My first computer was a Commodore PET. Was it 8 kB of memory, I think a 16 kB expansion boards.
I did not need to worry very much about security in the late 70s. But then by the 80s and into the 90s you had to deal with computer viruses on floppy diskettes.
And then in the 2000s actually having Trojans get dropped on my desktop pushing casino websites. I guess it was the Internet that was the big thing that changed the equation there right.
All of a sudden I’ve got threats that aren’t coming by sneakernet or by trading data with other people. It’s just me browsing a website. With the internet more online accounts, more passwords, everything kind of changes at that point. I’m dealing with protecting my computer from outside threats.
I’m concerned about my home network. I’m concerned about where’s my information, how much information am I putting into the things that I’m signing up for. And what are the passwords I’m using to manage those services.
It hasn’t stopped until today. Today a lot of things have changed, a lot of things are more secure in some ways but still the fundamental problems remain the same.
With the rise of legislation that attempts to bring the control back to the users many organizations nowadays have specified how they handle your data but do you even know what data you are giving in the first place?
Online privacy – like many things online – is an abstract concept our brains haven’t quite fully understood that our online existence and real life is no longer separate, they are one and the same.
Until we understand this, and until we treat our online existence the same way as we do our real lives, then we would never feel the gravity, the effect of online privacy. For example, in real life if we meet somebody, anybody are we naturally willing to share any fact about ourselves?
Let’s say you for instance are a very open person and you would just do this, do you expect them to just turn their backs and then share this with someone else? This is what’s happening online when organizations are sharing our information with third parties.
Most of the time when we agree to the terms and conditions this is exactly what were signing up for. Is it really their business to know if you’re pregnant or if you’re sick or if this is your favorite highway that you go through when you go from home to the office every day?
Being vigilant means taking back some of this control. And if you feel that you want to have an option, for example when you visit a certain website, you’d like to have more privacy or you’d like to eliminate it completely.
With just a click of a button. Wouldn’t you want to have this option? The very first mention of passwords was during the ancient times, where Roman soldiers were using this password-like system, called “watchword”, to identify if a person is a friend or an enemy.
They passed this sort of a password around to the soldiers guarding the gates to their fort. The initial use of passwords in computers started of as a way to segregate files between user sessions. But now the passwords are an essential part of security.
It has become a common advice to have a password that’s strong and unique. Something that is long, a mix of alphanumeric, special characters and some capitalization. Fortunately, password managers were created to help us.
They come with different forms and features. Common among them is that they store multiple passwords and encrypt them. Remembering them requires a memory retention of an elephant. For us humans, we have password managers to give us the protection and convenience in this connected world.
I think when I inventoried my network, at least two dozen different devices are capable of being connected. The way that I practice security, I don’t normally keep most of those things connected or on.
I turn them off if I’m not using them and the Wi-Fi gets shut off. But there’s at least 5 different devices that are always connected. Like smart lights at home vs my TV, turn it on and it immediately connects to the router.
If you’ve got devices that are connected and have an outbound connection to the Internet, they may also have an inbound connection. And someone can get into your network through that device. And if you’re not actively using it, if you’re keeping it plugged in and don’t have something that’s monitoring it..
It could be accessed to get inside your home network. From that insecure device they could go target one of your more secure devices. With home networks and smart devices, I don’t have a lot of smart home tech in my home at the moment.
I don’t play around with just adding things to my network. One of the limitations of this kind of tech though, is that’s geared towards me as the administrator. So I’ve got smart lights, I’ve got apps.
You connect the app by physically pushing the hub that controls the lights, and I’m great, I’m in charge. But if I put that app on my child’s device, and connect them to the hub and do the same process, they also become an admin, as opposed to a user. So a lot of this technology doesn’t allow for a graduated level of use.
I’m in charge or everybody is in charge. And there’s where we could use some tools and services to help you identify what’s on your network. If you’re limited to having everybody as an admin, you really ought to have more resources that really actually make you the admin, when you’ve got these things in your home.
Because people, such as children, want to be able to use the lighting, but if they’re updating the firmware and doing other things, connecting things to your home network, you the actual admin probably need to know about this.
It’s not going to be like any less that gets added into your network in the future, it’s going to be more and more things. And as you family gets bigger, so will the amount of devices on your network. Thanks you for watching! Remember to like, share and subscribe. And if you don’t feel like liking, sharing and subscribing, remember, you can also hack us. We have a bug bounty: if you’re able to break into our services, we’ll pay you money! Good luck, I’ll see you online.