I’m not going to lie; this module really opened my eyes to just how little information I know about cyber security. Thankfully, I have been provided with numerous articles and sources to increase my knowledge over the subject and I have ideas in place on how to change the way I use the internet and my data.

Cyber security is something that has always intrigued me, but not enough to make me feel worried or paranoid about my data and how I use it. A popular series on Netflix, Black Mirror, is a fictional show that is based around the danger of cyber security and shows extreme consequences to our actions on the internet. While I know that it is a made-up show, there are instances that really made me think “wow, what if that really happens sometime in the future?”.  Then comes this module, and all of the reading I have done made me realize that I am naïve to what I already know (or think I know). This has been a wake-up call that I need to better protect myself from the dangers that lay out there.

The first step I plan on taking is learning more about how to secure my network and data. From what I have read so far, I do not want to go into this process blind, I need some sort of background before I make any significant changes. I first started with reading over encryption, as it was stated in lecture how important it is. The reading provided was helpful, especially this article, “Different types of encryption” by the Security Education Companion. Learning about the differences between end-to-end encryption and transport-layer encryption is crucial, especially because this is a form of communication between our private information stored on a device. I will be taking the needed steps to encrypt my PC as well. I will be doing this as I travel with my laptop quite a bit, and on the off chance I leave it or lose it, I want to make sure my information is stored securely and that nobody will be able to get into it. One key here I learned is to protect this information with a long and varied alphanumeric password. So, while I encrypt all of my data, I will also be upgrading my passwords to something stronger.

When doing a random google search of myself I came up empty handed, except for my LinkedIn profile which I am okay with. I did not find any hits for my Facebook account, Twitter, Instagram, or even Pinterest. I am private on all of those sites except for Twitter. I am not sure how much it matters but I do not include my last name on those sites, except Facebook. Maybe it is because of my insecurity but I would rather keep a more laid back “you-only-know-me-if you-know-me” stance on social media until I am ready to branch out. So, for the most part I will keep my social media as is, but I will be using two factor authentication, while also brushing up on each sites privacy policies in the future.

From what I have learned this last week, I plan on taking things slow with my changes, as to now overwhelm myself. There, I will begin to change the way I use the internet, from using private browsers, encrypting my PC, and changing any insecure passwords. I know I have a lot more learning to do, and with the help from the knowledge I have learned over media literacy I can now confidently go out and identify reliable sources for my information.

There’s no better way to start a Monday morning that having your card declined for coffee – A $3 coffee following a payday Friday, might I add. I hadn’t had any problems buying groceries on Saturday or cat food last evening which meant I definitely had money 12 hours ago, so what was going on?

Not thinking too much about it, I went on my way to work and made a mental note to check my bank account when I got there. I thought maybe my card had some kind of fraud block on it, or that one of my transfers didn’t go through the way I thought it had. What I didn’t think was that when I logged into my bank account I would be staring at not even a zero, but a balance of over -$100.

After calling my bank and shedding some pretty embarrassing tears I was finally redirected to the real culprit, which was PayPal. Not my PayPal account, but my boyfriend’s PayPal account – A PayPal account that had both of our banking informations in it, and a PayPal that had cleared out his checking as well, making us double broke. Without my name on the account I had no authorization over what was happening with my money whatsoever, PayPal couldn’t give me any information on where my money had gone or how to get it back.

When we were finally able to get more information, it turned out that our Nintendo account (which was linked to our PayPal account) had been hacked into and used to buy close to one thousand dollars worth of Fortnite currency. Do you know how humiliating it is to get robbed by Fortnite? At least it brought some humor to the unfortunate situation. It took 1 big fight, 10 long days, and 100 angry tears for us to get our money back but eventually it was settled, and yet it still left me feeling really violated.

Before this experience, which took place just a couple weeks ago, internet security was something I thought was only a concern to those who have something to hide. Having all of my money taken from me and then not having the right to figure out why or by whom really woke me up in terms of how I should be protecting what it is I trust the internet with. From this week’s module one of my favorite statements was that the internet is essentially the Wild West, because really it is.

