KOLKATA: In June, Praveen Rai in Mumbai saw his coffers swell by Rs 90,000 while Akhilesh Bagla a Kolkata businessman sat baffled as the same amount
exited his bank account overnight. Though Bagla had done nothing apart from some e-banking, Rai sitting on India's other coast had successfully hacked into the businessman's account, to commit possibly the first e-fraud in the city.
Although the rise in online presence and transactions pose a potential risk to users, there are ways to safeguard your identity and information on the internet, ethical hacker and cyber security expert Ankit Fadia explained in the city on Friday.
"There are solutions that can substantially reduce the risk. Installing a firewall for your personal computer, as well as installing a good anti-virus and anti-spyware can provide significant protection," Fadia said. He was speaking at a seminar at the Heritage Institute of Technology.
"It is a misconception that firewalls are only for corporate use. Using them on your personal computer can mean that criminals have a harder time trying to access your personal information," he revealed, while adding that regular updates for operating systems, anti-virus and anti-spyware softwares were essential.
Fadia also recommended the use of strong individual passwords for each website or online service by using a combination of alphabets, numbers and special characters. "It's not good having your name followed by your birthday as a password for protecting vital information. You should also instal and use a key scrambler, so that your typing patterns cannot be copied or tracked," he said.
On the cyber terrorism front, Fadia who had worked with international intelligence agencies in the aftermath of 9/11 said terror organisations were now improvising email accounts to exchange information.
"Terrorists can sign into a single email account from different parts of the world and save their messages in the draft form, which the others can then access. As the email never leaves the server, it becomes increasingly difficult for security agencies to track these conversations," he said.
