In an age where the internet and social media is being used by millions across the world as an everyday tool, it's imperative that our students and staff take the necessary steps to keep themselves safe online.

We are introducing an E-Safety Sunday segment to our social media channels and website, which will be published every fortnight, to help raise awareness around some of the dangers of using social media, and technology in general, to allow you to continue scrolling and browsing safely and securely.

Strong passwords

The National College suggest users should create unpredictable passwords for any online account that you create. On many occassions, we naturally create passwords that are easy to remember, whether it be your pet's name, family name or favourite sports team. Cyber criminals routinely try a range of different combinations of passwords relating to these topics, and if any of the information on your profile is public e.g. images of your pets or regular posts relating to a certain sports team, then it can help cyber criminals narrow down possible passwords you may have set.

The National College also note that 'longer is stronger' when creating a password. They explain that our passwords are often stored by online services in an encrypted format, in case the service suffers a data breach. The strength of this encryption is dependent on the length of password you've set, so if your password is short, cyber criminals are more likely to be able to break the encryption and identify your password. Mixing up your password with letters and numbers can be useful, as well as including punctuation to make your passwords harder to guess.

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Data Stealing & Phishing

The National College explain that Phishing is a form of cyber-attack where people are targeted in the form of fake emails, phone calls or text messages.

The attackers will try to take advantage by pretending to be someone else in an attempt to access sensitive information, such as bank details (including debit and credit card information), passwords to access emails, social media accounts or online bank accounts.

Phishing usually takes place via email, where the attacker manipulates a message to make it appear to be from someone else, therefore deceiving the victim into doing as they say.

The National Cyber Security Centre say that Phishing emails are getting harder to spot, and some will still get past even the most observant users.

One way to spot a phishing attempt is that they will often contain poor spelling, grammar and punctuation, and many will attempt to include logos and graphics to make the email look legitimate. If you receive one of these, take a look to see if the quality is what you'd expect. If not, it's likely to have not been sent by an official source.

The NCSC also say that if an email or message sounds too good to be true, it probably is, so don't take the risk.

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Avoid Risky & Unknown Links

According to McAfee, a risky link is any hyperlink that redirects you to an unexpected webpage. These webpages can trick you into giving away personal information or it can download malicious viruses, malware or spyware onto your device. Risky links can pop up anywhere: on social media, in comment sections, or on uncommon websites. 

Avoiding these links requires you to be alert and think before you click on anything. Scammers and phishers disguise their malicious links to look legitimate, making them difficult to spot. Artificial intelligence tools are making phishing correspondences more believable and if you click too fast, you could fall for scams that you’d normally notice if you weren't rushing.

Before clicking on any link, preview it to make sure that it’s redirecting you where you expect it to. To preview a link on mobile, carefully tap and hold the link. Check for typos or for very long and complicated strings of letters and numbers. It's also useful to check the email address of the sender, as this can often be a random set of letters and numbers rather than a legitimate company name.

For more information on Risky & Unknown Links, click here >>>