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A lot of social media users love to publicize their life that it already feels like a norm to do that.
Source: Designs.Ai
By Nurul Arfah
Do we talk enough about cyber safety? The majority of Malaysians are still clueless when it comes to educating themselves when talking about their cybersecurity, especially in securing their data.
They are not aware of the danger in exposing their identities and personal data on the digital platform might cause more harm than good for themselves.
The Internet has existed for more than a decade. It evolves as technology advances and the number of users keeps growing through the years. Since then, many cyber crimes have been recorded especially during times when the existence of social media such as Facebook and Twitter arrived on cyberspace.
The invention of online banking and online transactions also contributes to the statistic of cybercrime.
According to The Star, Cybersecurity Malaysia has reported that cybersecurity cases have shown an increasing amount of 82.5% last year and the types of cases mostly derived from cyber harassment, fraud, and intrusion.
The reason these cases soared is because many people have to live at home due to implementation of Movement Control Order (MCO) that helps to flatten the curve of the spread of COVID-19. Hence, they moved to online platforms for their work, school, and studies since the pandemic started.
Thus, it is crucial to be well educated on how to be safe in cyberspace especially when you are constantly online.
The definition of cyber safety on the surface means having a safe environment online but there’s a deeper layer to look at.
Kaspersky, a well-developed cybersecurity company described cybersecurity as an act in protecting servers, data, networks, and electronic devices whether mobile phones or computers from cyber-attacks such as fraud, phishing, and malware.
To summarize the definitions above, as a cyber user, you need to ensure that your digital devices that connect to the internet must be well protected from cyber harm.
Many people on the internet love to share their photos and personal life on their social media platforms without knowing the impact it has on them.
Teenagers, young adults, adults, and even elders use social media nowadays to check what is happening currently and post about what they have gone through on daily basis.
People love to show their genuine and happy moments to their friends and followers online because the reaction that they get from the post is like a boost to their self-esteem.
Some even considered their social media account as their diary to post and wrote everything what they felt to the public without knowing the importance of data privacy.
Dayana Kemesky, technologist content creator.
Source: Dayana Kemesky
Your data is valuable
Data privacy is included in cybersecurity which means anything that you post online will possibly being recorded by a third party and it is also a part of the elements that you need to know to be cyber safe.
‘Data is the new oil’ a phrase made by a UK Mathematician and architect of Tesco's Clubcard, Clive Humbly, represents that data is worthy and valuable if being used intelligently.
A technologist content creator, Umi Dayana or known as Dayana Kemesky has explained how it is important for people to protect their data because there are always some organizations observing what you do on social media.
“There is the term called data economy where it is being collected, shared and used by the biggest company such as Google, Facebook, and Amazon.
“They use our data to build their empire,” she said.
As a responsible social media user, you have the right to protect your data privacy on social media, advised to not reveal too much about your personal information to the public.
Getting people’s personal information is easier today thanks to the internet, because just simply key in your real name on the search engine, someone could find personal information such as your age and where do you live.
Dayana, who is working in the cybersecurity field said that it is true if you put your full name on social media, people working related to cyber can easily track and find your full identification.
Cyber threats experience
A local musician from the band The Venopian Solitude, Takahara Suiko, who preferred to be called Taka, chose to hide her real name from the public.
She got a lot of experience in dealing with cyber threats and that is one of the reasons why she uses a pseudonym.
Taka knows that online space is not a safe place to be comfortable, revealing too much personal information.
She experienced her first cyber threat at the early age of 12 when she was sexually harassed on the internet.
“When I was about 12 years old, there was this chatroom called mIRC and I was sexually harassed on mRIC, I think I revealed to them that I was 12 years old and then that person harassed me sexually online,” she said.
That was when Taka realized that revealing her real name and age on the internet can be dangerous to her safety.
Takahara Suiko, musician.
Source: Takahara Suiko
There are certain things that you need to consider protecting before telling the people on the internet about yourself because you do not know who is the bad guy that could cause harm to you.
People especially youngsters are too comfortable sharing their information on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter because the millennials have been exposed to social media at an early age compared to the older generation.
They cannot see the danger in oversharing because they got a lot of mutual and friends that they can relate with on social media. Some even prefer to show themselves more on the internet than in real life.
Some social media users are not afraid of talking about their daily life without realizing the risk that they put themselves into.
Protecting your data is not only by not oversharing your personal information, but you also need to be aware of what technology abilities can do to you.
Somebody that has knowledge in the cyber field can hack your phone or electronic devices upon connection to the public Wi-Fi.
According to Dayana, public figure like Taka with a huge number of following on social media is vulnerable to cyberattack because she might have fans or stalkers that want to know more about her personal life.
One of the easy ways for them to get into her personal life is through the internet such as public Wi-Fi.
“Let’s say Taka wants to connect to a public Wi-Fi at Pizza Hut, and then the fan who is also good in technology is trying to stalk her, he or she can hack Taka using that public Wi-Fi,” she said.
Public Wi-Fi is not a safe wireless network to use if you are dealing with confidential and personal business, for instance, doing your online money transaction.
It is advisable to use your own internet data when you are dealing with money or important business that holds value to you when you are in public places because it can at least protect your device from cyber intruders that want to steal your data.
Taka also shared her worries about revealing her name to the public knowing that someone possibly uses that information to dig her past and use it against her.
She explain that she will not reveal her name in the near future or ever because she already built her reputation through her pseudonym and not revealing her birth name will protect her more from cyber-attacks.
On the other hand, Dayana who is also active on TikTok sharing about tech and cyber knowledge told her online experience where she received some threats from TikTok users.
Some of the users managed to find her personal information through the voting center where this person looks into her identity information.
And just like that, the user is able to know Dayana’s full name and address. With the information, the user has threatened her which affects her safety.
Nevertheless, Dayana acknowledges that she is quite well known on TikTok and she should be aware of the possible danger that she will face on the internet.
As we are constantly surfing the Internet, we should educate ourselves about cybersecurity and how to protect our data online in order to avoid the harm that could possibly cause our future being robbed.
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