Today Your Identity And Data Protection Is Critical!
You Must Build Your Cybersecurity Shield!

The Coronavirus Pandemic has changed the world. The new world order of remote workers and freelancers working from home has increased online cybersecurity risks.

Now you need to know how to protect yourself and your employer not only from cyberbullies and online harassment, but also from ransomware blackmailers who are often criminals after your identity, money, intellectual property, and data? This applies whether you are an individual, business or organization.

Make no mistake, there are criminals and sociopaths waiting to take advantage of you when you drop your guard.  Knowledge and using the right processes and tools can help you build a shield to protect your data and identity. We will show you how. You can also help us by writing articles as a guest contributor. You can read our guest post policy by clicking here.

Knowledge Is Power!

We will show you how to protect yourself from high tech crooks. Did you know Machine Learning can be your partner in building your shield to protect yourself? "Machine learning (ML) is the study of computer algorithms that improve automatically through experience and by the use of data.[1] It is seen as a part of artificial intelligence (AI)" (Wikipedia). 

To have the best cybersecurity you must know which software specialists have the best Research and Development investment in ML and AI to take on the hackers and win. Hackers are often sophisticated criminal organizations run as businesses. They also use ML and AI so your selection of the cybersecurity partners to build your shield is critical because they need the depth of resources to beat criminal organizations.  Helping you with the selection of your shield partners is our job. 

We will show you from our research which software companies have the best research and development in their products’ AI and ML so that the algorithms of machine learning will detect new hackers’ threat variants and block them from getting into your computer. For the work from home employees,freelancers, and businesses this is the first line of defence. This is what our research has revealed: 

Our Shield Recommendation For Work From Home Employees And Freelancers Is:

Our Shield Recommendation For Businesses Who Are Vulnerable To Ransomware And Other Threats Is:

Business Cybersecurity Audits Are Essential And Legally Mandatory!

For businesses that are based in the European Union (EU) or have dealings with the identity information of EU residents by way of international trade these businesses are required to comply with the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which was introduced on 25th May 2018. You can read more about the GDPR here, including how to get support.

For businesses we recommend the following prudent risk management strategies: 

• Implementation of an action plan to comply with EU GDPR. See here.
• Compliance with the Information Security Management System Standard ISO 27001 with regular Penetration Testing. See here.
• If you have a business with a high volume of website traffic on which your customer service depends, we recommend a Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attack mitigation service. See here.
• Being able to access your data in case of a system failure whether from internal or external causes. We recommend having your own data recovery software available. See here.

One of the most frequent ways that personal and business identity theft occurs is by thieves accessing documents that have been disposed of inappropriately.  All documents that carry personal and business information that could possibly be used by criminals should be shredded.

We also recommend that you should use a password manager software. This is particularly true of businesses. The annual survey of passwords being used by Splashdata showed that "people still continue to put themselves at risk for hacking and identity theft" by using weak passwords. You can read more about our recommendations on this subject here.

For businesses that are based in the European Union (EU) or have dealings with the identity information of EU residents by way of international trade these businesses were required to comply with the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which came into operation on 25th May 2018. You can read more about the GDPR here, including how to get support.

Cyber Security Insurance And Identity Theft

You can purchase cyber security insurance if you are a business and personal identity theft insurance if you are an individual.

On a risk management basis for business, it is prudent to carry business cyber insurance cover due to the frequency of cyber-attacks. Your business's insurance broker will be able to advise you on what is the most appropriate cover.

You can also purchase personal identity theft insurance protection. Basically, this is insurance on your identity that covers your name and social security number. Having insurance on your identity can save you lots of trouble and hundreds of dollars if your identity is ever stolen and you must try to clear your name and your debt.

Don’t make the mistake of assuming you don’t have anything worth stealing. Thieves are not only interested in people with great credit scores who have lots of money in the bank. They might be planning to rack up a painfully high amount of credit card debt in your name.

Even though credit card identity theft gets the most press, it is not the only kind. No matter how bad your credit score is, a thief can still use your name for a driver’s license or for tax purposes.

In March 2021 the authoritative Forbes magazine published an article by Chuck Brooks entitled “Alarming Cybersecurity Stats: what you need to know for 2021”. In the article it was stated that it is expected that by 2025 cybercrime would cost the world USD10.5 trillion annually. This was only one alarming statistic!  You can read the Forbes article by clicking here. 

It is no longer an acceptable risk for a business not to have the Information Security Management System Standard ISO 27001 (or equivalent) in place. Losses from cyber security breaches are a clear and present danger as an operational business risk.  Our goal is to help you become aware of the risks and to manage them better by referring you to appropriate professionals.

On an individual level, identity theft is a very serious problem, even though the chances may appear that you would not become a victim because it always happens to someone else. This is a mistake that can be costly in time and money.

It is important that you have identity theft protection so that you are not gambling on the fact that your personal information will never be stolen. You don’t want the consequences of stolen identity.