Reducing Hacking Damage

Reducing Hacking Damage

This month I will begin to deal with some ways you can “decrease” the likelihood of Hackers getting at your Cloud accounts. Understanding the threat and also dispelling some common misconceptions about Cloud security are the two keys to putting you into a new way of thinking about your cloud security and indeed all technology. 

Hackers And Cloud Servers
You have all watched a small child doing something where you think to yourself “he/she’s going to fall if they keep that up”,  I won’t go into the moral  dilemma of should you prevent or let them learn through their mistakes as that is for another forum. The point is that it is pretty much inevitable the child will fall. Such is the case with ALL cloud servers. One way or another hackers will likely hack one or more of the cloud servers containing your login and passwords. Knowing that fact prepares you for the inevitable question: How does this compromise my cloud security?

Passwords And Patterns
Given the fact the hacker has one of your passwords you need to ask yourself what does this tell him/her about me and how I generate my passwords? Remember the hacker at this stage may have a great deal of personal information about you. Therefore if your password uses ANY of this information the likelihood is that ALL of your passwords may be guessed for ALL of you cloud accounts. A scary prospect but also very true. Getting your head around what I’ve just told you will, with a lot of you, immediately set off alarms bells. The reason of course is that quite of few of you not only use passwords generated from personal data but also you are using the same password across multiple Cloud servers. Let me remind you that one or more of those servers has or will be hacked and your password will be known.

Good Passwords and Why We Don’t Use Them
What is a good password ? Well, #2FutX@3$!6%g&7 is pretty good J. Even if I asked you to remember that you won’t because it contains no pattern. “molly2642” does and that’s why you use that good old easily remembered password on everything from your facebook to your email account. Do you recall those security questions you answered when you setup your email account? Well if the hacker hacks that server he/she will know them too. So your favourite dog, first car etc are known to him/her.
Next month I’ll continue on this rather uncomfortable truth about modern living!