Sunday, June 13, 2021

More malware and data leaks - BUT...

This article at NordLocker is certainly more of the same, but suggests two things: first, that leaks continue unabated (those entrusted with our Personally Identifiable Information can't protect it) and second, that some obvious protective measures are brought into high relief.

The article states that most of the recently leaked data were either email addresses or login/password pairs.

That's a very interesting observation. Notice that in this case the information does not concern matters of irreperable compromise or near-irreperable damage (like leakage of tax/SSN, date of birth, vehicle operator license number, benefit or financial account numbers, etc.) but issues of email or passwords.

Issues of email (usually a free service) and passwords (usually regarding reconfigurable contexts) are completely within the control of the user. To change a password is trivial. To change (or shut down) an email address is more work, but also technically trivial. Replay attacks (using snatched ID credentials) don't work if passwords or addresses are different from when snatched.

Changing your email address and passwords could increase your security posture more than a brand new phone or computer.