Used Smartphones Contain Valuable Data From Previous Owners

When it’s time to upgrade to a newer smartphone, what should you do with your old phone? If it’s too old, or no longer functioning, you’ll probably look into recycling it. But, if it’s still in good shape, you can sell it for good money. The problem is that selling your phone might also mean giving someone else access to your data. AT ZDNet, Jack Schofield reports that a recent experiment by security company Avast revealed how vulnerable even deleted data is on smartphones.

Avast bought 20 previously owned Android smartphones off of eBay to find out how much data they could recover from the previous owner. Even though the phones had been wiped and returned to factory settings, the team was able to restore emails, text messages, images, contacts and even a completed loan application rich with valuable personal information.

All of this was possible through the use of available forensic software.

So, is selling your old smartphone really worth it if you’re risking losing control of your personal data? Probably not. There’s also an added worry with more employees using their personal smartphones for business. Their company’s data could be at risk also if they decide to sell their old smartphone for a few extra bucks.

There are plenty of apps available that claim to be able to effectively wipe your phone, but it’s hard to find out which are actually able to do the job. Many experts suggest that the only way to truly erase what’s stored on your phone is to destroy the hard drive completely.

This vulnerability is bad news for those who want to sell their old devices, but it could be good news for those who have accidentally deleted or lost access to important data. In those cases, it’s likely that those files can be restored through the right process.

At Geek Rescue, we’re able to recover lost, deleted or corrupted files from all devices. We also help secure your device, or reset it to factory settings. Whatever your need, give us a call at 918-369-4335.

Malware Again Puts Credit Card Information At Risk

In the fall of 2013, hackers infiltrated Target’s point-of-sale system and were able to steal credit card information from thousands of customers. That large scale attack prompted a re-evaluation of security by most companies to attempt to better protect customer data at its most vulnerable points. As Jaikumar Vijayan reports for Computer World, however, more businesses were recently victimized by a similar POS attack that compromised customers’ credit card information.

Information Systems and Supplies (ISS) provides POS systems to restaurants in the northwest. Recently, they informed customers that those systems may have been compromised, which may have led to the theft of customer’s credit card information.

The breach in security stems from attackers gaining access to ISS’s admin account, which allowed them to log-in remotely to ISS customer servers and PCs. Through remote access, data stealing malware was planted on the POS systems, which is capable of stealing the numbers of any credit card used between since the end of February.

It’s unclear exactly how hackers first gained access to the ISS admin account, but it’s believed to be fallout from a phishing scam.

One password was used to log-in to each POS system managed by ISS before this attack. Since learning of the breach, ISS has instituted unique passwords for each customer system.

This attack holds lessons for both individual users and businesses. This is an example of why reusing passwords, or using a single password to access an entire network, is dangerous. If one password is all that stands between an attacker and all of your most important data, you’re likely to suffer a catastrophic attack. It’s important to implement multiple passwords, two-factor authentication and other security measures.

Last year, nearly two-thirds of successful data breaches were caused by security vulnerabilities introduced by third party applications. Many businesses assume that third party software is secured and maintained by the vendor who supplies it, but that’s not always the case. Unfortunately, this mistrust leads to attacks that are able to use third party software to infiltrate an entire network.

At Geek Rescue, we offer support and service to both individuals and businesses. For help recovering from an attack or improving security to prevent one, call us at 918-369-4335.