Trend Micro: 10 Tips to Avoid Online Security Hassles During Summer Holidays

OTTAWA, June 27, 2013 /CNW/ - The plane tickets are paid for, your accommodations are booked and arrangements made to board the cat. But before heading off on summer holidays, raise the personal cyber threat alert on your digital life to stage orange, or even red. The places you are visiting online are likely not as safe as your home or office, according to global cloud security leader, Trend Micro.

Trend Micro offers the following top 10 tips for travelers to remain safe online no matter where their summer plans may take them.

1. Back up all your data before leaving home, and at the same time, remove any unnecessary information such as financial statements, health records or employment contracts from laptops and mobile devices.
   
   
2. Make sure all devices are protected with strong passwords unlikely to be known to anyone else but you. Do not keep a hard copy password cheat sheet or sticky near your device.
   
   
3. Have your laptop and/or mobile device serial number, make and model numbers stored in your wallet or luggage. Activate the lost device protection option with your mobile security application.
   
   
4. Keep your devices with you, or safely locked away at all times. Do not store devices inside checked baggage or in station or hotel storage lockers.
   
   
5. Don't use public Wi-Fi hotspots when making financial or online banking transactions. If you need to do any transactions that could expose private information, use an HTTPS connection. When doing so, look for anti-phishing awareness cues, like the green address bar, indicating that it is in fact a legitimate organization.
   
   
6. Avoid connecting USB and thumb drives to "stranger" devices and conversely, avoid connecting thumb drives or USB keys, media cards, and USB chargers from unknown sources to your own devices. This type of sharing can often results in an unwanted souvenir in the form of potentially malicious software, known as malware, which may come home to your desktop.
   
   
7. Be aware of your surroundings and who might be able to view your screen / keyboard especially in public areas (e.g. shield passwords from view). Terminate connections when a device is not in use.
   
   
8. Clear your browser after every use (delete history files, caches, cookies, URL, and temporary Internet files).
   
   
9. Avoid using the "remember me" feature on website, retype your password each time access to a password protected site is required.
   
   
10. When the holiday is over, create new passwords of all your personal accounts, even if not accessed during the travel.  This includes banking, social networking, and webmail accounts.

About Trend Micro Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in security software, strives to make the world safe for exchanging digital information. Our solutions for consumers, businesses and governments provide layered data security to protect information on mobile devices, endpoints, gateways, servers and the cloud. Trend Micro enables the smart protection of information, with innovative security technology that is simple to deploy and manage, and fits an evolving ecosystem. All of our solutions are powered by cloud-based global threat intelligence, the Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Network™ infrastructure, and are supported by over 1,200 threat experts around the globe. 

SOURCE: Trend Micro Canada

Claire M. Tallarico, 416 616 9940 or [email protected]