Two-minute guide to cybersafety

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Five dead simple tips to greatly improve your defenses against cybercriminals.

From kids to retirees, no one is safe from cybercrooks. And if you’re always putting cybersecurity on hold because it all seems so daunting, our five dead-simple tips are just the ticket. Each of them will greatly beef up your protection against the most common cyberthreats. We compiled this post as part of INTERPOL’s #ThinkTwice global information campaign to raise awareness of the main cybercrime vectors plus simple but effective ways to counter them.

Automate your passwords

Make all your passwords for both websites and apps long enough (at least 12 characters) and unique (that is, never use them more than once). No one can think up and memorize so many passwords, so use a password manager to create, store and enter them. You’ll only need to come up with and memorize just one (long!) main password for it; everything else — from generating to entering passwords — will be done automatically.

Keep in mind: you need to install the password manager on all your devices to enter passwords easily and safely everywhere. The data will be synched across all your devices. So, having saved a password on your smartphone, you’ll be able to automatically enter it on your desktop, and vice versa. Note that the password manager will let you store in encrypted form not only passwords, but also PINs, full credit card details, addresses, notes, and even document scans.

Pro level: for maximum security, disable biometric login to the password manager — this way you’ll have to enter the main password every time you use the app, but no one will be able to access all your data without knowing the main password (don’t write it on a sticky note, by the way).

Enable double checking

Double checking, or two-factor authentication, protects you from password-stealing hackers who break into your accounts using leaked credentials. Besides the password, they’ll need to enter a one-time code sent to you via a text or an authenticator app.

Although banks enable two-factor authentication (2FA) automatically, in many other online services it remains optional. Wherever your data is even a tiny bit confidential (social networks, messengers, government services, email), we recommend enabling 2FA in the settings, if available.

Keep in mind: There’s usually a choice of how to get one-time codes: by email or text, or by generating them in a special authenticator app on your smartphone. Of these methods, the safest is to use the latter; next come codes via text (they can be intercepted), and the least secure option is codes via email.
With an authenticator app, the only risk is if you lose your smartphone, in which case you’ll also lose access to accounts protected by one-time codes. Here again, Kaspersky Password Manager comes to the rescue: not only does it securely store authentication tokens and generate one-time codes, it also synchronizes them across all your devices. So, if your smartphone is lost or broken, you can easily generate a verification code on any of your other devices, as well as restore all your Kaspersky Password Manager data to a new phone.

Pro level: get yourself a FIDO U2F hardware key — this dongle looks like a tiny flash drive and offers the best protection against hackers.

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