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From the desk of Jason Balderama, CISO, County of Marin
Spring is not just a good time for cleaning your house or apartment, it’s also a good time to clean up your technology and cyber footprint.
Throughout the year, especially around the holidays and during tax season, you extend your cyber footprint by paying bills, shopping, using social media, and many other digital activities whether for business or pleasure. Spring cleaning your space is meant to improve the air quality after having it closed up all winter. Cleaning your technology and cyber footprint removes clutter from your life while at the same time protecting you and your loved ones.
With spring cleaning, you often make a list to ensure you don’t forget to clean the spots you don’t normally think about, like behind the sofa or on top of the fridge. To help you spring clean your technology and cyber footprint, we have developed a checklist to help you through the process.
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- Use strong and unique passwords on all your accounts and enable Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) as an added layer of protection. This is especially important on accounts that have financial information such as online banking, credit card, and retirement accounts.
- If you have several passwords to keep track of, consider using a password manager to help keep your accounts secure. If you use the same password for multiple sites and your password is stolen, a scammer can potentially gain access to all the accounts where that password was used.
- Review all your email accounts.
- Organize folders of emails that you want to keep. Delete and purge emails that you no longer need.
- Be sure that there is no personally identifiable information stored in your mailbox.
- Review and update your contacts. Delete contacts that are no longer necessary or current.
- Review and update email filters to send spam and unwanted e-marketing messages directly to trash or another folder.
- Review social media accounts and associated privacy settings.
- Review any photos or videos and delete those that you no longer need or want to make viewable.
- Search yourself online to see what comes up.
- Do not just delete a social media app that you are no longer using, close social media accounts that you no longer use.
- Over time, you may have signed up for a variety of accounts such as retail rewards and newsletter subscriptions. Ensure you have access to all accounts you have registered. Use account recovery tools when needed.
- Close any accounts that you no longer use.
- Remove apps that you no longer use.
- Confirm which apps have access to your camera, microphone, and location and adjust privacy settings as needed.
- Make sure all apps, operating systems, and devices (computers, phones, tablets, TVs, etc.) are updated.
- Set your devices to automatically update on a regular basis.
Use the 3-2-1 rule to help guide you:
- Keep 3 copies of your important data. This includes the original copy and two backup copies.
- Save your backup copies on 2 different media types such as the cloud, a USB drive, or an external hard drive.
- 1 of those media types should be kept in a separate location, either online in the cloud or secured in another room or building.
- Securely wipe data from your old devices prior to disposal. Don't let your data fall into someone else's hands.
- For more information on e-waste recycling options in Marin County, please visit the Zero Waste Marin web site.
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Copyright © 2024 County of Marin, All rights reserved. |
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Disclaimer
The information provided in Marin CyberSafe News is intended to increase people’s awareness of cybersecurity and to help them behave in a more secure manner. Links in this newsletter are provided because they have information that may be useful. The County of Marin does not warrant the accuracy of any information contained in the links and neither endorses nor intends to promote the advertising of the resources listed herein. The opinions and statements contained in such resources are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the opinions of County of Marin.
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