All sorts of businesses and individuals can find themselves the victims of hacking attempts. Therefore, you need to remain on top of these attempts and actively step in and stop them as and when possible. To begin with, you need to know the common signs of a hacking attempt before you can then respond to it effectively. You can then put in place more preventative measures to stop it from becoming a recurring issue in the future.
Look at failed password attempts
If you are an individual and you notice that your accounts are subject to several failed password attempts and they have not come from you, this is a clear sign that all is not well. The account provider will often email you to let you know what is happening. You also need to set up multifactor authentication, as this gives you an additional layer of protection.
The same goes for businesses, where zero trust security is certainly worth looking into – although you wish you could, you can’t trust everyone, so you must find security measures that consider this. When these failed password attempts start to stack up, you must change your password as soon as possible. Ensure it has not been repeated beforehand, as you don’t want to keep setting up the same one repeatedly.
Check out the traffic
Hopefully, checking out the traffic of your business website has become a common habit anyway, as this will help you to find out where your visitors are coming from. It will also help you to tailor content directly to them. You should also check out traffic, as it can tell you if it is coming from an unusual source, and you can take action to determine what is going on.
This may be your cue to report it to your internet security providers or take additional steps to ensure your accounts are secure. Too much traffic that is noticed to be coming from unusual or unexpected places needs to be looked at carefully and prevented if you suspect that it is a security risk.
Make it more difficult to access accounts
Hackers are looking for easy targets as these will prevent them from having to put in too much work. Therefore, if you have many means and methods of security in place, they will have to put in a sustained effort to gain access to your personal information.
Ensure you have the latest firewalls and antivirus, and update them regularly. Keep your passwords unique and updated all the time. Learn about the common signs of phishing emails. If you notice that all is not well, take active steps to do something about it rather than simply sitting back and allowing it to happen.
All of these are the steps that will keep you firmly on top of a hacking attempt and in the best possible place to prevent it from becoming a recurring issue. Ultimately, it is all about being proactive in your attempts to stave it off and making your defenses as strong as they can be.
