Connected and Protected – Keeping what’s yours, yours.
By Michele Thompson, Norton online safety advocate ANZ

The digital world is now very much engrained in our lives – in the office, the home - really anywhere we go. We use the internet for a variety of reasons, shopping and banking, downloading music and movies, gaming or just keeping in touch with friends on social networks.

The way we work, play, shop, and communicate has undergone a transformation unprecedented in its scope and speed. The advancements we’ve seen recently have profoundly changed life for the individual consumer – and for the enterprises serving them. In a relatively short amount of time, the entire online world is touching our lives in very different ways than we expected just a few short years ago. Today we’re more influenced by connectivity and more dependent on digital content than we ever thought possible!

All this collaboration and shared interaction is truly a great opportunity. However the nature of doing so opens us all up to a variety of potential security risks that we may not be aware of.

In fact, increased connectivity across devices means new ways for cybercriminals to target you online. In the last year, Symantec has seen an increase of 42 percent in mobile vulnerabilities alone. According to the recent Norton Mobile Survey 42 percent of Aussies have fallen victim to mobile phone loss or theft and only 41 percent of Australians are using passwords to protect their mobiles. As we make more financial transactions through mobile devices cybercriminals are likely to develop even more threats targeting smartphones in the future. We need to be protected wherever we are connected and simple things like password protection, is the first line of defence when it comes to protecting ourselves.

As numerous reports have shown recently, there are a growing number of individuals using applications as tools to extort money, spread viruses and generally cause mayhem for the regular internet user. In fact, over the years we have seen the motivation for cybercriminals move away from notoriety to financial gain, as the potential to steal money from internet users increases. Fame vs fortune the motivation has changed. Cybercrime has come a long way from individual hackers with a “Look what I can do” attitude to a multi-million dollar industry that cost more than $550 million in 2009. It’s big money, last year’s Zeus bust police arrested cybercriminals who netted $70 million over an 18-month period with a botnet that instigated malicious code attacks on online banking and trading accounts.

Cybercrime can happen to anyone and it’s already happened to more than 2/3 of Australians online. Cybercriminals don’t care who you are, where you live or what you do. If you have private information online, such as a credit card, bank account, e-mail address or date of birth, cybercriminals consider you a target. So how much are you worth to a cybercriminal? Believe it or not, credit card data can be bought from as little as $0.07 to as much as $100 per piece on the underground black market.

To put it all in perspective, cybercrime costs Australians $4.5 billion ($US3.9 billion) which is enough to rebuild the Sydney Opera House 10 times over (according to the Norton Cybercrime Report). Breaking this down into what it would cost you - it would take a victim 29 days to resolve a cybercrime and cost them an average of $608 in out-of-pocket expenses – in addition to any amount of money that was stolen, added to the inconvenience.

The notion of privacy and security online is changing and it is no longer just about protecting the PC, but it is all about protecting the interactions of internet users. Protecting identities today requires consumers to make smart choices and safeguard their personal information it comes down to education and the right security software.

Cybercrime is a global epidemic that can’t be solved by one company or law enforcement agency alone; keeping the Internet safe is a shared responsibility. Part of that is consumer education on how to stay safe online (with Government initiatives like Law Week and upcoming National Cybersecurity Awareness Week) and part is training law enforcement personnel who are on the front lines of the fight against cybercrime.

To protect and inform the billions of people online, Norton introduced a free tool earlier this year the Norton Cybercrime Index (www.nortoncybercrimeindex.com), a daily update which tracks and warns computer users about daily cybercrime risks around the world, providing information that is timely and actionable.

So how can you increase your awareness of online security and help deny cybercriminals access to your personal information? By following a few common sense tips, you can make the most out of your Internet experience, while protecting you and your family from online threats.

Here are some guidelines for how you can contribute to a safe online experience:

• Invest in comprehensive, up-to-date and paid security software that not only offers basic protection, but also helps detect attacks before they happen. It’s no longer sufficient to have anti-virus alone, but two way firewall, password encryption, anti-phishing toolbars and regular updates.

• When you are asked to “allow” or “deny” an application access to the Internet, always deny unless you’re confident the site it is accessing is authentic.

• Limit personal posts to people you know and trust. Don’t add people to your trusted list unless you know exactly who they are. Configure privacy settings on your social networking profile to limit the access of personal information to people you know & trust.

• What you say online may become public - even if you post it in a private area. Don’t disclose personal information about other people either.

• Secure your wireless network with a password and don’t allow unknown computers to access your home network.

• Always use strong passwords with a combination of letters and numbers, upper & lower case, special characters and change it regularly.

• Look for https:// at the top of your browser and the padlock symbol on the bottom right-hand corner of the screen.