Patch Lady – 31 days of Paranoia – Day 19

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Since it appears that I didn’t win the Mega Million Lottery, I will continue with my posts about paranoia.  Tonight’s topic is about Small Business sc
[See the full post at: Patch Lady – 31 days of Paranoia – Day 19]

Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher

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GoneToPlaid, SueW, GreatAndPowerfulTech

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Best way I can think of to protect one’s small business (such as my own with just one-employee: me) is to deal exclusively with trusted business parties and delete or ignore anything that comes out of the blue. One should realize that missing on unexpected opportunities is definitely outweighted by having one’s business and even one’s life left somewhere between troubled and wrecked.

And even with trusted parties, never to just go ahead and click on hypertext links found in their emails without first at least hovering the cursor on them and, if in doubt even then, asking the other party to confirm they sent you the (attached to yours) email. That goes also for attachments: one, whenever possible, should scan them with some good AV before opening them.

One could add to the above always encrypting emails and their attachments, but I find that “always” a little too much. Opinions may vary on this. Some of this also covers, at least in part, outright phishing.

And then there is social engineering. And that is where the “why this?” and “is this too good to be true?” questions definitely come into play. Here the best defense is to use a lot of common sense mixed with a little paranoia.

For more on social engineering: consider the telephone scams people here are still commenting on, and their comments thereof.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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GoneToPlaid

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I so totally agree. With regards to phone scam calls, I never play games with the callers. Instead I either just hang up, or I quickly tell them that I am not interested and then I immediately hang up. Why? Some have tried to play games with phone scam callers who actually are hackers. If you really piss them off, then they could DDOS you or your web sites, or take great efforts to hack your computers — just out of revenge for you trying to play games with them since you think that you are smarter than they are. The upshot is — never p*** off a potential enemy who you do not know in terms of their potential capabilities. Just don’t do it.

P.S. I am not sure if this post will pass any filtering tests for language. Yet on the other hand, I think that my post conveys a very important messages to all who try to play mind games with potential hackers.

2 users thanked author for this post.

SueW, OscarCP

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I agree and add that playing games with criminals is not a very healthy thing to do.

Although the people with foreign accents that make those phone calls of the “your Windows license has expired” variety are probably not hardened criminals, but are just very poor and grateful to have some job where, for as long as it lasts, they can earn enough to keep body and soul together and also have and keep a roof above their heads and those of their families. I believe that the actual criminals, the ones fully profiting from the scam, are those giving those people their dodgy occupation, probably paying them very little as well.

If I remember correctly, it was VS Naipaul who wrote in one of his books (forgot the book’s name, read it many years ago) that “India is the country of the man with the rubber sprocket”, meaning a country where some desperate people try to make a living by resorting to all sorts of imaginative activities, all not necessarily very honest, but such is life.

Before anyone rushes to criticize me for my soft and bleeding heart: no, I am not excusing the actions of the people, poor or not, who make those calls, I am only trying to give some background as to why this may happen.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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There is such a thing as a rubber sprocket:

https://www.alibaba.com/showroom/rubber-sprocket-gear.html

 

-- rc primak

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