Five Easy Ways to Protect your Digital Identity
Year after year, we receive more and more reports of data breaches at well-known companies. This may not come at a surprise — just think of the data scandal at Yahoo in 2013, with three billion personal data records leaked. Or the incident at the American consumer credit report agency Equifax in 2017. 143 million customers had their personal data records compromised, including highly sensitive information such as social security numbers and credit card numbers.
You might assume that these data scandals to such an extent won’t repeat themselves, since companies learn from their mistakes. In the first half of 2019 alone, 3,800 successful cyber attacks were registered. With it, 4,1 billion personal data records fell into the wrong hands. Facebook was also affected: 540 million user data sets were compromised. The reason? Lack of security measures.
Data scandals almost feel normal and are just going to become more frequent. The question is not whether they will happen, because IT systems will always have potential security gaps. The question is when they will happen. Often humans within the systems are the weak points. Highly secure IT systems can be cracked by careless behaviour, such as opening a phishing mail.
With all the negatives headlines, you, as an individual, can get discouraged quite easily. If even Facebook is not able to fend of cyber attacks, what chances do individuals have? Is it even possible to protect our personal data nowadays?
Admittedly, data protection can seem complex and this is not without reason, it is a sensitive and relevant issue. Don’t leave your head in the sand now! Individuals are indeed able to protect their Digital Identity, by behaving consciously in the digital world and using some tips and tricks. We will show you how.
Use a password manager
Simple yet effective: Password managers manage the user ID for online services. It is recommended to use strong and unique passwords for every single service on the Internet. The reality is different, because the internet user likes it simple and fast — and therefore uses the same password for multiple services. This simplifies not only the life of the user, but also that of the hacker.
According to a report published by Verizon in 2019, four out of five of all successful hacker attacks are directly related to stolen and unsafe passwords. In other words, it’s about time to change your passwords and store them in a password manager.
Popular and free password managers for Windows and other operating systems are LastPass, KeePass and Sticky Password.
Set up a multi-factor authentication
The status quo for secure digital identification today involves multi-factor authentication. For increased security, different authentication methods are combined.
There are three types of digital identification:
- knowledge-based (user ID)
- possession-based (chip card or smartphone)
- attribute-based (biometrics)
If you log in to an online service using your username and password, you use knowledge-based identification. With the two-factor authentication, you have to have another proof, in addition to the user ID. Either a proof of possession (smartphone) or an attribute (fingerprint). If you combine these types of identification, you gain significantly more digital security.
Many services already offer multi-factor authentication. It’s standard for digital services that require high security measures, such as online banking or the online function of the german ID card. The German Federal Office for Information Security also recommends the multi-factor authentication for every identification on the Internet.
Use an encrypted web browser
Web browsers are the gateway to the digital world. Many websites and online services track the user’s behaviour and store so-called cookies and other tracking tools directly in the browser. The intention is to make surfing more user-friendly but also allows third parties to collect information and use it for personalized online advertising.
Most of the popular browsers (Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Internet Explorer) offer the option to disable tracking. But if you want to be on the safe side, you should switch to an encrypted browser. This guarantees that no information on your surfing behaviour is collected.
A new encrypted browser is Brave. It places the user’s security and privacy as a priority. An integrated Adblocker and many built-in functions make it difficult for other parties to track you. For privacy-seeking users this browser is an excellent alternative.
For those who want a truly anonymous surfing experience the Tor Browser is the best option. Tor is best known for providing access to the Darknet. However, journalists, whistleblowers and politically persecuted people use it as well due to its given anonymity. The figure below shows how anonymous surfing is achieved: before accessing a website, you are first routed to three different IP addresses.
In this example, the connection to the Google homepage runs via a server in France, one in the United States and one in Germany. This way the original IP address is obfuscated, which makes tracking extremely difficult.
Use private search engines
A large proportion of internet users in Germany use Google to look up websites. Google’s market share in Germany is about 85%. This allows Google to record the user’s surfing behaviour holistically and to create entire interest profiles, which are used for targeted ad purposes.
There are many alternatives to Google’s search engine — equally user-friendly and fast. DuckDuckGo, Startpage, Search Encrypt and Disconnect Search protect the user’s privacy and don’t collect any information.
Use a VPN
A VPN (virtual private network) is a self-contained and protected network enabling the targeted and encrypted transmission of data via public networks (e.g. the Internet). With the help of a VPN, you can surf the Internet anonymously. Your IP address is obscured by the IP address of the VPN provider.
A VPN is particularly suitable for untrustworthy public networks, such as the wifi at an airport. Your data is encrypted and transmitted securely. Therefore, VPNs offer increased security and anonymity — ideal for protecting your digital privacy.
Popular VPN providers are NordVPN, ExpressVPN and CyberGhost. For a few euros per month you can surf the Internet safely and anonymously.
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About Us
Blockchain HELIX is a technology startup developing the Digital Identity solution, helix id. With helix id, internet users stay in full control of their data and can decide if and with whom they want to share it. Everything necessary for a trusted and secure digital future.
