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Its a tough question to answer, with so many "if's" and "maybes". There have already been some good suggestions here which I won't repeat. But one I would sugg
by traceroute66 5y ago
Its a tough question to answer, with so many "if's" and "maybes". There have already been some good suggestions here which I won't repeat.
But one I would suggest is minimising the number of places with your "real" information, i.e. if "real" information is not required by law (e.g. financial services, health services, insurance, billing etc.), then train yourselves to use pseudo information.
For example, if a website asks for your date of birth. Ask yourself, is it required by law or is it just for user profiling. If the latter, then just invent a date of birth (and if the date of birth may be required for password recovery, make a note of it in your password manager).
The same goes for your "real" name. Do you need to give them your real name as shown on your government ID ? Or can you give an abbreviation or even pseudonym ?
The same goes for answers to "security questions", just invent stuff, don't give the "true" answer.
You can take all the technical countermeasures you like, but sometimes it's easier to KISS ... if a service doesn't need your details, don't give it to them in the first place.
- isbvhodnvemrwvn 5y agoAnd have separate e-mails. I have three tiers of them - one is for official matters, the other for semi-official, the third for the rest. I almost always use garbled usernames as well.
- traceroute66 5y ago> And have separate e-mails Absolutely ! But that aspect is not just a security thing, its an anti-spam thing. Infact I'd almost consider the security aspect a bonus, the ability to kill off email addresses if you start getting spammed is the primary benefit (for me at least!).
- MerelyMortal 5y ago> The same goes for answers to "security questions", just invent stuff, don't give the "true" answer. Invent plausible stuff. Do not use random characters or nonsensical words, because then you make it easier for a social engineer to bypass that when talking with customer service. For example, "What was your first pet's name?" Make up something like "Mister Bubbles", something childish that could actually be a pet's name.
- jonplackett 5y agoThis is a very important point. Many customer service agents will let people in if they just say “I dunno I just kinda mashed the keypad” or “oh it was just some random letters”. Once you beef up your security, social engineering is the weak link that always remains.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- DamnYuppie 5y agoI have an easy to remember scheme I use for those annoying security questions that alleviates the need to write them down. I came up with this idea because everytime I am asked for these stupid questions I get very annoyed and my default reflex was to internally curse profusely. So I thought I would leverage this reaction. My scheme is this, for any security question there is usually a primary noun you can key off of. So I just construct the following string: "fyour" + PRIMARY_NOUN. The "f" is spelled out to be the more profane form of fornicate but thought I would keep it clean for HN. This allows me to always have an easy to remember answer to all security questions where I can satisfactorily express my complete disdain for them. I have had to say these out loud many times to CSR's and it usually gets a chuckle.
- Viliam1234 5y ago> For example, if a website asks for your date of birth. Ask yourself, is it required by law or is it just for user profiling. If the latter, then just invent a date of birth I opened YouTube, clicked on a video that requires age verification... Google told me to provide a credit card or a government ID. F*** Google.
- mkbkn 5y agoF*k Google indeed. These days I use FreeTube: https://freetubeapp.io/ https://freetubeapp.io/