We trust the internet because everyone around us does, and we are often more lax on security than we should be because we see our friends or peers using very basic protection measures online and having no issues. Before this week’s readings I really didn’t fully grasp just how easy it is for anyone to access anything we have done on our computers. From photos and videos to personal work files and search histories, if someone wants to gain access to these things it is simple and a good password isn’t going to protect you.

Reading the article about encryption in particular was incredibly interesting to me, because it made me realize that it is a step that any average person can take to better secure their online data and activity. It also made me realize that by giving so much of our information to online platforms we are essentially creating the opportunity for someone to gain access to everything about ourselves – Our address, phone number, social security number, all of our banking information, what we did yesterday, what we are interested in and so forth.

In the past, I haven’t given my internet security much thought other than privatizing my social media accounts so other users can only view my information if I am friends with them. What I’ve failed to realize, is that if someone wants my information bad enough no long password of “friends only” setting is going to prevent them from getting it, and that is the scary reality. If someone wants to clean out my bank accounts it’s not difficult, because I’ve essentially given them all the information they need to do so.

Moving forward, I plan to try and use the internet as if everyone is watching. While it may sound like a paranoid approach it really isn’t far off from reality. I also plan on continuing my research into the importance of encryption, and following the steps given on how to encrypt your information in the article linked above. I also plan to implement the tips given in this article, and I will start immediately by being extra conscious about the information I share via email since that is something I have not given thought to before.

In addition to these steps, I plan on getting a password manager and minimizing the amount of transactions I do online. While keeping my money and the internet completely separate would be ideal, in today’s reality it is just not a possibility. Having a secure password manager would allow me to have a variety of passwords without having to be worried about remembering them all, or someone having access to them all. Minimizing my online transactions and the sites that I trust with my banking information will also decrease my chances of ever having my money cleaned out again.

While I would definitely say this class gave me a little paranoia when it comes to my online security, I am thankful for it. I believe that everyone needs to be a little more paranoid when it comes to what they are sharing online and what their children are sharing online. One of my biggest take aways from it all, was that people need to be informed about what happens to whatever it is they decide to put into their computer and how it can be used for and against them.

One of my biggest fears leaving this class is that our internet users are getting younger and younger, and children may feel the impacts of things they shared online while underaged in their adult lives. Essentially, the internet really is the wild west – And we need to tread carefully, looking around corners and watching our own backs, because no one else is doing it for us.

I had always been somewhat aware of my information being taken and sold. I have been hacked a few times too, so I knew there were dangers when it comes to anything on the internet.

I’ve never really done anything to protect myself from any of this kind of stuff. I never touched my privacy settings, rarely changed my passwords, things like that. This weeks reading really opened my eyes. I learned a lot in terms of how to protect myself online as well as what it is exactly that I’m protecting myself from.

I definitely agree with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella when he says “we will regret sacrificing privacy for national security.” Everyone wants privacy and security, and we deserve that. We should not have to sacrifice that. Sure, there will be exceptions to that, but overall we should not have to sacrifice privacy just to be safe.

I often joke that I cannot say certain things online or over text, because I do not want to be spied on by the government. However, I’m not actually joking. We should not have to make sure every single word we ever post online is safe to use. I came across this article during our reading, and some of the words on the list are ridiculous.

We are not just sacrificing privacy for national security, we’re sacrificing so much more. We cannot say or do things that we want, or the government is right there behind us.

I know I will definitely be making some changes to the way I use the internet, and how I protect myself. One of the first things I will be doing is changing my password to everything, my particularly my emails.

This list also has some good advice that I will be following. Some of those I already have, like anti-virus software, and having a secure phone pin. However things like using a VPN and a password manager are things I am going to look into using.

I have always been a little wary of using password managers, because isn’t that just giving someone an incredibly easy way of getting all my passwords? But our reading from this week  gave me a better insight to password managers as well as good ones to use.

