Lessons Learned - Do Not Share Passwords

Passwords are an amazing thing. They are the key to many things in our lives. To our bank accounts, retirement accounts, e-mail, FaceBook, LinkedIn, and Twitter just to name a few. Today I have a story about my son and his ex-girlfriend who just so happened to know his password to his gmail account and his FaceBook passwords. I didn't ask, but I'm assuming that they were probably the same.

Lessons Learned

• Don't share passwords with anyone!

• Don't use the same password for multiple accounts.

• Don't rely on FaceBook to respond too quickly. Hacked accounts are common.

Today our lives are out there on the Internet with all the social networks. When accounts can be taken over by someone, things can start to go wrong quickly. Sometimes hackers take control of these accounts when they are able to compromise your PC due to you not keeping your PC software up to date. Or worse, some you know and loved but now you've parted ways. Sometimes not on the best of terms. That is when things can turn bad quickly. So protect yourself, my recommendation is not to share these passwords at all. Don't re-use the same password. Once a hacker steals your login credentials, they probably have many more of your accounts because if you are like most, you use the same user ID and password for multiple accounts.

OK, well have a super fabulous Saturday night and to the rest of the weekend also. Stay safe out there.

Friend's E-mail Account Hacked

The other day, I received an e-mail from a friend with a subject line of "Look". The body of the e-mail was short and sweet. It said "* Hi! Click the link, there is something funny for you" followed by a link that looked innocent enough to me. The computer security person in me thought this was a bit strange so I did a little checking on the site that was referenced in my friends e-mail.

After some checking, I found that the site was considered malicious and was hosted in China. I responded back to my friend and said that the computer security person in me wondered if he really had sent this. No response. Another few days and I get another e-mail from him with the same link. At this point, I contact him and he says no he didn't send me or any of the other contacts he had in his address book that were included on this e-mail.

Lesson, my friend had his e-mail account hijacked. The attacker who had control was trying to take advantage of the trust between my friend and his contacts in his address book. I sent a response to all the others who received the e-mail warning them of the malicious link. I never heard back from anyone but I had done my part.

Be careful when you receive an e-mail from a friend with a link, and this is also true of the other social networks like FaceBook, MySpace, and LinkedIn. My motto in computer security is to trust no one. Don't just randomly click on links just because one of your friends sends you a link. Hijacked accounts will send out messagse with malicious links and take advantage of the trust that is built up on these types of networks.

Be careful out there and stay safe. Happy Tuesday!