Summary
October is Nation Cyber Security Awareness Month. Since 2004, The United States President and Congress has declared October to be Cybersecurity Awareness Month. The goal is to educate and empower individuals and organizations to protect themselves when they are online as threats to technology and confidential information become more common.
Each week in October has a theme. This year’s themes are:
By Eve Owen, Library board chair and Cybersecurity expert
October is Nation Cyber Security Awareness Month. Since 2004, The United States President and Congress has declared October to be Cybersecurity Awareness Month. The goal is to educate and empower individuals and organizations to protect themselves when they are online as threats to technology and confidential information become more common.
Each week in October has a theme. This year’s themes are:
Enable Multifactor Authentication (MFA)
This is having more than one way of authenticating who you are. This is an option you can set with many online businesses. Sometimes the second factor of authenticating yourself after asking for your password is to have you answer a security question you have set up. Many businesses will send an authentication code to you either as a text message on your cell phone or to your email address. Once you correctly enter your code, you are logged on.
Use Strong Passwords
This can also be a strong passphrase. The idea is to use a long phrase that you are very familiar with as the longer it is, the harder it is to break. When setting this phrase as your password, put in upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers, and symbols. The longer the password, the harder it is to break. For example, a phrase to use could be, M0nd@yisth3f1std2y. Upon entering this password at Security.com password checker, you will see that it will take 7 quadrillion years to crack that password.
Recognize and report phishing
These are the emails that look legitimate but will do damage if you click on links in them. There are things you can do to check for an email phishing attempt.
- Look for spelling and grammar errors.
- Ask yourself if you were expecting an email for the person or company. If not, look closely at the from email address. Many times, these addresses are not the normal address you would see from the person or business.
- If you suspect ta phish, report it. If you receive one at work, follow your companies’ procedures. If you are at home, report if to your email provider, the business that is being imitated, or contact the person that it appears to be from to verify if they sent it.
Update Your Software
Your software/applications need to be updated regularly. Companies provide regular updates to ensure security from vulnerabilities and malicious actors. In many cases, you can set these updates to run automatically. If this is your business equipment, follow your company policy on updating.
What topics would you like to learn more about in regard to protecting you, your family, and your business online? Let us know!