While today might be the official Data Privacy Day, remember its Data Privacy Day tomorrow, the day after and the day after that. It’s like Quit Smoking Day – you take it on for the rest of your digital life.
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It’s Data Privacy Day today, i.e. 28 January. The purpose of observing such a day is to raise awareness about best practices regarding data privacy and data protection. A digital native should however treat every day as Data Privacy Day.
Apply these 6 simple tips to secure your data every day.
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1. Enable multi-factor authentication (MFA)
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Given that cybercrime now makes up majority of fraud-related incidents, we recommend enabling multi-factor authentication wherever possible. This adds an additional layer of protection against someone trying to access your personal accounts.
2. Use complex passcodes for your devices
It’s not just passwords for your email addresses and social media accounts that need to be secure, ensure that the login for your laptop and mobile phone have complex passwords that you change often. We would recommend phone passcodes to be at least six digits.
3. Be aware of what apps you use
Always check the permissions an app is asking for before you download it to your personal device. It’s also important to delete any apps that you don’t use anymore.
4. Know what you’re sharing on social media
Check your privacy settings on social media. Make sure you are aware of who can see your posts, and lock down your accounts as much as possible.
5. Don’t send sensitive data in an email
Be careful about what information you send via email. Ask yourself, could there be an implication if someone was to access this information?
6. Don’t reuse your passwords
The simplest upgrade you can make to your personal security is to have unique passwords for everything you use.
While today might be the official Data Privacy Day, remember its Data Privacy Day tomorrow, the day after and the day after that. It’s like Quit Smoking Day – you take it on for the rest of your digital life.
(Sunil Sharma is Managing Director – Sales, India & SAARC, Sophos)
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