The New York Times also put out a good list of ways to not leave traces on the internet. They mentioned ProtonMail, which I have seen a few times and it is something I am looking in to. Changing my email just seems like such a hassle, so we’ll see how that one goes.

I will also start to use DuckDuckGo rather than Google, because what I’ve learned the most from this weeks reading is that Google is seriously tracking us, in every way possible.

Overall, I just want to be able to enjoy my time online. I do not want to worry about who is tracking me, or getting my information. All of these tips and changes will help me feel safer and better about using the internet.

Before this module I hadn’t thought much about my security. I personally have never been hacked. I think this is a disadvantage because if you’ve never been hacked you don’t think about getting hacked. I didn’t realize just how easy it is to steal information and what that could mean for me as an individual.

The steps I plan to take to ensure my security are pretty straightforward. I’m going to stop using the same password for everything. I already did this for my online banking but outside of that most of my passwords are the same if not very similar. Strong passwords are unique passwords that aren’t simply ‘password123’. The Google Help Center gives some really good suggestions to make your password stronger. They suggest using a longer password such a quote or song lyric. The do not suggest using personal information like your pets name or your nickname.

I am also going to try encrypting my laptop. I had never thought of doing this before but The Intercept breaks down why if can be helpful. One of the reasons they mention is that it can protect your computer and sensitive data from hackers.  I like this article because it break down how to encrypt your laptop depending on your operating system (OS). Depending on your OS the process is pretty straightforward.

Another thing I’m going to do to beef up my security is reevaluate the browser extensions I have. I need to read through the terms to see if they are spying on me like Amazon does according the Washington Post. I’m really bad about reading the terms of service (TOS) and privacy policies for the apps, extensions, and devices I use. Getting better about this will help me to make better informed decision about my security.

The last thing I plan to do is to stop using public wi-fi without a virtual private network (VPN). I never really saw the danger in using public wi-fi until this module’s readings. VPN’s help you stay safe while browsing on a public network. I had only ever heard of using VPN’s while traveling to foreign countries to gain access to websites that are banned. Life Hacker created a spreadsheet to help you choose the best VPN for you.

These steps may seem minimal or obvious but for me they are huge steps in the right direction. I can say I felt pretty safe when it came to my technology but this module opened my eyes. I realized that just because I haven’t been hacked doesn’t mean I’m necessarily doing something right. Security should be taken as seriously as possible. These steps will help me on that journey.

If I’ve gained anything from this final module, it is that I have not been taking my security seriously when it comes to being online.
I’m the first to “x” out of my software protection update notification and I have been known to use the same variation of password for all my accounts. I suppose it’s the idea of, “Well, it hasn’t happened to me yet, so I’m sure I’m fine!”
Reading through just some of the treats in our learning materials, such as my data being sold by the browser extensions and surveillance capitalism as just a few examples.
I found the article that helped me clean up my act the most in terms of security was the Lifehacker article, “Top 10 Security Basics Everyone Should Follow.”
Some of the more obvious tips were along the lines of, “Never use public Wifi without a VPN” or “Use a passcode on your phone that’s more complex than a 4 digit pin”
I will say, the tip that I didn’t even realize was changing the basic settings on your Wifi router box and changing the router’s administrator login. This is defiantly something I did after reading about it.

Tor is also something that I have looked into after reviewing these module’s learning materials. Usually, I would use Incognito mode as an avenue to keep what I was looking up private but to have an entire browser system that runs like that is defiantly intriguing. However, It is scary that some people’s purposes for having such browsers would be for reasons like child pornography or even worse.

As stated in both the lecture and the Lifehacker article about Tor, if the NSA wants to find you, they will. Or at least be able to tell that you are using an encrypted service like Tor.

In conclusion, my final thoughts for this module, if it could be wrapped up in one word, it would be insecure. (No pun intended.) Before this final module, I was sure that nothing I would read could convince me to reactivate my security membership. Like many things I’ve learned in this course, I feel that I was let in on a dirty little secret about the internet that I wasn’t supposed to. I am happy to share that I have activated my software protection once again, as well as changing the basic setting on the wifi box not only at my apartment complex but at my aunts as well. I feel like my approach to security and safety on the internet has gone from laissez-faire to “Better safe than sorry.”

