Cloud services have become an integral part of our daily lives, catering to various needs such as storage, computing resources, and application hosting. With the increasing amount of data being generated and stored in the cloud, data security has become a major concern for both individuals and businesses. In this document, we will discuss how cloud services protect stored data and provide a comprehensive understanding of the measures taken to ensure the security of our valuable information.
Is It Really Necessary to Log Out of Online Accounts? Or Can I Just Close My Browser?
This is a question with a lot of maybe answers!! Let’s see if we can break it down so you can take the best actions possible.
Why? Think for a moment how much information about you a hacker would have if they accessed your email account. Bank info. Credit card processer for your business. Doctor info. Client information. Friends lists. Employee info. Employer info. Amazon account. Travel plans. Children’s schedules.
Public Computers
If you are using a public computer (library, hotel, etc.) ABSOLUTELY log out of every program, every time. Best option: Don’t use a public computer ever for highly sensitive work like your bank, your doctor’s portal, Amazon.)
Your Family Computer / Shared Office Computer
You have multiple people sharing a computer. Yes! Log out of every program every time. Don’t take the risk of someone getting access to your accounts. They may not intend to mess things up but they could accidentally cause you big problems.
Your Personal Computer/Tablet/Phone
Should the devise be stolen, the thief can open it up and use any app that is open. Yes, you have a password to open the devise. Do you think a good hacker can’t get past your password? Don’t place any money on that bet!
And since when did you plan to lose your device? No, it’s one of those nasty accidents of life.
A hacker can also access your Internet connection and waylay the session cookie to get into the app. Some session cookies are predictable so hackers can generate possible cookies! This is one of the common uses of malware on a computer. Even a friendly person using your wireless network can pick up on session cookies.
BEST Practice
Log out of every online software every time.
If you think logging in just takes tooooooo much time, use a Password Manager like Last Pass. It will autofill login information for you from a desktop, tablet or phone.
The Federal Trade Commission estimates that it can take approximately six months and 200 hours of work to recover from an identity theft. This estimation is based on the amount of work needed to follow the necessary steps to ensure the victim is not responsible for the debt incurred.
Don’t be a victim! Log out!
Digital Detox
Here is an excellent article for yourself, friends and family explaining the dangers of being addicted to your technology. There are also good suggestions of how to detox!
Internet Explorer Is Retired
As of June 15, 2002, IE is out of service.
If you try to open the program on your computer, you will get a message like this one:
You will still see the icon on your Start menu or taskbar. When you try to access it however, Microsoft Edge will open. In an upcoming Windows update, IE will completely disappear.
Good news! You can migrate your favorites, passwords and settings from IE to Edge. You may rarely find a website that will only work with IE – often older government or nonprofit sites. If you run across one of these sites, you can have Edge work in “IE Mode.”
Give Edge a Try
- Competitive speed as Edge is leaner software than IE.
- You can save text from a website in a Collection, not just bookmark pages.
- You can set up a “My Feed” starting page with news, videos or content you prefer.
- Simple privacy controls.
- You can use tabs on the left side of your screen instead of only across the top.
- “Immersive Reader” displays web pages in a cleaner, less distracting format.
- You can use Chrome extensions since there are so many of them already out there instead of waiting for an Edge extension.
- You can sync your Edge bookmarks, passwords, etc. to your phone whether Android or iOS.
How and When To Back Up Your Data
Simply put, the more important the data
the more often you should back up
the more back up copies you should have.
EXAMPLES:
Pictures of my daily Wordle results
Back up once a quarter
One copy on a thumb drive is enough.
QuickBooks back ups for my company
Back up every 2 times I close the program
Keep a copy on my external hard drive and a copy on Dropbox
Payroll records
Back up after each payroll period
Keep a copy on my external hard drive and a copy on Dropbox
Not only can your hard drive go bad, your external hard drive, thumb drive or DVD can also go bad. So important data needs to be backed up in multiple places. For years, when the standard back up method was to a DVD, I kept one copy in my office and another copy in the trunk of my car. I figured the office and the car wouldn’t be destroyed at the same time!!
Now with online options, it’s even easier.
Thumb Drive
Large thumb drives allow you to back up all of your files or a major project quickly. The process is manual which means you have to discipline yourself to do the back ups.
External Hard Drive
BBBS can assist you with purchasing and configuring an external hard drive that sits in your office and automatically backs up your entire hard drive. If the computer hard drive goes, you can download everything you need from the external hard drive.
Online Back Up Services
There are multiple options for you. BBBS can assist you in choosing the best service and help you configure the settings.
- One Drive is part of your Microsoft 365 account.
- Drive is part of your Google account.
- Dropbox is my favorite but there are many Software-As-A-Service (Saas) companies.
Pixel Tracking
Yesterday I went to a website to see what they offered in home meal deliveries. I didn’t set up an account. I didn’t request a quote. Just looked around the site.
15 minutes later there was an email from the company in my Inbox.
This was done with pixel tracking. While I was on the site, a piece of code gathered my information and added it to the company’s database.
Emails from Service Providers like Constant Contact and MailChimp use pixel tracking. That’s how they know who opened an email or clicked on a link in the email.
Facebook ads and Amazon.com use pixel tracking. Any search on Amazon will result in plenty of ads popping up on your browser offering the same or similar items.
So it isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s helpful. But you should have control over who is gathering information.
First line of defense – Turn off image downloading. (Instructions here.) The pixels are hidden in graphics. If you don’t download the graphics, you can’t get a pixel tracker. You can always choose to download graphics in an email from a safe source.
You can gain additional control by installing extensions in Gmail or other email softwares to block the tracking. I’ve installed PixelBlock in my Gmail. Another option is Ugly Mail. Each software is going to be a little different. Google “pixel trackers in Yahoo” or something similar to see how your provider handles them.
Working Securely While Working Remotely
“In today’s digital workplace, more organizations offer the option for remote work in an effort to cut overhead costs, reach talent in other geographical regions, and give employees a more flexible schedule. In fact, 74% of organizations believe that flexible working has become the “new normal”. Now, in light of the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), some organizations are even requiring remote work. “
Click here to read the full article.
COVID-19 Won’t Stop Us!
Kudos to the Phoenix Women’s Leadership Summit for fast, creative thinking. Instead of cancelling the conference, they switched to Live Streaming and On-Demand. They sweetened the offer with 12 monthly webinars and a pass to next year’s conference. Good marketing! Good community building!
Phoenix Women’s Leadership Summit
What Do You Base Your Decision To Open An Email On?
” 57% of email subscribers spend 10-60 minutes browsing marketing emails during the week. – ChoozOn
90% of email gets delivered to the intended recipient’s inbox, whereas only 2% of your Facebook fans see your posts in their News Feed. – Forrester Research
68% of Americans say they base their decision to open an email on the ‘From’ name. – Campaign Monitor
Across all editions, Outlook accounts for 56% of all desktop email opens and nearly 16% of total opens in any environment. – Campaign Monitor
Six in ten (61%) American workers who use the Internet say email is “very important” for doing their job. – Pew Research
Non-office-based workers to say the Internet, email, and cell phones have given them more flexibility in the hours they work (51% vs. 19%) but also that these tools have increased the amount of time spent working (47% vs.18%). – Pew Research”
Statistics from: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/email-marketing/2016/01/70-email-marketing-stats-you-need-to-know/