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Cyber hygiene: Best practices for a secure digital life
In the fourth and last episode of our Cybersecurity Awareness Month special series ‘Navigating cyber threats,’ we discuss the importance of maintaining cyber hygiene in today's digital landscape. Tune in as Rupak Ganguly, Cybersecurity Consulting Director and East Lead, EY India, shares relevant insights and innovative practices for maintaining a secure digital life, risks of using public Wi-Fi networks, and offers practical advice to help you safeguard your company’s digital presence.
Poor cyber hygiene can lead to data breaches, financial losses, and reputational damage. Achieving cyber hygiene requires clear policies employed training and continuous monitoring.
It is important to be cautious on public networks (Wi-Fis), use VPNs, and ensure secure website connections to protect sensitive data and devices from hacking.
Steps such as scanning for viruses, using antivirus software, changing passwords, and keeping applications and operating systems up to date are integral to cybersecurity routine.
Maintaining strong cyber hygiene is the first line of defense in our interconnected, digital world.
Rupak Ganguly
EY India Cybersecurity Consulting Director and East Lead
For your convenience, a full text transcript of this podcast is available on the link below:
Tarannum: Welcome to the EY India Insights Podcast. As part of the Cybersecurity Awareness Month special, we are running a series on ‘Navigating Cyber threats’, where, as a leader, you can learn how to effectively approach the cybersecurity challenges of today and tomorrow. In the previous episode of this series, we delved into cybersecurity threats within the ecosystem. In this episode, we will outline the best practices for cyber hygiene to ensure a secure digital life.
I am your host Tarannum Khan, and our guest for today is Rupak Ganguly, Cybersecurity Consulting Director and East Lead, EY India. Rupak comes with 10 years of extensive experience in delivering technology consulting services to clients across sectors and geographies. He leads EY India's East Cybersecurity account and is responsible for providing strategic leadership and management in IT risk advisory, data privacy, cyber programing maturity, risk assessments, and cyberthreat intelligence.
Welcome to our podcast, Rupak. It is a pleasure to have you.
Rupak: Thank you, Tarannum.
Tarannum: What is cyber hygiene? Why do you think is it increasingly becoming important in today's digital world?
Rupak: Cyber hygiene refers to steps that a user or a computer or other devices can take to improve their online security and maintain system health. It implies adopting a security centric mindset and habits that help individuals and organizations mitigate potential online breaches. A fundamental principle of cyber hygiene is that it becomes part of everyday routine.
It is important because it can prevent cyber criminals from causing security breaches, installing malware, and stealing personal or confidential information from our online devices.
Tarannum: What are some simple but effective practices for maintaining good cyber hygiene?
Rupak: There are two aspects to it – one for individuals and the other for organizations. For individuals, it is critical to develop regular routines or habits and using the right tools. Cyber hygiene is not a one-off event. It is something that must be practiced regularly. One can actually create habits by setting automated reminders or adding dates to your calendars for different tasks.
These tasks might include like scanning viruses, using an antivirus software, changing passwords, keeping applications, software's operating systems up to date, and even wiping off your hard drive wherever applicable. Once we get the hang of these practices, it becomes an integral part of our cybersecurity routine whilst using the right tools such as a firewall or wiping software, a password manager, and a high-quality antivirus software.
From an organization's perspective, there are leading practices which help secure the cybersecurity threat landscape, like establishing an incident response plan, implementing security frameworks and standards, and collaborating with security experts.
Tarannum: Thank you for those insights, Rupak. What are the evolving dangers of public Wi-Fi networks?
Rupak: Using Wi-Fi hotspots is very convenient because when we are traveling, working remotely from a hotel or an airport or a restaurant, we do use public Wi-Fis, but there are a number of threats and tremendous risk involved in using public Wi-Fi. These include cybersecurity attacks such as man-in-the-middle attack, unencrypted network, malware distribution, Wi-Fi snooping and sniffing, malicious hotspots, etc. Business owners actually think that they are providing valuable service to their customers, but chances are the security on these public Wi-Fis is lax or nonexistent.
Tarannum: So, how can people stay safe on these public Wi-Fis and what precautions should individuals take when using them?
Rupak: While using a public Wi-Fi, it is best to avoid accessing sensitive information. Checking directions is fine but it is best to wait when paying bills or making a purchase. A great way to minimize the security risk is to add an extra layer of security by using a virtual private network (VPN) bought from a trusted provider to ensure our data is safe.
Sticking to Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) websites makes our browsing more secure. If we connect unsecured networks by using Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) URL, our traffic could be visible to anyone else on the network. Using browser extensions like HTTPS everywhere, we force all websites to connect using a HTTPS. This helps in reducing the risk of ending up on an unsafe website. We can adjust our connection settings by turning off the ‘connect automatically’ feature on our devices, so that they (devices) do not auto connect and search for known Wi-Fi networks. Use a privacy screen to prevent fraudsters from being able to see or photograph any of our information in public areas. Turning off file sharing while accessing over public Wi-Fi is also important, as open file sharing allows the hackers to access our folders without permission. Also, use two-factor authentication to prevent cyber snoops from gaining access to passwords or credentials.
It is critical to keep our operating system up to date with the latest security patches. Most importantly, once we are done with browsing over public Wi-Fi, one should always remember to log out and ‘forget network’ in order to prevent automatic reconnect.
Tarannum: Thank you for touching upon that in such detail, Rupak. What is the impact of poor cyber hygiene and what can firms do to navigate that?
Rupak: The impact of poor cybersecurity hygiene can be profound. It leads to increased vulnerability, data breaches, financial losses, reputational damage, legal and regulatory issues, and a heightened risk of falling victim to cybersecurity attacks. Understanding cybersecurity statistics is essential because it provides tangible insights into the evolving threat landscape, enabling individuals and organizations to make informed decisions, allocate resources effectively, and stay ahead of emerging cyber threats.
In conclusion, cyber hygiene is essential for reducing the risk of cyber threats and protecting digital assets. Poor cybersecurity hygiene can have severe consequences, as evidenced by rising cyber-attack statistics. It underscores the urgent need for better practices, including education, vigilance, proactive security measures, and to defend against evolving cyber threats.
Tarannum: Is there anything else that you would like to add or any final words of advice for our listeners to ensure that they maintain a secure and private digital life?
Rupak: Cybersecurity hygiene is very crucial in today's digital age. Our interconnected world, driven by the internet and digital devices, present both opportunities and risks. Poor cyber hygiene can lead to data breaches, financial losses, and reputational damage. Key elements of cybersecurity hygiene include keeping strong password management, using multi-factor authentication, regular software updates, safe online practices, network security and data backup.
Achieving cyber hygiene requires clear policies employed training and continuous monitoring. By following these best practices, organizations can enhance their cyber security and protect sensitive data. Cyber hygiene is not an option, but a responsibility ensuring a secure digital environment in our ever-connected world.
Tarannum: Thank you so much for joining us and sharing the best practices for a secure digital life. It was lovely hearing from you on this very pertinent topic.
Rupak: Thank you, Tarannum.
Tarannum: Thank you to all our listeners as well. If you have any feedback for today's episode or questions for us, please do feel free to share it on our website or email us at markets.eyindia@in.ey.com. Until next time, I am Tarannum, and this is the Cybersecurity Awareness Month special podcast series by EY India. Thank you for listening in.
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