Before leaving on an extended (and expensive) vacation, I bought travel insurance. I wanted to protect myself in case I or my traveling partner tested positive for COVID-19. I had to answer a number of questions about my eligibility for such insurance before they would approve me. Nor did the insurance come cheap, but I wanted to protect myself and recover

Instagram, like other social platforms, has a verification system for high profile accounts. A verified badge means Instagram has confirmed that the account is the authentic presence of a public figure, celebrity or brand. Have you ever wanted to get your own account verified? We noticed a large number of Instagram accounts all claiming to offer this as a

The holiday rush is upon us, and so is the risk of cyberattack. Threat actors often get to work during the holidays. IT staff is heading out for vacation, and everyone is in a hurry. This means we might skimp on security. Still, there are some holiday cybersecurity tips that will help make the season go smoothly.    End of Year and Christmas

Supply chain attacks are growing more common. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), there were just 19 supply chain attacks in the final quarter of 2020. In the following quarter, that volume grew to 27 attacks — an increase of 42%. Those incidents in Q1 2021 affected 137 U.S. groups and a total of seven million people. Why are the

When you think of access, passwords are likely the first thing that pops into your head. While passwords are a large and important part of managing access, there are other aspects to consider as well. Using the full spectrum offered by Privileged Access Management (PAM) can help. It’s easy to focus on the glitzier sides of cybersecurity. However, if y

We’ve written at length about account compromise and identity theft, and how criminals will often hijack accounts belonging to dead people. In many ways, it’s the perfect crime for anyone indulging in social engineering. The amount of abandoned accounts due to death can only ever go up, and nobody is really paying attention if someone accesses them illici

Emil Sayegh, president and CEO of Ntirety, unpacks the issue of inauthentic identities opening doors to untraceable, fake social accounts and the impact that it has on society. Emil is a cloud visionary and is known as one of the “fathers of OpenStack.”Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5UDKiGLlzxhiGnd6FtvEnmStitcher: https://www.stitcher.com

Gas shortages caused panic after the Colonial Pipeline attack two weeks ago. This highlights how digital attacks can break into the real world in a big way. Specifically, the Colonial Pipeline attack blends crypto-locking data with data exfiltration and extortion, as well as other threats to infrastructure. How did the attackers do it, and what makes them d

You probably have a place where everyone knows your name — and maybe your address and your birthday and your favorite drink. That place could be your favorite restaurant, your office or your grandma’s house. It doesn’t matter where that place is; when everyone in the room greets you by name, it gives you a warm feeling inside, knowing this

Practically everything consumers do online — shopping, paying bills and signing up for new services — requires some level of personal data sharing or changing privacy settings. Consumers need to feel that your organization’s digital experiences are worth trusting and that their data will be used for only its intended purpose and kept safe.

Contact tracing apps are designed to help public health agencies connect the dots by linking confirmed carriers of novel coronavirus to recent, close-proximity interactions. In theory, this creates a protective safety net — a way for countries to manage the spread and mitigate the impact of COVID-19 at scale. Despite good intentions, the push for thir

Everyone is fighting for the attention of potential customers. It’s the work you’ve done; the creative energy expended by your team; and the amount of time your group spent just to get the right people to visit your website or mobile app. After all that sweat and toil, you don’t want to lose your customers to a high-profile security breach

With data breaches often appearing in the news, customers and enterprise leaders alike may be concerned that the enterprise isn’t doing enough to protect customers’ personally identifiable infomation (PII). As today’s chaotic economy makes for a hungry threat landscape, what methods can the enterprise apply to better protect the increased

Instead of asking employees to input passwords every day, single sign-on (SSO) offers a simplified but secure authentication process. SSO authentication gives a user the option of choosing a single set of credentials to access multiple accounts and services. So, how can organizations best use SSO for their purposes? This authentication scheme works with the

As a security architect within IBM Security Services, I often get asked the question, “What exactly is a Zero Trust architecture?” Well, there is no single or unique answer to that question for two reasons. First, Zero Trust is not an architectural model but rather a set of guiding principles that should be applied to existing and new designs. W