Drawbacks of new technologies

DRAWBACKS OF NEW TECHNOLOGIES

INTRO

Because of the very impressive progress in the new technology sphere, we now are confronted to new kinds of threats that did not exist before. We are going to talk about 3 of them: Cybercrime, Hacking and other dangers of new technologies at work.

1. Cybercrime

Cybercrime is a bigger risk now than ever before due to the sheer number of connected. Basically, Cybercrime is defined as a crime in which a computer is the object of the crime, whether it is through hacking, phishing or spamming. The computer can also be used as a tool to commit an offense : indeed, cybercriminals may use computer technology to access personal information, business trade secrets, or use the Internet for exploitive or malicious purposes. Criminals who perform these illegal activities are often referred to as hackers, but we will talk about them later.

Criminals committing cybercrime use a number of methods, depending on their skill-set and their goal. Here are some of the different ways cybercrime can take shape:

- Theft of personal data

- Copyright infringement

- Cyberstalking

- Bullying

As you can see, cybercrime covers a wide range of different attacks, that all deserve their own unique approach when it comes to improving our computer’s safety and protecting ourselves. It is thus really difficult to get rid of all of them.

For example, phishing is a form of cybercrime. Phishing is when a victim receives a supposedly legitimate email (quite often claiming to be a bank or credit card company) with a link that leads to a hostile website. Once the link is clicked, the computer can then be infected with a virus.

1. Hacking

Now, let’s talk about hacking. Hacking is the practice of modifying the features of a system, in order to accomplish a goal outside of the owner's original purpose. The person who is consistently engaging in hacking activities, and has accepted hacking as a lifestyle and philosophy of their choice, is called a hacker.

Certain corporations employ hackers as part of their support staff. These legitimate hackers use their skills to find flaws in the company security system, thus preventing identity theft and other computer-related crimes.

Computer hacking is the most popular form of hacking nowadays, especially in the field of computer security, but hacking exists in many other forms, such as phone hacking, brain hacking, etc. and it's not limited to either of them.

We have been looking for ways to avoid being hacked online and those are some that we’ve found:

1 : Never use the same password more than once. Actually, many people have the same password for every of their social media accounts for years and, even worse than that, the most common passwords include “123456”, “password” or “abc123”.

2: Check if you’ve been hacked. There are some websites where you can check if you’ve been hacked or if your personal details have been compromised. You just have to enter an email address or username into the search bar and it will tell you if you've been a victim.

3:  Check before you download and make sure you’re downloading the original version.

4: Use anti-virus software.

5: Keep your settings on private.

6: Always make sure you log out of your accounts when you’ve finished with them and log off a computer when you’ve finished using it. Even though, I know no one is doing it.

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