February News from Information Security
Welcome to February, the month of Valentine’s Day, Black History Month, World Cancer Day, Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, World Day of Social Justice, and many other international, regional, and country-specific days of remembrance and celebration.
This year it is also the time when a new Virtual Scavenger Hunt is launching, sponsored by Information Security and the Office of Information Technology. If you participated in and enjoyed the Virtual Scavenger Hunt back in October for Cybersecurity Awareness Month, you will love this one. No need to wait a week for the next set of questions-this scavenger hunt can be completed in an afternoon or evening (or morning, if you prefer).
The Scavenger Hunt will kick off on Monday, February 15th, the day after Valentine’s Day, so it is appropriately named the “Post V-Day Virtual Scavenger Hunt”. The hunt will conclude at noon on Friday, February 19th with a drawing that will determine who will win the four available prizes.
Two winners will be drawn from a pool of names made up of anyone who attempts the scavenger hunt. To qualify for that drawing, you only have to attempt the hunt and submit answers to at least the first day of questions, even if those answers are wrong. For the sake of clarity, I am calling these prizes “runner-up” prizes. They will consist of a collection of college, OIT, and Information Security branded items along with a generous amount of Valentine’s Day candy.
Two prizes I am calling “grand prizes” will be awarded to two lucky people whose names are drawn from a pool of names of those who successfully complete the scavenger hunt. To qualify, you must complete the hunt by finding all the correct answers to the questions, then complete the form at the end of the hunt. The grand prizes will consist of a package including a super cool and vaguely Berry blue Rocketbook Smart Reusable Notebook (8.5″ x 11″) with a Frixion pen and microfiber cloth, seven additional Frixion pens in various colors, and a Rocketbook Pen Station pen holder. This notebook is reusable, eco-friendly and can scan your notes directly to a cloud storage provider like Google Drive, Dropbox, Evernote, OneNote, iCloud and others with the help of an app on your Android or Apple phone. There are lots of available accessories for these notebooks including folio covers, additional pens, and even “Beacons” which will allow you to scan information on a whiteboard using the same app. Good luck! I will send a reminder about the scavenger hunt on the 15th.
I want to revisit a topic introduced in the January newsletter, which you can read at this link. Our new training platform is ready for use, with several short security awareness courses focusing on single topics like email phishing, other social engineering tactics, data security, passwords, and safe browsing. There is also a longer general security awareness course that incorporates all of these topics, spending substantially less time on each one.
If you would like to have access to this training, just go to the InfoSec News and Alerts site, click on “Latest Posts” in the main menu, then click on the link to the form, which is on the right-hand side of the page. You can also simply click this link to access the form.
If you are depending on Zoom to attend or conduct classes or for work, be sure to check out the Zoom resources provided here for tips and information on how to effectively and safely use Zoom.
If you don’t already have it, multi-factor authentication (MFA) is coming your way. This adds an additional layer of protection to your Berry account and lets you keep the same password for a whole year! Setup takes only a few minutes. You can request MFA be enabled on your account or wait until you are automatically enrolled in the next few weeks. Make your request by emailing computing@berry.edu to tell them you want MFA!
If I’m not covering a topic of information security you are interested in or concerned about, please let me know. I want to be your first and best resource on information security, so let me know how I can help and inform you.
If you’re not following Berry OIT on Facebook (@BerryCollegeOIT), Twitter (@berryoit), or Instagram (@berrycollegeoit), you should be, as more information from OIT and specifically Information Security, will be provided using these outlets. If you are not into social media, you can also subscribe to get updates via email.
You can always check back here for warnings about current phishing emails, confirmations of valid emails you might have a question about, and data breach notifications. There’s also the Q&A section, where you can ask a question and get an answer directly from me, and the events calendar where events will be posted.
Food for Thought
Permanent link to this comic: https://xkcd.com/1016/
Featured Image: Photo by Jason D on Unsplash
