the article Beware of Tax Identity Theft if you believe you are being targeted.

IBM is looking to its supercomputer Watson to fight cybercrime using its deep learning techniques. The company recently announced that 40 organizations have joined the Watson Cyber Security beta program, which is "learning the nuances of security research findings and discovering patterns and evidence of cyberattacks and threats that could otherwise be missed." As more organizations take part in the program, the increased amount of collected security data will further the intelligence of the system, evolving and improving current defense strategies.

Victims of ransomware attacks should report such incidents to their local FBI office or the Internet Crime Complaint Center to allow the FBI to investigate and understand the threat, the agency wrote in a public service announcement recently. The announcement cites the reasons ransomware victims don't report incidents to law enforcement, and offers ways to reduce the risk of cyberattacks.

Social media is one of the biggest challenges for cybersecurity in the education sector, according to a report from Wombat Security Technologies. The report found that education professionals missed about one-third of assessment questions related to safe social media use. This serves as a good reminder for parents that they should take an active part in helping kids stay safe online and in using social media properly, and not entirely depend on schools to cover these kinds of topics.

Online crowd-funding is an effective way to get the word out about people who are in desperate need of financial help, but do you know who is receiving the funding and the real circumstances of their situation? Steven Petrow lists some criteria you might think about before making a donation in a recent column on the USA Today site. The list includes donating to those you know and trust, understanding that you will never know exactly what the money will be used for, and knowing these types of contributions are not tax deductible.

If someone locked down your pacemaker what would you pay to regain control? What about paying a hacker to relinquish control of a plane’s cockpit? This is the future of ransomware writes Carl Herberger of Radware, a security solutions company. He also contends that if companies and individuals continue to pay hackers who lock down their computers with ransomware, they will continue to be attacked. Instead of paying, Herberger writes, those who "take steps to be aware of attacks and raise the proper defenses and fail-safes are less likely to be targets" and suggests some ideas for taking those kinds of precautions.