Archives - Security Best Practice


Secure your printers

A printer is an easily overlooked member of your IoT family, but consider how advanced modern printers are. Many are Wi-Fi and Bluetooth enabled, and they’re connected to your network, both at home and in the office. Without suitable precautions in place, your printer could be the backdoor a hacker needs to access your network. […]

Create a dedicated administrator account on your computer

If you log in as admin on your computer for day-to-day use, you leave your whole system vulnerable to  infiltration. Should a hacker gain access to your admin account, they’ll be able to track, install and change pretty much anything they want. Instead, create a separate, dedicated administrator login that you only use when you […]

Don’t connect to rental cars

If you hire vehicles when traveling — for leisure or business — avoid using the connectivity features in the car. Whether it’s Bluetooth for your phone or music, or synced GPS maps, you’re opening up your personal device to exchange data with an unknown entity that has been used by an unknown number of strangers. […]

Overwrite deleted files to fully destroy your data

The idea that deleting files doesn’t truly delete the data in them is, for the most part, true. In order to truly secure your data, you’ll need to perform an overwrite on deleted files so information cannot be recovered by bad actors. This is especially important if you’re planning to sell or dispose of an […]

Activate administrator privileges to protect your family

If you have a family or shared computer, make sure your loved ones are safe by adding administrator controls to restrict downloads and installations. Many modern operating systems allow you to require approval from an administrator (i.e., primary user) before executing scripts, device drivers and system firmware. To set up an account as an administrator […]

Construct very strong passwords

Use the strongest, longest password or passphrase permitted. Don’t use passwords that attackers can simply guess, like your birthday or your child’s name. Attackers can use software to conduct dictionary attacks, which try common words that may be used as passwords. They also conduct brute force attacks, which are random password attempts that run until […]