Fires have been raging all around the Western Cape in recent weeks and the effects have been devastating.

It got me thinking, that a breach is a lot like a wildfire, especially when it goes undetected for some time. By not having the capability to detect a breach, that acts like a strong wind that fans the flames and allows the hacker to spread and grow across the environment. When this is eventually detected and the fire dies down, you then bring in specialists like J2 Software. The damage has already been done, the information is gone and your reputation is decimated. Recovery is going to require far more time and much more effort to get back to 100%.

Being prepared and equipped, is the key. By now we should all understand that breaches will happen, you need to ensure that you have the right level of visibility to prevent the fire from going from a spark to an inferno. Why do so many wait until they have suffered a major loss before they get the right solutions in place to protect the organisation?

As we live in an interconnected world, every single system we interact with needs a password. Oh, the pain, the anguish and the downright aggravation of having to keep a different complex password every time we want to do something online or at work.

Simple solution, use the same difficult password for every system you interact with. What could possibly go wrong?

The truth is that for every system, cloud storage, app and network we place our information and login credentials into we increase our risk landscape. When you use a single password for every platform, a breach of one is a breach of all of them. You may practice safe cyber activity and still have your credentials compromised in a third-party app that has poor security measures.

You may or may not have seen the latest Facebook trend that has gone viral and numerous articles that are skeptical of this seemingly “harmless” game.

The 10-year challenge has users adding a then and now photo, to show friends and family the effects of time and perhaps laugh at their former personas.

Just like click bait, this way of gathering data is a bait, and they wait to see you take it. By falling for these types of ploys, you are giving them even more information and allowing them to see what type of consumer you are, what ad’s will work etc.

This is all good and well, but with facebook’s recent track record for breaches, any information put on there is vulnerable, especially updated “now” versions of you. Perfect for tracking and hackers.

The theme for this week is Phishing, an oldie, but a goodie. Phishing and malware are part of a larger scheme which is known as Social Engineering.

Phishing is one of the most popular forms of social engineering.

You would think that these types of attacks don’t work anymore due to the ever-growing knowledge around the structure of these types of scams because people are more aware of what to look out for.

Unfortunately, when an attack involves social engineering, it exploits the weakness of the organisation it is targeting, which means the hacker often can tailor a scam in such a way that it won’t be obvious and will most likely be successful.