Don't wait, get proactive in preventing being hacked!

Most of us only worry about our cyber security when something happens. Data leaks and hacks are continuing to grow in number and size, the global average for a data breach is $3.83 million, but the average cost of a data breach in the United States has hit an all-time high of $8.64 million (2020).

Here is the average cost per compromised record by data type:

• Customer PII – $175

• Anonymized Customer Data – $171

• Employee PII – $163

• Intellectual Property – $151

• Other Corporate Data – $150

Stop choosing one or two digital security techniques, here are 7 digital privacy tools we all need now!

• VPN: A VPN is a “virtual private network,” which routes all of your internet traffic through a secure server that hides where you’ve browsed–and even where you are located.

• A private Web Browser: Brave is far away the best option. Firefox and Opera are also decent options.

• Encrypted DNS: This sounds fancy, yet is very simple to set up! Here is a 5 min video.

• A Secure Messaging Application: Messaging apps that support end-to-end encryption prevent third-parties, even the companies that run the messaging service, from reading your messages. My Favorite is Signal

• A Password Manager: Simple, cheap and one of the best tools available! Check out our previous blog post here and here is a great article, PC Mag password Manager review.

• An encrypted hard drive/USB Thumb Drive: Search BitLocker

• Lastly, a Data Destroyer: Is deleting a file really deleting it? .... CCleaner is a great option

Ponemon Institute. Cost of Data Breach Study. 2020