Engin Kirda

Look Out for These 3 Red Flags Before Downloading an App Over the Holidays

What a policy agreement says about data collection is another important factor to consider before hitting download, according to Engin Kirda, a professor at Northeastern University’s Khoury College of Computer Sciences. Going hand in hand with this is how the app makes money, Kirda said — particularly if it’s free to download.

Is that Android or iPhone app safe to download? 3 red flags to look out for

3 red flags you should look for before downloading an app

What a policy agreement says about data collection is another important factor to consider before hitting download, according to Engin Kirda, a professor at Khoury College of Computer Sciences at Northeastern University.

This social network wants you to interact IRL, but may spark a new privacy concern

“I’m concerned about the fact that facial recognition is being used, and I’m concerned that you can point the camera at a person and their name could pop up,” said Engin Kirda, executive director of Northeastern University’s cybersecurity and privacy institute.

Please Don’t Use Airport USB Ports To Charge Your Phone (But Don’t Panic Either)

But Engin Kirda, professor of computer science at Northeastern University, says it’s easy to take precautions — and unless you’re a diplomat or a CEO in a foreign country, you probably don’t need to stress out.

Under Armour says 150 million MyFitnessPal accounts hacked

“Email addresses are valuable for spammers because the attackers would know that active, real users are behind these addresses,” said Engin Kirda, a professor at Northeastern University in Boston. “The dark web is usually where data like this is sold to the highest bidder.”

Buzzfeed

150 million users of the MyFitnessPal app had their data stolen by a third party

Hashed passwords, however, are still valuable information for hackers, according to Northeastern University Northeastern Professor Engin Kirda. “Having the hashes means that attackers can launch offline brute-force guessing attacks against these passwords and potentially crack many of them as users are often notoriously bad in choosing good passwords,” Kirda said in a statement to BuzzFeed […]

Popular tax software may expose users to phishing attacks

Try not to click on any links within an email, said Engin Kirda, professor at the College of Computer and Information Science at Northeastern University. “If you can avoid this, you will be much safer against attacks,” Kirda said.

A typical small business website is attacked 44 times a day

“Small and medium-size businesses typically have fewer resources (e.g., money as well as knowledgeable people) to secure their IT infrastructure as well as maintain a good backup strategy,” Engin Kirda, professor of computer science at Northeastern University, told TechRepublic. “Hence, whenever a ransomware attack happens, they often end up having to pay the ransom to […]

Tech Republic

The average SMB website is attacked 44 times per day

“Small and medium-size business typically have fewer resources (e.g., money as well as knowledgeable people) to secure their IT infrastructure as well as maintain a good backup strategy,” Engin Kirda, professor of computer science at Northeastern University, told TechRepublic. “Hence, whenever a ransomware attack happens, they often end up having to pay the ransom to […]