7 Personal Cybersecurity Tips That’ll Keep You Out of Harm’s Way

Personal cybersecurity isn’t usually discussed as much as it is in a business context. People assume they don’t have enough for a malicious actor to really care about them. They’re wrong.

Cybercrime is a $2 trillion a year industry, and people struggle to recover with the ease that businesses do. In the following article, we share seven personal cybersecurity tips to keep you out of trouble.

1. Always Take Precautions

Like defensive driving, it helps to assume the worst. Don’t trust pop-ups and emails from unknown senders or sources. Open nothing if you don’t know the source, or if the source is familiar but the approach is suspicious when compared to what you know about them.

2. Enable 2FA Whenever Possible

The second of our tips for personal cybersecurity is to enable 2FA or two-factor authentication. Two-factor authentication is an extra layer of security for your online accounts.

It’s a feature that you should use to protect those accounts from being compromised. What 2FA does is require you to enter a temporary passcode sent to your phone in order to log into your account.

3. Submit Info Only to Secure Websites

The third of our cybersecurity tips for individuals is to pay attention to HTTPS. This stands for Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure. You’ll notice it in the URL line, usually with a closed padlock symbol that indicates security.

The alternative is HTTP, which stands for the same thing minus the Secure part. That means information submitted on such a page is not encrypted and easily attainable by a malicious actor.

4. Run Your Updates

One of the most obvious cybersecurity tips that go ignored is the frequent software updates that you’ll see from your computer or phone applications. On some phones or computers, these updates can sit for a very long time before the user ever addresses them.

Big mistake. The previous versions have vulnerabilities that can be exploited. The longer you go without updating, the more vulnerable you are leaving your devices.

5. Stay Informed

It’s top cybersecurity best practices to stay up-to-date on the latest threats and security risks. Being aware of what’s going around in terms of viruses, data leaks, and malware can keep you from becoming a victim.

6. Be Vigilant With Passwords

If you’re not using an encrypted password manager at this point, you’re either using a journal where you write all your passwords down or nothing at all. A journal isn’t a bad idea and is impossible to hack (unless you lose it somewhere).

Nothing at all probably means you’re reusing the same password on every protected account that you have, which makes you an easy mark. Encrypted password managers keep all your passwords under lock-and-key without having to remember what they are all the time.

7. Have a Hack Plan

The last thing you should do is have a hack plan in place. Assume, at some point, that someone will get ahold of your data.

Determine where you are the most vulnerable. Who would you need to contact to stop the damage from being done? Keep those numbers or email addresses handy, and get to work at the first sign of a hack.

Take Your Personal Cybersecurity Seriously

Your personal cybersecurity is almost as important as your physical safety, considering how much of our lives are lived online. You must be vigilant by putting the suggestions here to good use.

Assume you will be a victim. Have a plan to mitigate and prevent, and you’ll stay safe across the board. For more technology tips and suggestions, check out some of our additional posts!