But, hey, at least you can claim your part of AT&T’s $177 million data breach settlement!
Remember that time our Social Security numbers got hacked? Well, technically, it was “lost in a data breach,” but the end result was the same: Last year, National Public Data lost the SSNs of nearly every American citizen. Well, the site is back, and this time it’s a free people search site, and it probably has your information on it. This week, we reported on, among other things, how to remove yourself from its database.
Speaking of your personal information ending up on random people search sites, now is a good time to look into a personal data removal service. And hey, if your data does get lost and you’re worried about identity theft, we have 11 tips to make sure it won’t happen to you.
Let’s back up a second, though. We finished out last week with some great coverage from Black Hat in Las Vegas, including an incredible walkthrough of the Network Operations Center (NOC) that powered the conference, and Jennifer Granick’s part-plea part-warning to security experts to stop enabling mass surveillance by collecting treasure troves of data. If you missed our coverage from the show floor, make sure to read our Black Hat wrap-up.
Breaches don’t stop for security conferences. For example, last week, security researchers discovered a flaw in the venerable WinRAR file compression software that could be used to deliver malware. If you use it (and even if you don’t, you probably have it installed), you should update it now. If you were an AT&T customer when they were breached back in 2019, we have a guide to help you get your part of the $177 million settlement over that hack.
Finally, because we want you to stay safe out there, this week we also published a guide to check your phone for malware, and some things to look out for if you think your phone is being tapped.
