Data breaches seem to happen a lot these days and are expected to occur more in the future with no practical way to fight against them. However, data breaches happen when cybercriminals access your data, data on your devices, and data related to you in vendors and service providers.
If you want to buy a service or product from companies, you may notice they will ask you to give them some information about you like your social security number, your name, address, and credit card. So, when hackers get access to such information saved in the companies’ servers, we call it a data breach.
Hackers could sell your information or spread it to the public, and you don’t want anyone to use your credit card and ruin your financial register. Also, cybercriminals could use this information to make fake IDs and passports and use it in criminal activities.
You certainly don’t want anyone to use your information like that. So, in this article, we will discuss how you can protect yourself when a data breach occurs and what to do if this has already happened.
Change your password
When a data breach happens, the first thing to do is change your password; the attacked company may inform you that a data breach occurred, and your data could potentially be exposed, including your password. For having a secure password, you can use random password generator.
If you are using the same password on multiple accounts, you will have to change it on all your accounts because hackers could immediately use your exposed password and try it on your other accounts or even sell it to third parties which could make use of it.
This tip will help reduce the damage that may hit your privacy and security and prevent hackers from tacking all your accounts. However, make sure to use a strong, unique, unpredictable password, and you can use password managers to make it easy on you.
Watch your credit records
Many companies store all their clients’ credit card information, which is valuable for hackers. If a data breach occurred, others could compromise and use these data to buy things and steal your money. To ensure that your credit card is not operated by someone else except you, if you notice any suspicious activities, inform your bank immediately, so they can act fast and keep your bank account safe.
Also, check regularly to know if there is any new account in your name and your address has not changed. Activate the notifications feature for your bank account to be aware of any changes.
Activate fraud alert
A fraud alert is a service offered by many companies, Experian, for example. However, you can add this feature to your credit card. These companies will inform lenders that your credit card could be frauded, so when the hacker tries to borrow money using your credit card info, the lenders will call you before taking any further steps to ensure that no one else is doing that except you.
This feature adds a security layer to your credit card and prevents anyone from using it without your knowledge. There are many types of fraud alert you can choose from, like extended fraud alert and active duty fraud alert.
Credit freeze
A credit freeze is another service you can use to get more protection. Furthermore, unlike fraud alert, a credit freeze will prevent lenders from seeing your credit history, and because of that, they will refuse to give anyone who uses your credit card a loan unless you unfreeze it. Just remember to unfreeze your credit before creating a new account.
Conclusion
Data breaches happen almost every day around the world, and if you are using many services, your data could be exposed at any time. So, it is essential to know how to protect yourself and prevent others from using your personal information.
You can do many things to increase your online security, such as password managers, two-factor authentication, antiviruses, and many other measures that can help maintain your privacy. Luckily, online banks have high-security standards and many features and services that should keep your money safe.
Source: Plato Data Intelligence: PlatoData.io
