New Job Post New Target | Hackers

LinkedIn Privacy – Don’t Let Your New Job Post be a New Target for Hackers

LinkedIn is a fantastic social network for connecting with colleagues and industry associates, but posting about your latest new job on the platform could make you a target for cybercrime.

Here’s a brief overview of the current threats on LinkedIn and how to keep your profile secure.

Cybercriminals targeting professionals on LinkedIn

The excitement of getting a new job is something we all like to share with our social network – but unfortunately they aren’t the only ones looking at our LinkedIn profiles.

A new wave of cybercrimes using LinkedIn is on the rise with professionals around the world wishing for the days when their most annoying connection requests came from pushy recruiters.

Today, hackers and cybercriminals are tracking professionals who have started new jobs and using the information they gather to carry out impersonation scams.

The typical MO of a LinkedIn impersonation scam goes like this:

The new employee who has recently joined a company receives an email from their boss or supervisor, requesting that they make an unexpected purchase or funds transfer.
Not wanting to make a bad impression on the boss, many overly trusting people will follow the instructions as given – only to find that their actual manager knows nothing about the request.

In reality, the person who sent the email was simply impersonating a senior member of the company after researching both the employee’s and manager’s details on LinkedIn. This double violation of privacy has cost workers in various countries a small fortune – and you certainly don’t want it happening in your organisation.

As online scams escalate, privacy protection is non-negotiable

Protecting your LinkedIn profile from unwanted eyes – and ensuring that everyone in your company does the same – is an essential first step when it comes to avoiding these LinkedIn scams that are becoming more and more common.

Employees should be guided to not accept connection requests from people they don’t know and have never interacted with before.
The onboarding process is an ideal opportunity to educate your team on the importance of verifying that emails are legitimate and have been sent from one of the company’s official email addresses before following instructions.

Online scams and other cyberthreats are a reality that every business needs to prepare for. To secure your confidential data and enjoy peace of mind, browse our range of secure cloud storage solutions today.

Facebook Lost Control | Mobile Apps

Has Facebook lost control?

Social media is a huge part of our lives and for most of us, Facebook is the platform we go to for news, entertainment and to keep up with everyone we know. This wildly successful social media platform has grown exponentially over the years and is now used by 3 billion people worldwide, or almost half of the world’s population.

With so many people sharing information over the Internet, a number of serious privacy concerns and other issues related to Facebook have surfaced over the past few years. For some tech experts the real question is: should we be using Facebook and is the system out of control?

Facebook executives warned that the system is too big to manage

Recently the media reported that a group of advisers had warned the executives of Facebook that their iconic SM platform has grown to such a size and level of complexity that even the world’s best coders and IT experts are having trouble understanding and managing it.

While the company was quick to downplay these fears, a number of Facebook executives are said to have agreed with the experts’ assessment and are looking at ways to make the social sharing network more manageable.
These may include splitting the company up so that its sister brands Instagram and WhatsApp become independent entities once again.

is Facebook still a secure place to socialise?

In early October the world was shocked when Facebook and Facebook messenger went down for a full day, causing billions of people to lose touch with their personal and business contacts.

This may be a glitch in the system never to be repeated again, but it certainly exposes Facebook’s vulnerability to data security vulnerabilities and begs the question, is facebook out of control?

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Even one of the world’s biggest companies can fall prey to data security failures, but you can avoid this outcome by focusing on your own company’s digital security.

As your business grows, you’ll almost certainly face the reality of having to implement an IT and data security policy for an organisation with increasing information needs. An online backup service such as Soteria cloud ensures that your data is never lost even if your information is destroyed by a virus, or your business is burnt down.

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Tracking the Facebook activities of potential employees

Present-day laws and regulations make it particularly difficult for an employer to fire an employee once the contracts have been signed and the first few months of employment have passed. But what do you, as an employer, do when you end up hiring the wrong person? Some would say that ‘prevention is better than cure’ and this is the very reason why so many recruitment teams and business owners spend time tracking the Facebook and other social media platform activities of potential employees before taking the plunge and making an offer to hire/employ.

What to look for and what to overlook

It’s one thing to say that you should be tracking the Facebook activities of potential employees, but what are you actually looking for? It all really depends on the type of position you are trying to fill and what type of person you would like in that specific role.

It’s an accepted fact that some personalities just aren’t good fits with the culture of certain teams and it is, therefore, a good idea to weed those personalities out of the running as early on as possible. Checking (or trawling) the social media accounts of potential employees will often give a good indication of their ‘fit’.

Here’s what to look for:

What is the candidate known for online?
What type of content is the candidate posting, ie. do the posts appear to be positive or disruptive?
Does the candidate appear to have any particular themes?
Do the candidate’s online activities show them to check or uncheck boxes when it comes to the job requirements?
Are their online activities in conflict of interest for your business?

Protection of Personal Information

As an employee, you need to take care when screening candidates that you remain neutral and that if you turn down a candidate after a social screening, that your decision could not be seen as unfair discrimination.

For example, if you are looking for a new integral member for an animal rescue team and you notice that a potential employee consistently writes posts in support of animal cruelty, it would not be unfair or unreasonable to offer the post to another applicant, based on the screening.

However, you cannot discriminate against applicants based on personal agendas or preferences.

Last Word

Undertaking “snooping or screening” activity should shine a light on just how easy it is to gather personal information on a person or entity. That being said; carry out your online investigations on potential employees responsibly and with the professionalism that you would expect yourself. This will ensure that you use the intel ethically and that you don’t create an unnecessary media storm! Good luck in finding the right new employee for your team.