AVG: Social Networking Users "Failing to Take Basic Steps to Protect Themselves"
AVG: Social Networking Users "Failing to Take Basic Steps to Protect Themselves"
Posted 08/27/2009 at 11:45am
| by Paul Lilly
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Social networking sites are all fun and games until you contract a nasty virus and lose your data, or worse yet, lose your identity to the highest bidder in a seedy underground market. But that's the risk the average social networker is taking by failing to perform basic security measures, suggests a new study by AVG and the CMO Council.
The study surveyed a random sampling of 250 consumers. According to the poll results, 86 percent of the respondents participate in a social network at home or at work. Almost half of those surveyed said they have been victims of malware attacks, 55 percent said they have seen phishing attacks, and nearly 20 percent have experienced identity theft.
Despite past experience, barely a third of respondents change passwords on a regular basis, while 57 percent said they infrequently or never adjust privacy settings.
"The fact that users understand the risks, and yet are failing to take the basic steps to protect themselves presents an interesting challenge to companies, like AVG, that are working to create a safer cyber community," said Siobhan MacDermott, head of Public Policy, Corporate Communications and Investor Relations, AVG Technologies.
See all of the results here, as well as some basic security tips that should be second nature to most power users.
Image Credit: staysafeonline.info
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AntiHero
August 27, 2009 at 2:10pm
The most uncommon thing in the world is common sense.
Most people don't realize how good it is to make a sensible password. I've worked on Windows servers, and one instance i remember, was a top administrator was let go of the job he had, so he had all access to everything and knew EVERYONE'S stupid password like "1234" or "password" or their first initial and last name, so this person could gain access to everything. In truth, after forcing the server to only accept passwords with 1 special character, letters and 1 number, there were numeorus pissed off calls about people who don't want to change their password, some of them actually said "can't i have my password i use for everything like my banking, my facebook, and my email" and then actually told me the password like it wasn't important. I knew their email since it was off the exchange server, and that means i can find their facebook information and everything else. Nobody realizes how unsecured their computer habits really are. Unimportant things like free games and stuff like that get the same generic simple password, important things like banking an email get different passwords for each one that are all complex, which is still a little unsafe since I don't change them as often as I should, I typically do it quarterly, and all i change is the number/special character combinations.
I don't like Microsoft, I associate with it.
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