Cyber hygiene refers to cybersecurity best practices that both businesses and individuals implement to maintain the security and health of their accounts, networks and devices. Having good cyber hygiene protects you from common cyberthreats and cyberattacks that target you and your sensitive data.
Continue reading to learn more about cyber hygiene, its importance and how you can benefit from practicing good cyber hygiene.
Cyber hygiene is important for everyone to practice because it can prevent people from becoming a victim of cyberattacks. When people don’t practice good cyber hygiene, the dangers that linger online can make them a target and place all their sensitive data and credentials at risk of becoming compromised.
If you’re someone who is always on the internet, you should be practicing and implementing good cyber hygiene to prevent cyberattacks, or lessen the damage if one were to occur.
There are many cybersecurity best practices that are considered part of good cyber hygiene. Here are a few.
Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) is an authentication method used to verify your identity. With MFA, two or more authentication methods are required before you can successfully log into an account. Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) differs from MFA, as it only requires one additional authentication method for you to log in.
Some examples of MFA or 2FA include the following:
MFA and 2FA are important when it comes to maintaining good cyber hygiene because they ensure that no one but you will be able to access your accounts. If a cybercriminal were to crack your password, they would still need to verify your identity, which only you have the ability to do.
It goes without saying that using strong, random passwords for each of your accounts is crucial to practicing good cyber hygiene. Each of the passwords you use should always follow password best practices.
A good way to ensure that you’re always following password best practices is by using a password generator to create your passwords and a password manager to securely store them.
A password manager is a tool that generates, stores and protects all your passwords in a cloud-based vault. When you use a password manager, remembering your passwords is simplified since it remembers them for you. All you have to remember is your master password, which acts as the key to enter your vault.
A firewall is a network security system that monitors incoming and outgoing traffic. The purpose of a firewall is to act as a barrier between traffic that comes and goes from your device so you’re protected from viruses and cybercriminals that attempt to target you.
Antivirus software is another way you can protect your device from threats on the internet. This software prevents, detects and removes viruses before they begin to infect your system. Having antivirus software already installed on your devices is essential when practicing cyber hygiene because it’ll run automatically and protect you from viruses such as malware.
Regularly updating your software is something you should always do. Software updates not only patch security flaws that cybercriminals can take advantage of, but also add new features and improve existing ones.
Backing up your data is crucial to ensure that you’ll always have access to it, no matter what happens. With malware attacks, your data and files can be easily stolen or you can have your access to them restricted or blocked entirely. In the case of a ransomware attack, which has you pay a ransom before you can access your files again; having your data backed up comes as a relief because that means you won’t have to pay the ransom.
One way you can back up your data securely is by using Keeper’s Secure File Storage add-on where you can store all types of data and files in the same vault as your passwords. All your data stays in one place and you can access it from anywhere and on any device. Keeper is zero trust and zero knowledge – so only you will be able to access your stored data, no one else.
There are many benefits that come with having good cyber hygiene. The following are a few.
When we consistently ignore new software updates, we’re doing more harm than good to our devices. It’s important to update your software whenever updates become available. Not only will they patch existing security flaws, but it’ll also keep your devices running well for longer periods of time. This is because your device gets all the new updates it needs to be running as it should be. Ignoring these updates can cause our devices to overexert themselves and begin to lag or run slowly.
As cyberattacks continue to rise, it’s important to develop good cyber hygiene so you can protect yourself from becoming a victim of an attack. Implementing cyber hygiene practices can aid you in lessening the damage of an attack, as well as the amount of data a cybercriminal can get away with.
As a best practice, keep all your data in an encrypted vault like Keeper – where all contents of the vault are encrypted with 256-bit AES record-level keys and folder-level keys. When cybercriminals can’t access your secured data, they can’t compromise it.
Since good cyber hygiene requires you to implement password best practices, you benefit by not having all of your passwords become compromised. Although one of your passwords can be compromised, for example due to a company experiencing a breach, only the credential that was part of the breach would become compromised instead of all your passwords.
When you decide to implement a password manager to follow password best practices, changing your compromised passwords becomes a seamless process.
Implementing good cyber hygiene in your daily routine is essential, but it can be hard to do all on your own. This is where Keeper can help. With Keeper, you’ll be able to generate and store all your important data, credentials, credit cards and more in a secure vault that you’ll be able to access from anywhere with just your master password.
Don’t let your cyber hygiene worsen because you don’t have the right cybersecurity tools. Keeper makes maintaining your cyber hygiene easy – get started for free today.
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