Media Law: Having our cake and eating it too

I am approaching the final blog assignments of my Digital Media Literacy course, and for the first time, challenged in finding my words. I probably need more time to process this week’s learning materials; to look at the world with this new information before I can really develop my views. And I will, but here are some of my thoughts about media law and what we have learned this week.

Media law, plus those who create and use it, has tough questions to answer. How do we use the access technology gives us to make the world a better or safer place? Who gets to decide if our means justify our ends? Who should be protected? Governments? Populations? Individuals? Women? Men? Computer literate? Computer illiterate? Corporations? And at whose expense? Who gets to balance the scales when these worlds collide? And how far can they go? Where do we draw the line as consumers?

I appreciated when Cory Doctorow said, “We don’t know how to make a back door that only good guys can go through.” There’s definitely a need for backdoors, but backdoors create problems. It’s almost too big to solve, like the whole chicken and egg conundrum.

My husband recalls news that the FBI issued a subpoena to Google for a list of all of the people in a certain area at the time of a murder. They found the murderer because of the information provided by Google, but they violated a lot of innocent people’s privacy to obtain that information.

I searched for this story, but could not confirm it. But this is a perfect example of how things get fuzzy very quickly with media law. Was this right or wrong and how far can the authorities peer into our lives through technology? I also wonder, why it was okay to call on Google to solve this particular crime. Certainly, the FBI can’t run to Google to solve all of their murder cases. So, why this one?

Here’s another example: Amazon handed over Echo data to the FBI in a murder case. The company challenged the subpoena at first but later released it with the defendant’s permission.

This may be an odd but fitting story. My husband and I disagree about donating blood. I think people should donate blood to banks whenever they can, but my husband thinks that blood banks use at least some of the blood irresponsibly – perhaps for research or to feed vampires. Blood donation is ethically wrong in our belief system, but both of us would accept blood from the hospital to save ourselves or our children.

People might get a little uncomfortable with the amount of access agencies have to their lives through media, but they’d probably use it to solve their own problems in a heartbeat.

All that said, I still have to figure out what all this means. For now, this knowledge is not changing how I use technology, but I certainly have a lot to think about.

In our lifetime, we have watched social media, in all forms, go from a casual pass time to essentially what our world revolves around. This means that there has to be rules, laws and regulations covering all aspects of media use.

The thing that interests me the most is our privacy or lack thereof on social media. Before this class, I have always been very open on social media and had not really payed attention to or even cared if what I was posting was private to the public. I always thought “well I’m not posting anything bad so it doesn’t really matter if people see it”. The truth is though, it does matter. Whether it is my family members, future employers, or even random strangers, anyone can see what I am posting about my life.

What surprised me the most is when we were prompted to Google ourselves. This led me to a whole host of photos of myself that I had completely forgotten about. Things that I posted in my teens years are not necessarily things that I want attached to my name for the rest of my life.

This is where privacy comes into play. Since searching for myself on Google, I have adjusted my social media settings to be more private. I previously cared more about the reach that I had to my audience so by keeping my accounts public, more people were able to find my page. I do not have much of a desire for that now as I get older and use my social media less frequently.

Overall, privacy is much more complex than just changing your settings on social media though. The thing that really intrigues me about privacy is the fact that the majority of us don’t even realize how little privacy we actually have. We are constantly being watched, monitored, and accounted for. Every search we make, every place that we go, and every post we put on the internet is out in the open whether our settings are changed or not.

This is something that I have recently becoming more aware of due to this course. Watching the Ted Talks that discuss this issue are what really opened my eyes. I had no idea that every place that I travel or connect Wi-Fi to is constantly being logged. I personally do not think this is a huge issue for me because like I said, I have no reason to worry about being tracked or looked into on the internet. At the end of the day though, it is an invasion of privacy.

