Technology Threatens Your Privacy

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Privacy threats are currently the biggest threat to National Security today. The threats are not only concerning to the government, however. An alarming 92% of Americans are concerned that the power grid may be vulnerable to a cyber-attack (Denholm). Although this is a more recent development to the cyber threats we have experienced, this is not the first time that privacy threats have stepped into the limelight as people are forced to watch their every online move.

There are twelve major ways technology threatens your online policy today. The first of these threats is phishing. According to Riva Richmond, phishing is a ploy to gain personal information that will help people to steal your identity. Hackers will send you fake e-mails that appear to be sent from a credible source. They then use these e-mails in order to trick you into handing over important personal information to them. The second threat is spyware and malware. In the past, hackers sent viruses through e-mail but now they have upped the ante by creating malicious website which can infect your computer and collect your personal data. An even larger threat is social-networking. While this may seem harmless enough, social media is a huge threat to your privacy because people often overshare information about their personal lives which everyone on their friends list, whether you know them well or not, can see everything that you post and everything anyone posts to you. The fourth major threat to your privacy is video and photo sharing. Once again this seems like a harmless task, and it is if you post appropriate and non-revealing photographs and videos. The problem with these, most often, is the pictures and videos are not quite as private as we think. Often times, vi...

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...n. While many people don’t realize it, there is always risk when you use the internet. You must be able to know how to defend yourself against these attacks or you risk losing it all.

References

Denholm, Martin. "The Number One Threat to America's National Security." Tech Innovation Daily. N.p., 01 Apr. 2013. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. .

Hettinger, Mike, and Scott Bousum. "Cybersecurity." TechAmerica Cybersecurity Comments. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. .

Richmond, Riva. "12 Ways Technology Threatens Your Privacy (and How to Protect Yourself)." Switched. N.p., 14 May 2009. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. .

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