Silicon Prairie Cyber Services' Blog

Cybersecurity Awareness Month begins tomorrow! Are you ready?  This year’s theme is  “Do Your Part. #BeCyberSmart.”. Here’s a rundown of this year’s  weekly themes  that will help you learn how to protect yourself and your business from cyberattacks through actionable steps. Review the schedule below. Oct 4 - 10: Be Cyber Smart Oct 11 - 17: Fight the Phish Oct 18 - 24: Explore. Experience. Share. (Cybersecurity Careers) Oct 25 - 31: Cybersecurity First You can also catch me speaking live at the  Nebraska Cybersecurity Conference  on October 19. The conference is virtual, and there’s still time to register. So no matter where you’re sitting, you’ll have a great seat. In honor of Cybersecurity Awareness month, I’m switching up my email and blog schedule. During October, I’m going to kick off your week by sending you an email every Monday morning all about the week’s cybersecurity awareness theme. Not on my email list? Join now . Also, you'll want to follow me...

When I say ‘FlyTrap’ what comes to mind? A venus fly trap? ‘The Little Shop of Horrors’? A bug zapper? A strip of sticky tape with a bunch of flies stuck to it? Malware?   I hope you were thinking about malware because there’s some FlyTrap malware taking over Facebook Accounts, and it's been around since March.   How are they doing it? Social Engineering .   The bad guys have placed malicious apps in Google Play and other Android stores to lure you in with offers for free Netflix coupon codes and voting for your favorite soccer player or team. These apps look legit. They are high quality, use great graphics, and are free from grammar and spelling errors.   To get the code or to vote, you have to log in with your Facebook username and password. You are actually using Facebook to login, but unknown to the victim, there is something nefarious going on in the background, and it’s stealing their sensitive info.   WHAT TO DO IF THIS HAS ...

Last week I shared the Top 7 Things you Need to Know aboutFacebook.   One topic that made the list is the push to move people from Messenger to WhatsApp because of the end-to-end encryption issue. I’ve been getting lots of questions asking how safe it is to use Messenger, and I’ve got answers for YOU.   By DEFAULT Facebook can read everything you share in Messenger, just like they can read everything you post in the Facebook platform (remember you’re paying with your data).   AND so can anyone else (in theory with some not so savory techniques).   Casual conversations that you don’t need any privacy for are ok to have via Messenger just like anything else you feel comfortable about posting on Facebook.   Should you have a conversation that’s sensitive in nature in Messenger? NO Don’t discuss confidential or sensitive business info Don’t share your secret sauce Share nothing you wouldn’t want your mother to know.  😬 What can you d...