CAPE CORAL, Fla. — Now, more so than ever, more folks are working from home.
Whether that’s due to the Covid-19 pandemic or simply having the choice to work remotely. But did you know the simple act of working from home can put your personal information at risk?
“The whole advent of remote work has raised a wide variety of issues.”
Working from home may sound innocent enough, but bringing home the bacon can be a little more worrisome now than ever before.
"If you’re in fact using a device that is also being used at the office, it’s likely that you’re being tracked- likely," says Tom Kelly, CEO of IDX. 'Not only likely but you should presume that.”
Kelly is with IDX- a group specializing in identity protection services. He says his company has helped with close to one thousand security breaches this year already. But the concept of being tracked or blocked from certain sites while on company time isn’t entirely new.
"That’s the privacy world that your listeners are living in, is that anything we do on our digital footprint is now being monitored," he says. "In some cases in an abusive way to support a business model. Quite frankly, much of the digital commerce world- whether it’s Google, Facebook, you name it. The other side is monitoring you- if they’re doing it for the right reason- to limit exposure to the enterprise.”
In fact social media poses the biggest threat, as Kelly says, thru phishing, cyber threats and general access into your system.
"That’s because you’re in an environment you think that’s safe," says Kelly. "You know, I know these people, I’m connected. Some of them are safe and some of the people you think you’re connected to may well in fact be somebody else.”
Thankfully, there are certain barriers or steps you can take to avoid issues altogether.
“The use of VPNs, the use of good hygiene- password security- of multi factor authentication, being really cautious about what you do on social media, who you share things with," said Kelly. "How you do all that- these things- none of that goes away. That is still of paramount importance.”
All in all— Kelly says try to separate your personal devices from your work devices. If you can’t, that might also affect the way you spend your time while at work.
“If that gives you cause for thinking about whether or not I want to be spending as much time on social media, that’s a good outcome. That’s a good outcome because maybe stepping that stuff back isn’t a bad thing for anybody at this point in time.”
