Passives, The Devil's in the Details

Passive

"Accepting or allowing what happens or what others do, without active response or resistance."


The word passive can both be used for the user victim and the type of attack that makes them the victim.  If a person doesn't attempt to protect themselves, then they are by definition, passive to the threats all around.  The threats themselves are also passive, because they aren't directed.

What can only be described as wide spread chaos, the Internet is a thriving center of both directed and not directed threats.  A virus can be written both to attack particular people, or just attack anyone who touches it.

Lets walk in the shoes of a malicious person, who wants to take advantage of people who don't know any better.  Just like a normal person, he or she doesn't want to do anything too complicated.  You see, a good hacker, whether white hat, black hat, a threat or a good guy, likes the elegant type of solution.  The simplest answer is the best one.  In the case of our malicious person, lets say that he or she creates a picture file, with a virus in it, and emails it out.  And that email is forwarded by people because they thought the picture was funny.

You can say that this email was not directed to anybody in particular, but people still got infected.

Not all hackers are out to get you directly...  they fish.  They fish to see who would bite.  Who would take their bait?   Sometimes people don't even know that clicking that picture and looking at it is the equivalent of taking the bait.

Now passive threats can come in many different ways... it could be because a site has threats in their ads, you don't even have to click those.  It could be because you got an email from your "bank" but it linked to a page that wasn't really their page.  It could be just as simple as giving your computer access to the internet and visiting just one website.


Passives are dangerous, but they're sadly a part of the risk of surfing the Web.  In later posts we'll cover ways to try to make your journey through the Internet as safe as possible.  Remember, there is no such thing as 100% safety when it comes to computers.



~F.Zver

Aggressors do exist...

What do you think of the word "Aggressors"?
Usually, you'd think of an aggressive person.  Trust me, there are some aggressive people there... just look at politics and government.  But just like the devil, you could say that there are other aggressive people that would want you to believe that they didn't exist.  People would generally call them "hackers", but the term means way more than it's been used in the general media. 
The definition of HACKER used to mean just a person who looks at a system and try to devise a new more unique way to use the system, or reverse figure out how the system works.
We're here to use the term more like how the general populace has started to use it, as an all encompassing term for the type of person or people who use technology for a negative or evil purpose.  A hacker is someone to fear, and rightfully so. 
There are two types of evil hackers that we should try to protect ourselves from.  Those who are not organized and those who are.  Unorganized or loosely organized hackers are dangerous because they can take your information and use it for their benefit and most likely against your own benefit.  Some of these groups can appear on your news network as Anonymous or Lulsec.  They are dangerous but easily defended against.
But there are more serious hackers that definitely don't want you knowing that they exist.  These hackers work as close teams and groups for organized crime.  They    can obtain and siphon alot of information about people, and that information can be sold in the black market and used for Identity Theft.  So for these guys, you REALLY don't want them to get information about you or your family.  Even the tiniest bit of information like the family pet or your first car, can have dire consequences and lead to identity theft.
Identity theft is also an umbrella term which can mean anything from someone obtaining your credit card number, to someone opening credit lines in your name and racking up debt, all without you even knowing it.  The internet has no police, and no way to track everything that can happen.  Consider having access and using the Internet the same way as when people used to travel by horse drawn carriage through the wild west.... make good judgement calls, plan ahead, and watch your back.
As I progress through this blog, I will attempt to explain how to setup good defenses, and also how to develop good habits to minimize your family's exposure and risk from the Aggressors that exist in the internet.
~F.Zver

Users Need Protection

Sometimes there's a hidden danger that people dont realize.  This is because sometimes people dont know what they dont know.  Ignorance maybe bliss for some, but for others, ignorance is a bit of a bane in everyone's existence.