Welcome to DR's note, your weekly dose of knowledge from Circuit Stitch Blog.

This weeks DR note is how to tell you've been hacked.

With cyber crime on the rise I am here to show you how you can tell if someone could have access to  your computer or device.  Let us start off by going to a website https://haveibeenpwned.com , with this site you can put in your email address and see if it was found in any data breach's.  If so then you want to change the passwords to these accounts, and if you use the same password for other account you should change them too.  Like I've said before you want to get yourself a password manager.    Also on that website is a list of other sites that have had data breaches, so you can check to see if one of the sites you visit often is on there.   You can even set up a Google alert for data breach, that way when they happen you can be on top of it. 

Those are a couple of ways to tell if you've been hacked, but what do you do if you have been hacked.  First off notify family, friends, and any one that follows you on social media platforms.  By doing this it helps to keep others from getting hacked as well, with them thinking that they are interacting with you.  Secondly if they demand a ransom for your information on your computer, DO NOT PAY IT.  By paying it you are funding them whether you think  you are or not.  Contact the police and possible 3rd party to get you info back.  Lastly if you suspect someone has log into an account of yours, make sure you change the password immediately.   You should also have 2FA (Two-Factor Authentication) enabled.

I hope this helps you to understand if you've been hacked and to take precautions to keep from getting hacked.  As always feel free to email or message me if you have any questions or concerns.

Welcome to DR's note, your weekly dose of knowledge from Circuit Stitch.

 In this weeks note we will talk about social media privacy.

In this day and age we like to share all sorts of things to our social media.  Anything from special occasions and holidays to the mundane like what your eating for breakfast or look at me walk down a road.  But our we over sharing?  Could what we put on our social media be used against us?  Yes it can!!!  Hackers can use this information to pose as trusted sources and trick you into giving them information.  Let me tell you they are very good at it, if you don't believe me check out some videos on youtube by scammer payback and just listen to the scammers script.  It shows you how good they are at what they do, then finish the video and watch as this guy just destroys the scammers.  Very good watch.  But back to the point at hand, I will explain how to make your facebook and instagram more private. 

First with facebook go to facebook.com, if you are logged in at the top right hand corner of the page you will see a triangle pointed down.  Click on that, then click settings & privacy(on mobile it is in the menu button at the bottom).  Click privacy check up (mobile click settings then privacy check up).  Click on the first box who can see what you share.  Go through the prompts making it so that either only your friends can see or only you.  That is it for facebook unless you want to add more security which we will talk about at a later date. 

Now onto instagram, go to instagram.com if you are logged in click on your profile picture in the upper right hand corner(on mobile click the profile picture in lower left).  Click on privacy and security(on mobile click privacy).  Check the box that says private account if not checked.  That is it then for instagram.

Now you have some of your social accounts a little more private and secure.  If you have any questions feel free to leave a comment below.  Thank you and have a great day.

Starting off!!!

 Welcome to Circuit Stitch!!!!

I plan on using this blog to showcase device repairs, cybersecurity, CTF write-ups, and anything tech related.  I just want to share my love for repairing tech devices, troubleshooting computer and mobile devices, and even share small articles I write weekly for my work.  The articles pretain to tech advice and cyber security.  Thank you for stopping by and please come back soon.