Strengthen Your Online Security With COACH
Do you have any idea if you are “safe” online? Online security and privacy are complex, and the risks differ from person to person: you may be worried about being stalked, hacked, or your boss finding your horrible old blog posts and using them as an excuse to fire you. Crash Override’s Automated Cybersecurity Assistant helps you secure your accounts according to your needs and guides you step by step so you don’t get overwhelmed.
First, tell COACH what you need to do: avoid hacking your accounts or website, hide your personal information, keep your computer and phone safe from hackers, or clear old accounts. Then follow the instructions, which are detailed enough to be a little tedious. But it’s better to be bored than worried.
For example, to avoid hacking your online accounts, COACH can help you set up two-factor authentication for popular accounts such as Google, Apple and Dropbox. It will also help you install a password manager so you can set passwords that are harder to crack and safely forget all of them.
Let’s say you want to hide your contact information and address. If they are already on the Internet, it is difficult, but COACH tries. First, you are asked if you own any domains or websites (site WHOIS information may reveal your address and contact information). COACH then explains how to make them more confidential. COACH will then help you remove your name, family information and home address from Spokeo’s people search database . It then reveals that there are at least 272 similar data brokers on the network and helps you opt out of the most popular ones.
COACH is the Crash Override service, “a crisis telephone line, advocacy group and resource center for people facing online violence.” You can check out other Crash Override resources , such as a guide to talking to family and the police when you face online breaches, links to services for anonymous web browsing, device security protection, and more.
COACH itself often cites other resources such as Just Delete Me , which helps you delete old online accounts, and the Two Factor Auth List , which gives instructions on how to enable two-factor authentication on hundreds of sites and services. (Many resources selected by COACH are Lifehacker favorites.) As we said, this is tricky. So just try one step, and if it helps, try another one.