We’re just over halfway through the year and things haven’t slowed down.
The pandemic and subsequent shutdowns didn’t seem to affect tech companies. In fact, many of them reported record numbers again during the pandemic. Now that people are getting vaccinated we can expect things to ramp up even more. Let’s recap what has happened so far this year. But before we do, I’ll point out that Microsoft has issued an emergency patch for Windows. If you have a Windows machine you should update it to fix a particularly bad vulnerability.
We started off the year talking about the largest hack in history. The Solarwinds hack affected software that dozens of companies, the military and government agencies use. This hack allowed intruders access to internal networks. Just a few months ago an oil pipeline that served most of the states in the southeast had to be shut down because of a ransomware attack.
Ransomware attacks work by infecting one machine on a network and then spreading. Usually this is done via a targeted email asking the recipient to open a link or an attachment. The emails can be made to look like they come from anyone, even your boss. As an individual there’s not much you can do about a Solarwinds attack. If a piece of software you’re using is compromised and you don’t know, what can you do?
But we have a lot of control over ransomware attacks. Don’t click on suspicious links. Be wary of attachments in emails you weren’t expecting. If you’re worried about an email you can always verify with the person that sent it before opening anything in the email. Doing this will greatly reduce the risk of a ransomware attack affecting you or the company you work for.
In April we found out that Facebook leaked our data again. At this point you should consider anything you put on Facebook to be public.
I’ll also take this opportunity to reiterate that you should stay off of social media. We know that social media sites employ algorithms to try to keep you on the site. Those algorithms have been shown to favor conspiracy theories. To keep you on the site, whether it be Facebook, Twitter, Youtube or whatever, they will show you the more and more controversial videos/news/tweets. This is definitely a detriment to society.
Twenty years ago it would have been hard to find anyone who believed the Earth was flat, but today they have conventions. Thousands of people stormed the Capitol building on Jan. 6 because they believed conspiracy theories about a stolen election. It’s easy to think that you won’t fall for one of these conspiracy theories. That you’re too smart for it. But there was a geophysicist at the Capitol building on Jan. 6. No one is safe from that very subtle slide into an outrageous belief. Don’t take that chance, stay off those sites.
The right to repair our stuff has gained a lot of traction lately. I wrote a column about it a few weeks ago. So much of the stuff that we buy is impossible to repair. This increases costs to us as consumers and has a huge environmental impact. Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple (he left the company in the ’80s) has recently voiced his support for the right to repair. We’re starting to see bills passed in states regarding it and we could see a federal bill soon.
Though I expect these bills won’t cover smartphones, tablets or computers, they are a step in the right direction. We can only hope that future bills will cover more of the stuff that we buy.
