Security: defending against an attacker
How to protect your accounts, money and family from flawless phishing and cloned voices, and what to do in the first hour after a breach.
A course for anyone with an email account, a bank and parents with a phone. You will set up a password manager, passkeys and backups, agree on a code word with your family, and know the order of steps when an account is taken. This is about an attacker: data that flows without malice is in the Privacy course.
So far there is only this table of contents. Lessons appear one at a time, and we promise no dates. Feed of new lessons (Atom)
16 lessons, 5 parts
Part 1 How you are attacked now
The old signs of a scam have stopped working, so what you check has to change.
- coming soon
Who attacks you and why
Most often it is not a hunt for you personally but a cheap mass campaign, and understanding that economy shows which defenses pay off.
- coming soon
Phishing written by a model
A message with no mistakes and with details from your life: errors are no longer a sign, so you check the channel, not the text.
- coming soon
A cloned voice on the phone
A relative’s voice can be faked from a short recording: how such a call works, and why the safest move is to hang up and call back yourself.
- coming soon
A video call with people who were not there
Employees have already sent large sums after a video meeting with faked executives: how to approve a payment on a call from now on.
- coming soon
“Your bank’s fraud team” on the line
Why a real bank does not ask you to move money to a “safe account,” how pressure works, and how to end the call.
Part 2 Locks
A few settings, one evening’s work, close most of what attackers rely on.
- coming soon
A password manager: one lock instead of a hundred
A long, unique password for every site, and why changing passwords on a schedule is no longer advised.
- coming soon
Two-factor authentication: from text messages to a hardware key
Which methods stand up to phishing and which do not, why a text message still beats nothing, and what happens if you lose your phone.
- coming soon
Passkeys: signing in with no password
How a passkey is tied to the real site and so will not work on a fake one, and how not to lose access along with your phone.
- coming soon
Your email is the master key
Almost everything else can be recovered through it, so it comes first, and so do the ways of recovering it.
- coming soon
Backups: 3-2-1 and the test restore
Three copies on two kinds of media, one away from home, and a check that a copy really restores, before ransomware or a theft happens.
Part 3 The people around you
Your family can be deceived with your voice, so the defense has to be shared and agreed on in advance.
- coming soon
A family code word
Why a family needs a secret word against faked voices, how to agree on one in person, and what to do if the caller does not know it.
- coming soon
When they call your parents
How to talk with older relatives about calls demanding urgent money, without condescension and before the first such call comes.
Part 4 When it has happened
A breach happens to careful people too, and the order of your steps matters more than the shame.
- coming soon
The first hour after a breach
Your bank first, then your email, then the rest: why the order matters, and why an unauthorized transfer has to be reported at once.
- coming soon
Your data leaked: now what
How to check whether you were in a breach and what comes next: change reused passwords, freeze your credit and expect well-aimed scams.
Part 5 An agent with your access
An agent you gave your mail and files to becomes a new door, and it needs locking too.
- coming soon
An agent holding your keys
What makes an agent with your mail a target and what to check after a breach; permissions and prompt injection are in the course on working with a machine.
- coming soon
A look ahead: attacks run by a machine
Real-time fakes and identity checks that can rely less and less on a face or a voice: what to prepare for, and what is only promised.