Discussion Post: Let's Talk About 'Egosurfing'
In our lessons this week (and in previous weeks), we learned that a simple Google search can lead to many snippets of information about a person. These small amounts of information can paint a large (and sometimes eerily accurate) picture for an attacker in a very little amount of time and with very little effort. As a general precaution, it is often wise to "Google Yourself" for the purposes of seeing the types of information that show up when the general public searches your name.
Fun Fact: "Googling Yourself" is a common name or the practice of searching for one's name or pseudonym in a popular search engine in order to view the results. For today's discussion, we're going to do some egosurfing and discuss the results.
To get started: Go to Google and perform a Google search on your name
Then, answer the following questions:
i. What information were you able to find?
ii. Were you surprised by the amount of information that was available about you through the search?
iii. What types of things can you do to reduce your footprint on the Internet?
iv. In your opinion, what can we do to prevent attacks on our personal data or devices?
v. We also returned to the topic of phishing and how it can aid in an attack. What do you personally do to verify whether an e-mail is true and correct and is not a phishing scam?