In this digital age, there is a greater need for you to protect your private information. We are cautioned on how much personal information we put out there, especially on social media sites. Today, it’s become even more imperative to pay attention to how secure we are being while navigating the Internet.
What is Heartbleed?
This week information was released about Heartbleed, which affects OpenSSL (secure socket layer). This bug affects some of the web sites where you see HTTPS in the address bar. On the Heartbleed homepage (a site created to address the bug), they state “The Heartbleed bug compromises the secret keys used to identify the service providers and to encrypt the traffic, the names and passwords of the users and the actual content. As long as the vulnerable version of OpenSSL is in use it can be abused.”
Mashable.com has created a list of web sites that have been or potentially were affected. Click here to view that list. Make note of the sites you use and once they’ve verified that they have applied the patch to protect the site from Heartbleed, change your passwords.
How Does it Affect You?
Here are a few sites where you can learn more information about Heartbleed and the affect it may have on you.
How Can You Protect Yourself?
Below are a few resources for additional precautions and best practices you can implement to help you protect yourself while using the Internet. One of my personal rules is to always verify the settings on any sites you register for especially social media sites (i.e. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.) to make sure you have not been opted into anything you would not like to be.
http://securitywatch.pcmag.com/security/314607-infographic-how-to-keep-your-internet-usage-private
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2365692,00.asp
https://www.fcc.gov/guides/how-protect-yourself-online
http://home.mcafee.com/advicecenter/?id=ad_ost_tohtpyo&ctst=1
http://www.cdc.gov/SocialMedia/Tools/guidelines/
Be safe. Protect yourself and your information from online predators.