How to Tighten Your Online Security in 7 Simple Steps

Seven Simple Steps for Safe Surfing – Online Security Tips

When a large corporation with insufficient security suffers a data breach that exposes your personal information, password information, or profile pictures, you can do nothing. But this does not mean you are powerless to protect yourself. Concentrate your efforts on ensuring your home's security and privacy. You don't want ransomware to encrypt your manuscript, leak private photos for all to see, find out you’ve been playing rigged games because you clicked on the wrong banner, or for a banking Trojan to drain all your money, do you?

Fortunately, it is possible to mount a local defense against these local issues. Making your gadgets, online identity, and activities more secure requires little work. Several of our suggestions on being more secure online boil down to little more than common sense.

Multi-factor authentication

 MFA should be used on all your accounts. Email accounts often hold sensitive information, so secure them first. Every day, data breaches occur. Suppose a criminal obtains your email account credentials due to one of these breaches. In that case, you might be in big trouble if you don't have another layer of protection. MFA adds another element to authenticate your identity each time you log in by using at least two of the following: something you know, such as a password or PIN; something you are, such as facial recognition/fingerprint recognition; or something you have, such as a hardware security key.

Passwords

This is the most boring piece of advice in this post, but it is still relevant. According to a Google online security survey, 13% of consumers use the same password for all their accounts. This leaves you susceptible if your credentials are leaked in the event of a data breach, which has been increasingly common in recent years. Despite some debate, using a password manager is the most convenient way to track your various logins. Even while no solution is completely secure, a password manager enables you to create multiple strong passwords and keep them all encrypted.

Unused accounts

The more online accounts you have, the larger the attack surface is for cybercriminals, who frequently use one compromised account to target more valuable accounts. This is why you should look through your internet accounts and delete those you don't use. Thankfully, Background Checks.org provides an online service called “Just Remove Me” that can assist you in eliminating unused accounts. The program is a collection of direct links enabling you to erase your web accounts. The directory is additionally color-coded to indicate which accounts are simple to delete (green), difficult to delete (red), and impossible to delete (blue) (black).

Browser extensions

Businesses and websites monitor everything you do on the internet. Every advertisement, social network button, and website collects information about your location, browsing habits, and other factors. The information gathered reveals more about you than you may realize. Ads and the data they collect are blocked by browser extensions such as uBlock Origin. The uBlock Origin plugin also prevents malware from operating in your browser and provides an easy option to disable ad blocking when you wish to support secure sites.

Software updates

Be careful to update your operating system and other software regularly, especially when security updates are released. Hackers frequently use flaws in obsolete software to get access; don't give them a chance. For example, if you're running an out-of-date operating system, such as Windows 7, whose support ended in January 2020, you should upgrade; it's a prime target for hackers.

Phishing scams

Daily, about 3 billion phishing emails are sent, and hacker attacks are among the most severe cybersecurity dangers. Cybercriminals will try to dupe you into supplying personal information such as your username and password, banking information, or credit card information. Bad links can cause a lot of trouble in various ways, so check the links and ensure they're from reliable senders before clicking. You do not need to be an email specialist to detect a phishing email. Look out for emails from unknown senders, and look closely for grammatical flaws or any discrepancies in the email that look suspect.

Privacy settings

If you have social media accounts, those networks have a lot of information about you. You might be surprised how much of it is automatically exposed to anyone online. As a result, we strongly advise you to check your privacy settings: It's up to you to determine how much information you want to share with strangers versus friends — or perhaps with nobody but you.