Can you imagine a world in which you weren’t in fear of having your most private information leaked to the entire world? Whether in business or your private life, it often seems as though nothing is safe and secure from intrusion because we are living in the digital age. Most people aren’t even aware of all the various ways in which cyber thieves can gain access to everything from their personal financial information to that new patent they are about to apply for. Let’s look at a few of the biggest threats we face today to be better informed.
1. Breaches in Corporate and Government Security
Consider what huge corporations such as national HMOs and government entities like NASA go through every time a cyber attack hits their mainframe. From personal information to highly secure government bodies, the exposure could bring down entire networks – entire governments as well! The issue is so extreme that major universities are now focusing on IAT training for careers in cybersecurity for government agencies.
2. Identity Theft and Fraud
One of the reasons large corporate entities are so concerned with cybersecurity is due to all the information held on their mainframe. Not only is all the personal and financial information of employees held within their network, but anyone and everyone they do business with has information ripe for the picking. According to IBM, $4.5 million was just the average cost to corporations in 2022 resulting from a data breach.
3. Multi-Level Social Media Exposure
Consider all the information the world discusses on social media every day. Social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are amazing ways to keep us connected in real-time. However, they also leave us extremely vulnerable to cybercriminals who can use the information we divulge to gain access to areas of our personal and business lives we assumed were highly secure. Hacking our accounts is now one of the least of our worries. Cybercriminals are now cloning our social media accounts so that they can converse with friends and contacts seamlessly without going through the process of submitting a new ‘friend request.’ Now that accounts can be cloned, it could be weeks, months, or never before someone realizes they are not communicating with an authentic ‘friend.’
These are just three of the leading cyber threats we face today but surely serious enough to make you sit up and take notice. What an amazing accomplishment it would be to be on a team that could virtually eliminate the risks we are faced with today. That would be a patent for the history books, wouldn’t it? Until that day, the best thing you can do to safeguard your personal and business lives is to stay informed on the latest threats to avoid breaches, hacks, and clones. It is no longer “not what you say but how you say it.” Our final note is that it is “not what you say, but where you say it.” Keep that in mind.
