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Easy way to secure your accounts from cyber hacking

Ebay released a statement last week confirming that their online auction house had been hacked sometime during January – March 2014, compromising 145 million accounts. Their investigation revealed that employee login credentials were stolen by cyberattackers which were then used to access their corporate website.
While their official position is that there has been “no evidence of any unauthorized access to financial or credit card information, which is stored separately in encrypted formats”, the personal information of users including name, address, emails and passwords have been stolen. If you are a user of ebay, you would have received by now an email from them asking you to change your password.
The real concern here is not third parties unauthorised access to your ebay account. Instead, it’s third parties being armed with your personal information logging into other databases such as your emails or paypal account with a password that is the same as the one you used for ebay. It is a serious problem.
Users can change their emails and passwords of other accounts but cyber hacking is prevalent and such an incident will happen again.
Two step verification is an increasingly popular setup with regards to account access. It should be available with all your online bank account access. Please contact your bank if you don’t already have this setup. Further, you should set this up with your emails. I recently posted a blog on how to setup 2-step verification in Gmail. If you use Gmail then I highly recommend you set this up as well. http://www.onsitehelper.com/index.php/blog/99-2-step-authentication
If you are a user of PayPal, it is recommended that you set up the PayPal Security Key rather than simply changing your password. For further information see https://www.paypal.com/au/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=xpt/Marketing_CommandDriven/securitycenter/PayPalSecurityKey
PayPal Security Key is a form of 2 step verification which along with your password, an additional method of verification is sent to you which is unique and changes every time you need to login. This can come as an additional password sent to you as an sms.
There are two options with PayPal:
Security Key card: This is an electronic device that creates a unique security code instantly at the press of a button. It is the size of a credit card. One time cost of $32.95 AUD.
Mobile phone Security Key: You can sign up to receive security codes by text message. – free.
I use the mobile phone Security Key which only took 30 seconds to setup. Here is how to do it.
1. Sign into PayPal
2. Click this link to register your mobile phone to receive sms https://www.paypal.com/au/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_register-security-key-mobile
Then follow the prompts.
Be proactive with your security and prevent your accounts from being hacked. The 2 step verification system is by far the best solution to date.
If you need any help in setting up or reviewing your IT security, please contact [email protected] or call 03 9999 3106

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