What to do if you’re a victim of a data breach

If you haven’t been a victim of a data breach, chances are you might be one day! The steps you take depends on how serious the data breach is, in the worst case scenario you need to set up fraud alerts on your credit report or even close your credit and bank card accounts. Let’s see what steps you can take if you are ever a data breach victim.

How does a data breach happen? – First hackers gain access to a computer that contains personal information about people, or they steal a disk or device that contains records. These personal records may be stored by a business or organization like a hospital or even your bank, by hacking these records they can view anything from simple contact details (cellphone number, email address) to highly confidential information like your credit card and bank account numbers.

Hacking is not a rare event, it happens all the time, but luckily these cyber burglars don’t always find what they’re looking for and if they do they barely ever use your personal information for identity theft, but just think about it if all your private records are online they are still vulnerable to a data breach.

What to do if you’re a data breach victim? – First of all it’s important to know that most businesses that have had a data breach will send out a warning to all of the victims, but some still don’t, so you need to be aware. Here are some steps to take if you are a victim: 

1. Firstly check if the notification you received is genuine, if you have your doubts contact the    organization and make sure it’s real.
2. Find out what information has been breached so you can decide what to do next, in most cases if  the organization has your personal information including your bank and credit card numbers you  need to assume the worst.
3. Establish what help the organization plans to give you, they don’t actually have to do anything to  help you, but these days some may offer to pay for services that can monitor your credit card and see  if anyone is using it.
4. Take the following steps:      *Change, delete, replace your email address
                                                   *Change passwords
                                                   *Don’t give out information about yourself
                                                   *Ask the bank to notify you about any strange activity in your name
                                                   *Put a fraud alert on your credit records
                                                   *If you’re really worried ask the bank to cancel your accounts

The golden rule: assume your personal information will one day be stolen in a data breach, because it probably will, you always have to be vigilant and be careful how you spread your details around.

If you feel like you are in need of some IT or software support or perhaps repairs and maintenance, contact us at The Computer Guyz in Cape Town or Centurion.

Written By: Christine Romans
CopyWriter at The Computer Guyz