With this new information that I have been accumulating, I have begun changing as much as I can to protect my privacy. Often times, apps will ask to use your current location which is fine in certain instances where it may be needed, but when I do allow it I make sure to choose the “only allow once” option. This prevents the app from using my location when I am not using the app.

One of the most fascinating and at the same time scary aspects of the internet is that anyone can add an contribute content to it. Well, the same lies true for the ever so popular online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Not to be alarmed, Wikipedia has set in place the proper measures to ensure that the contributed content meets the standards of the site.

Wikipedia has online training in place to give contributors and editors the tools the need to ensure accurate insightful content is added to their site.  Through a course of tutorials you can stand confident in your approach to editing and creating. As Wikipedia states, the main thing is to just dive in and “be bold.”

In searching for an article to edit and contribute to, I wanted to stay true to my semester long blogging topic of sports betting. Wikipedia indeed had a page for sports betting that, in my opinion, could have used some contributions. Having my article selected, it was time to begin the editing process.

I started my contribution process by highlighting the edits that I wished to make into the articles “talk page”.

This was my first declaration to the talk page that I intended to reference the existing mention of political election betting with a reference to an article from OddsShark as the previous statement was not referenced. Under the “Sports Betting” section the section ends with discussing previous betting scandals referencing proven cheating ex NBA official Tim Donaghy. I added that proponents of legalization argue that with legalization the chances of future betting scandals are actually minimized due to the fact that regulated sports books and a thriving free market are the biggest watchdogs of foul play, citing an article from USA Today.

Next, under the “Type of Bets” section of the article I proposed to add Team Totals to the existing Totals (Over/Under) section. I also requested to add Player Propositions as a wager type under the existing Proposition Bets section. Under the existing In Play Betting heading, I proposed to add the synonym Live Betting. All of these “type of bets” were referenced with respective articles from OddsShark that describe the bet option.

I waited a full day to hear back from any other Wiki editors with no luck. In hindsight I wish I would have heeded the modules instructions to start the talk group process early to allow ample time for responses. Never the less, twenty four hours later no fellow editors had chimed in and I began my edits.

Getting into the edits, it really was a simple process as Wikipedia said it would be. The platform they have set up is extremely user friendly and the interface provides direction and suggestions for best practices such as including a recap of your edits for other contributors to asses. The best approach to becoming a successful editor is to start with the provided training. Also, editors should take advantage of the talk pages and reach out to other more experienced wiki editors as the platform does a great job of facilitating peer editing.

Once my edits were published, I had a sense of pride for contributing to this article. Sure it’s sports betting, just how important is this wiki article. Well, to me it is, and contributing to it was rewarding. The legalization of sports betting has only recently been available to every state as of May 2018. Since this is such a new market, I believe that early contributions to this article are a great base or framework as I can only see this article evolving more and more alongside the evolving sports betting market.

Overall, this was a very satisfying project. Initially watching the wiki tutorials, it seemed kind of corny when they were indicating that when you contribute you are helping to shape the site and even the world. Presently I can definitely relate with this sentiment. After finishing my edits, I concluded that I will most likely continue to contribute to Wikipedia. The essential skills and core concepts of contributing to wiki does not only add to the platform but actually helps us as students in our pursuit to become more and more digitally literate.

Francisco Healy

I remember the first high school I attended had changed the required reading during my sophomore year. So instead of reading the regular classical novels or plays, we got to read books like World War Z. This was the coolest thing in the world for a 15-year-old. I didn’t have to read another Shakespearean play, I got to read a book about the zombie apocalypse. Then we started reading a book called Little Brother by Cory Doctorow. We ended up not being able to finish it because a parent complained about a sex scene in the book, but before that, I devoured it. Little Brother is the story of Marcus, who gets caught in the wrong place at the worst time. In the middle of a terrorist attack, Marcus is taken away by the Department of Homeland Security and ordered to unlock his phone. He refuses and is tortured before being eventually released. He then decides that he’s going to use his knowledge of technology and the internet to hit back at the people who wrongfully imprisoned and tortured him.

