As per a report by Google, more than 15% of the online users have experienced theft of email accounts or social accounts on popular websites including Twitter, Facebook, and few others. Most of these thefts are never reported because users create another account to avoid any discomfort. The process of restoring a stolen account is mostly cumbersome if you haven't secured your account with additional 2-step verification security such as validating your account with your mobile phone.
Next, to the University of California, Berkeley, USA, Google produced a report which analyzed what are the most preferred techniques cybercriminals when attacking its users account. Between March 2016 and March 2017 they were followed several steps to analyze how hackers were stealing passwords and other sensitive data.
According to Google, the hackers mainly use three techniques "that pose a risk to all account services online , " not only for your company.
Three Techniques Used by Hackers
1. Phishing
The study authors identified 12.4 million credentials of accounts that were stolen using a technique known as phishing .That computer heat comes from the English word in Spanish translates as "fish" and refers to identity theft by fraudsters to obtain personal information from users. The goal can range from names and passwords, bank details and account to access other online services.
The "fishermen" access information using fake messages as "bait" for their victims, posing as other persons or entities through email, messages or phone calls.
"A password is not enough to access Google, so hackers more sophisticated tried to collect sensitive data might ask to verify the authenticity of the user, such as IP address and location, telephone number or model of the device , "
"Analyzing the risk to users, we conclude that phishing poses the biggest threat."
2. Keyloggers
The second threat is keylogger s, a type of programs that allow you to record every keystroke we make in the computer or everything we see through the screen and send it to an external server.
This type of digital fraud often occurs in places of public connection, such as Internet cafes. Often part of major infections is done by malware (malicious software). "Thanks to this program, criminals can steal a large volume of confidential information without the victim realizing it", explained in the blog of Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab. If you have a habit of leaving your computer unattended for a longer period of time, you certaily risk theft of your own identity or your company data if in case anyone installs keyloggers in your computer.
Google has identified 788,000 potential victims of this scam during the year - long investigation.Cybercriminals distribute these programs through worms and other Trojans (viruses).
3. Security Breaches
The third way hackers are using Google says security breaches in third party services. In such cases, cybercriminals steal databases of a company. The company identified 1,900 million data generated from these failures and checked later if some of these data served marketed to access Gmail accounts and other services. This was what happened to Yahoo in August 2013, when he suffered a hack mass, he acknowledged late last year.
How to Protect your self from online theft?
The Google security specialists say there are new alerts to warn of dangerous practices to prevent users click suspicious links. Pay attention to them. Never click on emails asking you to disclose your personal details such as location, phone numbers etc.
Suspects also monitor attempts to access the account from other devices or different locations than usual. When that happens, they send a message to "verify" if it is you. This allows the "two - step verification" , which would strengthen security.
Another option is to report suspicious accounts through Gmail to prevent further damage.
You can use a tool called Chrome Smart Lock to manage passwords. Finally, you can visit the Google website of "security review" in the following link. https://g.co/securitycheckupAvoid using common social logins (G+,FB,Twi tter) on important websites. If incase your G+ account or facebook account is compromised, you will be blocked from multiple other websites as well. So avoid using G+, FB, Twitter social login especially on important websites.
Never leave your computer unattended. If you are sitting in a office then you should always lock your computer unless and until you have been instructed not to lock your computer.
Make sure your Anti-Virus is upto date and working. Highly infected viruses can disable your Firewall or disable your anti-virus from loading at startup. You will assume that your anti-virus is working in background whereas it is not.
Never Upload personal images or important data on social media sites. If your account is compromised, you will end up losing your mental peace because all your personal data will get copied by hackers. There have been cases where personal images of celebrities were made public after hacking their account. Make sure you are not on the list.
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