Security Jared Shockley Security Jared Shockley

LinkedIn Security Issues

Unless you have been under a rock today, many news agencies spoke about the LinkedIn loss of user accounts and passwords. Even the local ABC affiliate news website had stories about this issue. So why should you be afraid?

Let's talk first about basic security on the internet. Most everyone uses the same password for all their websites. I even know my own mother does this. I have tried to talk with her about this but there is a problem with most people: they do not want to manage a lot of passwords for all the different sites. I see this with my family and friends and I see this at my job as an IT Professional. While it is easier for people to use one password, it is a danger for security in general to security on the internet. This is what we see in today's announcements. If you have a password that is being used by Internet service A and service B, not matter what they are (banking, e-mail, social networking, etc.), if company A gets hacked, your account at company B could be compromised fairly easy.

You might be asking me "Jared, what can I do?" Well, there are a few things you can do.

  1. Use a password management tool. - This is what I do. I utilize a service called LastPass to manage my passwords. I highly recommend it to anyone from the basic users to the most advanced. It has browser plugins and mobile applications to allow easy access to your information but it is very secure. The company has cloud (or online) storage of your information but they cannot decrypt it. Only you can decrypt the data on your client, be it a browser or mobile device. They offer free accounts for browsers only but cost $12/year to offer mobile system support too. Systems, programs and services like this allow a user to have a very complex password for each site.
  2. Use different passwords for specific types of sites. - Many people use this system to separate their account types to have 3 or 4 passwords. Each password is used for a certain level of access. For instance, one password could be used for only a few critical site types like banking and very private information, one password could be used for social networking only, one for e-mails accounts and one for other systems. Problem is that if any of the sites in that "security level" loses your data, you have to reset your password on all the sites of that level.
  3. Use password haystacks. - Originally brought up to me by Steve Gibson, of Gibson Research Corporation, the thought of adding atrophy to a password makes it more difficult to "crack". Going from a password of 6 characters to one of 12 characters can increase the complexity by factors of large numbers.

There are a lot more I could speak about on passwords and will probably write about again. Take the following action items:

  • Change your LinkedIn password if you use that site.
  • Change your passwords on other sites if it was the same as the LinkedIn site.
  • Start to determine how many of your passwords are exactly the same.
  • Own your security online and make sure to use some basic understanding of what is important.

Stay safe online.

Jared

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General Jared Shockley General Jared Shockley

Welcome to my Launch

Welcome to my new blog, Jared on Tech. The things I will be talking about are technology, gadgets, services and how people and businesses can use them. If you know me personally, you know that these things are a big part of my life today and into my future. Postings will range from a quick thought to fully thought out, researched articles to guest postings by friends on topics I think you will enjoy. I am also setting up a specific Twitter account, http://twitter.com/jaredontech, to talk about these posts and other posts I find on the internet that would be of use to like-minded people.

I will be enabling comments on my site but they will be moderated. I hope to approve all comments but will be deleting or modifying comments that I feel are offensive to the general public (not offensive to me specifically), to be of a spam nature, or of a flame nature. I want to encourage thoughtful discussion and interactions with people coming to my blog but I also will not allow it to be a platform for "diarrhea mouth syndrome".

Please head on over to my bio page to learn a bit more about me and my background. A few things about my writing style and my biases:

  1. My writing style is pretty upfront. I will be using citations of other sites to show some of the details that I have found or include screenshots of my own findings. At other times, the writing will be my opinion and viewpoint.
  2. I worked at Microsoft and feel their solutions are some of the better ones out there. They are not the only ones and in some cases, not the best ones.
  3. Google is the ultimate evil. As I found online, "if you're not paying for something, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold." 1 Google's intent is to deliver advertising to you as they state that "We generate revenue primarily by delivering relevant, cost-effective online advertising." 2 in their 10K filing with the SEC. I do not use Google tools as much as I can and block their tools as much as possible.
  4. Apple makes wonderful devices and an okay operating system. That said, I personally do not want to pay extra for their devices nor get locked into their world (iTunes, iThis, iThat). I feel they are way behind in thinking about certain aspects including security and compatibility with other systems. If you do not do it their way, you are not allowed to do it.

One thing I will be setting up is my blog entries available through RSS fully. One thing I hate on other blogs is when they only give you the "summary" via RSS making you visit their site. I understand they are trying to make their money via site advertising but it is very annoying. I would love to have you visit my site to drive my possible income, but this is not a primary job for me. If that ever changes, I will let everyone know but that will never change. I might include ads in the feed but I will be transparent with you about it. One area for income I will be using is being an Amazon Affiliate. Thank goodness I live in Washington, so it will never go away for me. If I list items that you are interested in and want to purchase from Amazon, please use my links to get me what little from them in return.

Thanks for coming to this new site and I hope you get as much from it as I get from other very informative sites.

Jared

Notes/Citations

1 - http://lifehacker.com/5697167/if-youre-not-paying-for-it-youre-the-product - Article on LifeHacker by Jason Fitzpatrick calling out the phrase used by a MetaFilter user by the username blue_beetle.

2 - http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1288776/000119312512025336/d260164d10k.htm In the Business section of the 10-K filing by Google, Inc. describing it's primary revenue source.

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