What would you leave unattended in Starbucks?

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Category: Cyber Security (Personal)

Yesterday I was in a central touristy location using the free Wi-Fi (don’t worry I had a VPN running at the time!). In the space of twenty minutes two things shocked me:

1. A mother came in, left the baby awake in the pram next to the door and walked ten metres to buy a drink without watching the baby.
2. Two tourists came in, sat near the door and left: two handbags, their coat and phone on the seat and table while buying a drink.

Using open un-secured Wi-Fi is bad enough, but leaving your baby, phone, coat and handbag - probably stuffed with cards, cash and passport - is just asking for trouble.

Password security - it is not all about length and strength #1

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Category: Cyber Security (Personal)

Passwords, or sometimes pass phrases (a longer password made up of words), are the primary authentication system for pretty much everything and have been around for decades. From Twitter, Facebook, trading platforms and email mailboxes to sites where security is even more important, such as online banking. Due to poor password hygiene, laziness and general increases in computer power, passwords can be cracked, in some cases in mere minutes. Dictionary password cracking uses a list of millions of passwords and can go through millions of passwords in under a minute.

Most people or businesses recommend a password of over 8 characters (in reality 12 or 14+ characters is best) made up of lower case letters, upper case letters, numbers and special characters (e.g. £*$ etc). Ideally, a password would look like “xNKc0<\e3U@WES”, but this begs the question: can someone remember this, let alone a unique one for each website? A “kick-ass” password may be used but it can lead to people using it for every website login, or writing it on a Post-it note to help them remember it. Then all it takes is to steal one password and get access to someone’s life.

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Me in the SC Magazine: Siri voice commands can be used to steal iPhone data

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Category: Blog

Siri voice commands can be used to steal iPhone data