Essential Security Steps For iPhone Fanatics

This is a guest post by Claudia.
For being an iPhone owner, chances are quite bright that you may be obsessed with the same. You will also never be bored from the same, given a range of cool apps that are available on iPhone.
iPhone Security

However, attractive as they seem, iPhone are a big threat too and the chances of these getting stolen are very high. However, taking some security measures will ensure that the iPhone is safe and secure.
  1. Have an Auto Lock and a Password: One of the basic security measure that can be taken is to have an auto lock for the iPhone. Though this may not prevent the phone from being stolen, having an auto lock and a password will ensure that all the important data within the iPhone will never fall in wrong hands. In an incident that took place in 2012, an iPhone belonging to a top political leader in India was stolen while he was travelling by a train. However, as per the information given by the leader in media, no vital data was lost as the iPhone had auto lock mode on. Having this basic security measure ensures that your iPhone will never fall in wrong hands, as the data will be secure all the while.
    Real Life Example: Recently the media in India was abuzz with speculations that iPhone belonging to a senior political leader was stolen when he was away on a tour of his home constituency in Rai Barelly in the state of Uttar Pradesh. However, much loss was prevented as the iPhone had auto lock feature that prevented data loss.
  2. Using Wi- Fi Wisely: Wi-Fi is the most important feature on an iPhone and most iPhone users relish having this feature on the phone. However, unmindful to your knowledge, the Wi-Fi facility on your iPhone can be a security concern too.

    If you are using Wi-Fi facility on your iPhone, ensure that your home network is encrypted so that the iPhone cannot be used without your knowledge. Though, this feature might not be limited to iPhone only but using the iPhone on non encrypted network can have security concerns and you should avoid the same.
    Real Life Example: Wi- Fi facility needs to be used wisely, else the same can lead to data theft too. Top ranking IT companies as Wipro and IBM have caught some mischievous employees who were in the habit of proliferating data on a regular basis causing numerous losses to the establishment.
  3. Have an Insurance Package for your iPhone: One of the biggest security concerns for your iPhone is the risk of it being stolen. Though you might be able to protect the data in your iPhone by enabling the auto lock feature, the physical loss of the iPhone can cost a lot. The best and viable method of getting your iPhone protected is to get an insurance for the same.
    A range of iPhone insurance services are available. Use your instinct and choose a compatible insurance plan for the iPhone that covers iPhone loss due to theft, fire or data damage.
    Real Life Example: Having an insurance package for the iPhone can help recover losses, in case the phone is stolen. Leading insurance companies as Bajaj and HDFC have some plans that have been specially prepared for iPhone users who wish to have insurance for their prized possession.
  4. Data Wiping: You can ensure an additional protection layer for the iPhone by having data wiping facility for the iPhone. This feature is especially useful if someone accesses the passcode of your iPhone. All the data gets wiped off automatically ensuring that no vital information stored in the iPhone lands in wrong hands.
    However, this has risks associated too. Small children in your home might access the iPhone and lay seize to vital data in the iPhone. This will lead to wiping of the data in the iPhone and you might end up in unnecessary trouble.
    Real Life Example: Data wiping is a critical issue that needs to be addressed. A range of software are available online that will help you recover the data in case it is wiped unintentionally. This facility is of special use to intelligence agencies who usually need to crack codes and recover data that might help them solve a case.
Technology comes with its flaws too and safety of your iPhone is one such concern. Pay attention to the above listed facts and your iPhone will be safe.
About the author:

Claudia is a writer/blogger. She loves writing, travelling and reading books. She contributes to Dr. Keith Ostrosky.
March 4, 2013
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Why These Days Hacking Is Easy And Everyone Is Hacked?

This is a guest post by Claudia.

This is among the most common questions which seem to be troubling the modern day generation. People with even some basic computer and internet knowledge can understand the severity of this issue.

Hacking

However, hacking is not an easy nut to crack; it requires lots of skills and efforts and is considered among the tougher tasks. Yet, these days, hackers have created whole lot of mess by simply cracking passwords of emails, bank accounts, and other similar things. This has emerged as a serious threat in the present context especially when you transfer money online, and carry out countless things on the web. The following are few possible reasons why hacking is becoming a rampant phenomenon where so many people are getting hacked.

The Password Habits of Users are Getting Worse

Any average internet user maintains around 25 different accounts but simply uses merely 6.5 passwords to secure them. The fact is maintaining this much of accounts is not an easy job as you need lots of brain space to remember complex code combos which is actually a difficult task. This simply ends up creating common passwords for a number of accounts.


Further, the password people select are often very simple and even stupid which are easy to crack. According to different studies, it takes hardly ten minutes to crack any lower case six character based passwords. The best way to avert this issue is to use dumb passwords.

Cracking Passwords Have Become Easy

Earlier cracking passwords was really a tough nut to crack, however, these days with so many tools, graphic processors, and password cracking programs doing this job has become faster and easy. In fact, there is a drastic advancement seen in the hacking world which has made cracking password a simple exercise. The most classic example is the LinkedIn breach of how things have changed in hacking domain. This has therefore proved that modern passwords are no more secure as they were in the past.

Growth in Hacking Network Effect

With every successful password hacking effort, the hackers and cyber thieves learn a lot about these crimes. The fast growing list of a wide range of leaked passwords has enabled the programmers to device rules which make the cracking algorithms more accurate and fast. This has therefore made the password attacks a cut and paste job, which even the script kiddies are able to carry out without much efforts. Still, you would see many web users having a password like ‘123456’ or words like ‘password’ despite being cautioned several times to use difficult and unique passwords.

Websites Have Now Turned Worst in Protecting the Users

The best example is again the case of LinkedIn breach where the company confessed that it simply occurred due to some poor protective measures. There are other examples of such hacking over a number of big and small websites. Most of these sites simply do not have sufficient amount of ‘cryptographic salt’ to their password protection. This renders opportunities to cyber criminals to hack such sites. A number of popular sites are seen ignoring this cryptographic salt element in their password security system.

Conclusion

Checking the above reasons confirms a fact that we have now reached to end of these password security systems. However, let’s keep our fingers crossed and see technology fixing these issues for the millions of users. Or, we need to simply embark with our own solutions to shield us from different hackers attack.

About the author:

Claudia is a writer/blogger. She loves writing, travelling and content marketing. These days she is busy to write an article on content marketing. Recently she did an article on viral marketing.
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