How Can I Secure my Home from Hackers

How Can I Secure my Home from Hackers

We have talked in my previous blogs that we all must be cautious about hackers around us, no matter in what industry we are in and even if we are home makers. The obvious question that comes is HOW?

Let me start with a story in my family. 

My in-law used to be government servant and its been a decade since he is retired. He always carries multiple debit cards and stores his secret PIN in an "encrypted" format (I wont reveal the key, LOL) in his diary. He was out with the whole family for two days. He has not used his card many times, but when he came back, he noticed he has lost $$$ from his account. And it was using a well known e-commerce payment system, with no details !

He was shocked, we were too. 

We, being a Cyber Security minded people, started digging more into the transaction history, time of the event etc, to understand more and possibly try to know what or who could have misused the card.

After all the discussion among us and with the back people, we are now aware that this was a purchase made using a portal (e-commerce system of payment gateway) choosing not to use OTP.

We also know that this transaction was done using the debit card pin and the hacker was able to skip the OTP (One Time Password) that is usually required for any online transaction in India (and most parts of the world). However, we are still investigating this Incident to know "WHO" is the hacker and "HOW" do we get back the money. I will let you all know when we are successful :)

If you have a Cybermind, you would have a list of suggestions for my in-law don't you?

And you would probably be suggesting 'n' number of things to be careful of and some 100 possibilities.

Here comes the question, HOW he could have avoided this situation or in general, How Can I Protect my Home from Hackers?

Keep in mind, it is not always money that you lose to a hacker. It could be anything and everything- your data, your privacy, your property or your time and resource. You are welcome to read my Why Will I be Hacked? to know more

There might be a billion things that you should be doing, but, here are some IMPORTANT ones-

Do not Share your PIN wit anyone--> No matter how close a third person is or how frequently you see him, do not share your credentials to the card or net banking with anyone ! This is direct money

Keep Safe and Use Safe--> Keep your card always inside your wallet and after you swipe anywhere, immediately keep it back. Keep it in a way where no one has easy access to your card, "Even if you are at home". Yes, even if you are at home, keep it safe so that no one has easy access. Do not share your PIN again with anyone while swiping your card or do not allow others to see your card details

Update your smart phone --> Always keep your smart phone updated. I am pretty sure that at least 50% of our smart phone users will have their PIN, Creds and other Important, personnel OR private data on their phone. Its not bad to keep your data on phone, after all you are utilizing the features of it. But be smart while storing your data on your smart phone and always keep up to date.

Update all your apps and your phone's software without miss.

A single vulnerability on your smart phone or any app on your phone might come costly to you.

Most of the above points will mostly have a direct impact on your bank account. There are other things that you should take care of-

Say No to Unsecured Devices--> Yes, there are a million devices that are unsecured in the market. And most of these are very light on the pocket when you buy. Do not trust the face value that you see, do your research before you buy a cool stuff. That cool stuff could be transmitting all your data to a cloud ! Check on the internet if there are known vulnerabilities with the device that you are buying.

Harden your WiFi--> Setup a unique  and strong password for your Wifi network and configure a unique and strong user name & password for your WiFi router. Close all open unnecessary ports and enable available router's firewall. Setup a separate guest wifi with password for guests.

Smart Home Devices, Be your Guest--> Keep all your smart home devices in a separate guest wifi network and keep them separate from your regular home network

No Defaults, please--> Check for factory installed creds on your devices and change them immediately once you install them at home.

Update--> Update firmware or software on other smart devices that you have at home

Accept Only If you Agree--> Accept for accessing any of your data on your phone by any of the applications or data only if it is required. Same goes with your other smart devices too. Always review privacy policy and say "Agree" only if it makes sense and if you really "AGREE" Do not just click on it :)

Do Not Click--> Last but not the least, Do NOT CLICK on any unknown fancy links. No matter what the email address or phone number that you see, do not click on the link if you do not know what it is.

Can you think of anything else which is a MUST do to secure your network?
Add in the comment section or add it when you share it !

--mEGhS (Meghashyam Chikkatoor)