Reduce the amount of public information that hackers can find about you online to disrupt your work, harass you and steal confidential information.
What can you do to lower your security risks? How can you sanitize public records to avoid unwanted exposure? What should you do if you are the victim of an internet crime?
This blog lists twenty security resources, online services that scrub personal information and links to the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) if you have been victimized. Thanks to Mike Sager, CISO at Emily's List and Yael Graeur for collecting and sharing much of this information.
Hacking self defense starts with lowering your digital footprint. Hackers get personal information from data brokers which they can use for phishing and social engineering attacks. Reduce your security risk by requesting you be removed from these data broker services and search engines. You can do this manually on many sites, or subscribe to a service that does this for a fee.
PAID SERVICES THAT SCRUB PERSONAL INFO
DELETE ME ($130/annually)
PRIVACY DUCK ($1,000/annually)
REPUTATION DEFENDER ($5,000/annually)
PRIVACY DEFENDER
KANARY
CONTACT THESE SITES DIRECTLY TO REMOVE YOUR PERSONAL INFO
ONE REP
DO NOT CALL REGISTRY
ACXIOM
SPOKEO
WHITE PAGES
BEEN VERIFIED
INFOTRACER
TRUE PEOPLE SEARCH
PEEK YOU
PIPL
PUBLIC RECORDS NOW
SEARCH PEOPLE FREE
SMART BACKGROUND SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINES
MSN
MORE RESOURCES
A comprehensive list of security resources to opt out of data broker services complied by Yael Graeur.
Extreme Privacy: What it takes to disappear.
Privacy manual to reduce your public profile by Michael Bazzell.
FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3)
File a complaint with the IC3 if you believe you have been the victim of an Internet crime or if you want to file on behalf of another person you believe has been such a victim. They also issue regular consumer alerts.
Takeaway: Lower your digital footprint to reduce your risks of being hacked.
Deepak
DemLabs
Image credit: Pixabay