Here is my last story on security and the new threats we are facing. On the surface, this hardly seems like the typical security issue, yet, it is indicative of the kinds of dangers technology has brought. A couple in Oregon temporarily pulled off a clever robbery when they ran an ad on Craigslist that announced that a home owner wanted to get rid of the items at a specific address.When people read that there was free stuff available, they began to stream to this house and go in and take whatever they needed.Our clever thieves slipped in early in the procession and made off with a few horse saddles (their intended target all along.)If this seems strange, note that a number of people have run ads like this when they were trying to clean out rental properties that had been abandoned so it was not unheard of to clean out a house in this way.
When the true owner showed up at his property, he was shocked of course to see most of his stuff gone and people continuing to stop buy wanting to get their “free” goods. At first the police thought is was some random prank, but after investigating further, they were able to trace the couple that placed the ad and tie them to the saddles. Score one for the deputies I say!! So what does this have to do with security? Good question…
Another aspect of security is managing our personal information on the Web. Evidently, this is going to not only include being careful with the personal data you provide, bit also will now include monitoring you personal information so you can see if someone has posted something of yours in a public way. My MacGyver solution to this would be to use GoogleAlerts to check on any important personal information (address, phone number, etc) constantly so that if my data turns up on the Web, I get an alert.The endgame is certainly going to be specific services that you can subscribe to that will manage and secure our information on the Web.Kind of like cyber-bodyguards.
Although this story is kind of cute and funny to most of us (excluding the victim) it portends a slew of tricks that could be played on competitors, and enemies. The Web is fertile ground because of hackers with the ability to remain anonymous, combined with the power and reach of the Internet in general. It is no longer necessary to hack into a system in order to cause mayhem, now one can simply crowdsource lemmings on the Web into doing bidding that either passes on misinformation, or creates a line of lemmings trotting through your house taking pictures of grandma so they can have the frame.
Scott