Hello Friends. Today we will take lesson on the importance
of protecting the social media account from being compromised. A strong social
media policy can protect your brand and avoid embarrassing posts. Social media
accounts are the latest phishing target.
Social
media has made its own place in the world of people. There are some people,
whose day is not complete without using it, but always be aware of the fraud
and cyber-crime that occur while using social media. So far, people have had to
pay the price for not doing so.
It's a good time to update existing policies to cover the
increase in remote work and set clear expectations for employees about using
social media during work hours.
One
fine day you may get email that someone is trying to log into your Instagram
account. But the thing is, you don’t have any Instagram account.
This is a very common phishing scam. A phishing scam is when
someone tries to impersonate a company or service that you might actually do
business with in an effort to steal your account information.
The scammers
assume you have a Instagram account and are hoping you will click on the link
and provide your login credentials so they can use this information to access
any account you might have.
These tend to
be more common with scammers claiming to be from your bank or other financial
institutions, but lately they have been targeting social media accounts. Their assumption is that if you use the same
login information at one site, you probably use it for another.
Once they get
a user name and password combination, these scammers will meticulously go
through every possible online service and try to access the accounts with the
information they have from this one phishing attack.
That is why it is always a good practice to use a unique password
for each one of your online accounts. And yes, that can be a real hassle.
I have been
using Google Chrome and logging in with a Google account. This allows me to
create and save complex and unique passwords for all of my online accounts.
If you’re not a fan of Google, look at a dedicated password
manager like LastPass or 1password for managing this.
Social media
platforms like #Facebook, #Twitter and #Instagram started out as a way to connect
with friends, family and people of interest. But anyone on social media these
days knows it’s increasingly a divisive landscape.
Undoubtedly
you’ve heard reports that hackers and even foreign governments are using social
media to manipulate and attack you. You may wonder how that is possible. As an information
security enthusiast I can explain – and offer some ideas for what you can do
about it.
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Bots and sock puppets
Social media platforms don’t simply feed you
the posts from the accounts you follow. They use algorithms to curate what you
see based in part on “likes” or “votes.” A post is shown to some users, and the
more those people react – positively or negatively – the more it will be
highlighted to others. Sadly, lies and extreme content often garner more
reactions and so spread quickly and widely.
But who is doing this “voting”? Often it’s an
army of accounts, called bots, which do not correspond to real people. In fact,
they’re controlled by hackers, often on the other side of the world. For
example, researchers have reported that more than half of the Twitter accounts
discussing COVID-19 are bots.
As a social media researcher, I’ve seen
thousands of accounts with the same profile picture “like” posts in unison.
I’ve seen accounts post hundreds of times per day, far more than a human being
could. I’ve seen an account claiming to be an “All-American patriotic army
wife” from Florida post obsessively about immigrants in English, but whose
account history showed it used to post in Ukranian.
Fake accounts like this are called “sock
puppets” – suggesting a hidden hand speaking through another identity. In many
cases, this deception can easily be revealed with a look at the account
history. But in some cases, there is a big investment in making sock puppet
accounts seem real.
Sowing chaos
Trolls often don’t care about the issues as
much as they care about creating division and distrust. For example,
researchers in 2018 concluded that some of the most influential accounts on
both sides of divisive issues, like Black Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter,
were controlled by troll farms.
More than just fanning disagreement, trolls
want to encourage a belief that truth no longer exists. Divide and conquer.
Distrust anyone who might serve as a leader or trusted voice. Cut off the head.
Demoralize. Confuse. Each of these is a devastating attack strategy.
Taking control
So what can you do about it? You probably
already know to check the sources and dates of what you read and forward, but
common-sense media literacy advice is not enough.
First, use social media more deliberately.
Choose to catch up with someone in particular, rather than consuming only the
default feed. You might be amazed to see what you’ve been missing. Help your
friends and family find your posts by using features like pinning key messages
to the top of your feed.
Second, pressure social media platforms to
remove accounts with clear signs of automation. Ask for more controls to manage
what you see and which posts are amplified. Ask for more transparency in how
posts are promoted and who is placing ads. For example, complain directly about
the Facebook news feed here or tell legislators about your concerns.
Third, be aware of the trolls’ favorite issues
and be skeptical of them. They may be most interested in creating chaos, but
they also show clear preferences on some issues. For example, trolls want to
reopen economies quickly without real management to flatten the COVID-19 curve.
They also clearly supported one of the 2016 U.S. presidential candidates over
the other. It’s worth asking yourself how these positions might be good for
Russian trolls, but bad for you and your family.
Because of the multi-purpose aspect of social media
platforms, they become valuable tools that the average person spends
approximately 100 minutes on every day, according to a recent
study. Because they are such omnipresent platforms, and being linked to an
increasing number of applications on smartphones and other devices, it becomes
even more necessary to secure them.
Users
can save themselves from all these things by taking care of few things.
Create
strong password
It
is very important to protect yourself while using any social media platform.
For this, first create a strong and different password. This is such a thing,
without which you cannot open your account. For this reason, create a password
that is difficult for the hacker to think and cannot easily break it. This will
keep your social media account safe and no personal information will be able to
go out. Also for the sake of protection please activate multi-factor authentication password
while logging into the social media account.
Take
care of privacy
Have
you ever noticed that whoever is watching what you are sharing on social media?
If
you do not want everyone to see the photos, files and other things you have
shared, then take care of the privacy settings. While creating an account,
first make the settings related to privacy so that your things do not fall into
the wrong hands.
Report
offensive post
Many
times we see many such posts on social media which do not look right, but in
spite of this we ignore them. This is our biggest mistake. You should report such
posts immediately. It will be beneficial for you as well as the rest of the
people. By doing this you can secure multiple people at once. In
addition, you can also report fake IDs.
Do
not use third party app
Many
applications, software, and websites etc. give you the option to login with a
social media account. You must have thought many times to press the button of
Login with Facebook, but it can become a big problem for you. To avoid this,
tap on the app and website in the settings and see all the apps and websites
associated with the ID, immediately remove what you don't feel safe.
Conclusion
This article is
drafted to explore the privacy and security issues that affect social media
accounts. The topics covered herein reveals that users of social media post
personal information, which can be used by malicious criminals and businesses
to compromise the privacy and security of individuals in the real world. It has
been noted that people post personal information because they have a false
sense of security while using social media.
Irrespective
of the fact that there are laws and
policies that seek to protect users’ information from such vices, individuals
should exercise caution and filter information that they publish on social
media, because it becomes public as soon as it is posted. So prior to posting
any personal information in social media account please judge the personal
contents you are willing to publish.
Protect Social Media Account | Protect Your Facebook Account| Protect Your Instagram Account
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