When I first read the book I was blown away by the idea that the government would go to such lengths to unlock a cell phone. When I was reading the learning materials for this week, I was reminded that the government will do quite a bit to unlock a cell phone. I am consistently reminded that the government and many private entities want as much information about me as they can. This, by itself, is very concerning. I don’t want the government to be able to unlock my phone with an electronic skeleton key. Even if I didn’t do anything wrong. It’s like not wanting someone to go into your bedroom without your knowledge. Even if nothing was touched, it’s still an invasion of your privacy that can make you shudder.

Privacy is incredibly important and hard to keep track of when websites are pulling all kinds of data from your browser’s cookies. Some of the information that we store online is supposed to be private. However, time and time again we see that the information we thought was stored away in a secret vault, far from private eyes, can easily become public. Even googling your own name will bring up a lot more information than what most are willing to let on.

I was able to find my own address and every other address I ever remember living on with that quick Google search. And there’s no way to remove this information here in the United States. If I had a stalker, they could easily find out where I live, where my family members are, and other ways to contact me within minutes.

As there isn’t any way to remove this data from online I will continuously be monitoring what information I share with websites, how those sites use that information, and how to take that information back. I don’t want to be some kind of recluse who doesn’t have any information about themselves available online. But I also don’t want just anyone to be able to find out where I live with a few taps of their keyboard.

This weeks learning materials was eye opening to say the least. I guess the fact that I have heard about such topics as copyright, defamation, net neutrality, censorship etc. but didn’t think too much of it until this module goes to show how much I choose to actually research and learn more about vs. other topics in my day to day life.

A particular statement mentioned in our Mediactive textbook, “As the Electronic Frontier Foundation says, “New technologies are radically advancing our freedoms, but they are also enabling unparalleled invasions of privacy.”  This exact phrase describes perfectly what is affecting our privacy in media now and only will continue to do so, technology. The more advanced and broad technology gets within our digital media world, the more the law can possibly have control, but also means all of us need to stay informed frequently.

An important fact that I learned of myself and how I view law and the media in this module, was through our module conversation, we had a topic question of choice that mentioned have we read privacy policies and terms from our social media and other technology. I answered no, because its true, typically there is too much to read, big words that are not understandable and I would always think that those rules and regulations perhaps were created for those that don’t like to follow “the rules”. Now, I actually want to go and try to read what I am actually agreeing to on the net and in a day to day basis of the technology I invest my time in.

As learned in this module, we often think that the word private means secret, but in reality it only means that something isn’t actually public as the Medium article mentioned. Its important that I get to choose what privacy essentials are important to me as an individual, and well, we are all different. The government seems to think that we are all the same in the sense of what should or shouldn’t be private to a whole population. However, as Medium also mentions, we should be able to choose so that we can fight for the type of privacy’s we want and need.

Fact of the matter, currently I feel there is minimal to no privacy for citizens in the media world, and it only seems to be taking a turn for the worse if action isn’t taken in a different direction. What is most complicated is if all this is truly driven by the government, how can we the citizens get to that level and fight for what we believe should be? I think that’s where people, including myself, get stuck and have no clue how to attempt to make changes where necessary. Although, we can start by learning in depth all our terms of use and privacy in media, along with truly learning media literacy, and perhaps those are steps to take in the media privacy challenge we are currently trying to diminish drastically.

Through this weeks learning tools, I also was surprised to find out that duckduckgo was even an actual thing. My first time using it was during this weeks module just to test it out, and I actually like what it is and how it works. I feel that the majority of invasion of our media and day to day privacy is due to web servers we use. If those servers remember majority of what we type, search, say, upload, delete, etc. then there is truly no privacy from the start. In the duckduckgo scenario, you at least can have peace of mind of no ads, no tracking or targeting of any sort. Sounds like a starting  solution to a real privacy problem that has barely just begun.