November 27 is Black Friday and November 30 is Cyber ​​Monday

One of the strongest sales campaigns in shops and online sales recently established in Spain is Black Friday and Cyber ​​Monday. A tradition imported from the US where all physical stores and online businesses make numerous discounts on all their products for the Christmas season.

It is a good time to catch a bargain ... If you are thinking of doing it in an online store, you should take into account a series of tips to avoid possible upsets and make your purchases 100% safely:

1. Activate a Card for Online Payments and Deactivate It When You Have Finished Your Purchases 💳

For the maximum security of your bank accounts, many entities enable free virtual cards to be able to make purchases online safely. We will activate and deactivate these cards only when we are going to make a purchase online.

2. Buy on Websites With Trusted Seals 📝

Cybercriminals can spoof websites to mislead consumers into believing that they are buying from a legitimate site. The website may appear almost identical to the real site; however, subtle changes may indicate that it is not. Take a good look at the URLs.

If you are visiting an e-commerce website for the first time, look to see if it has a trust seal such as Confianza Online or Trusted Shops. These seals guarantee that member companies are periodically subjected to complete quality, safety, and service evaluation.

3. Only Use Secure Sites With Certificates 🔒

The way to know if a web page has HTTPS is by looking at the browser. When accessing any website, you can see an indicator in the upper left part of the browser that indicates whether or not the page uses the HTTPS protocol. Depending on the browser, it will be seen in a different way but in all of them, it will be very clear if the web is secure or not. Certified web pages display a  lock next to the domain. When you click on the padlock, a message appears indicating that the connection is made safely.

4. Be Wary of Suspicious Bargains 🏷

On “Black Friday” and “Cyber ​​Monday” many cybercriminals take advantage of it by replicating and introducing many fake offers.

It can be difficult to tell the difference between a real offer and a fake, so it is best to make sure that a website is real. Shop at reputable and trustworthy stores that you know or have recommended to you. Avoid eCommerce that are unknown or that offer dubious discounts that are hard to believe.

5. Find Out About the  Ecommerce Where You Are Going to Buy 🔍

Check that the seller's contact information appears on the website and that the conditions of use are clearly explained: shipping costs, return policy, customer service ... If you have questions, try to contact them before making a buy or consult their social networks to read opinions of other users.

6. Be Careful With the Wifi Networks We Connect to 📶

Many public spaces such as cafeterias or train stations have free access to  WIFI networks. What we must ask ourselves is: Are they safe? Many cybercriminals simulate free Wi-Fi networks in order to access our devices. When in doubt, use your mobile's own internet.

9. Use Strong Passwords 🔐

It's always best to use a unique username and password for your various accounts, so in the unfortunate event of being the victim of an attack, cybercriminals won't have access to all of your accounts.

10. Beware of Fraudulent Emails or Phishing  📧

Phishing is a technique frequently used by hackers, with which forged emails are sent, with an aesthetic appearance very similar to the original, whose mission is to manipulate the user who receives it to steal confidential information.

You Can Identify a Phishing Email in Our Post.

Checking typographical errors, installing antivirus software on our computer, not sharing bank details by email or messaging, are other aspects to take into account when making your purchases online. Enjoy this Black Friday and Cyber ​​Monday in a 100% safe way! 🛍🛒

Malicious Codes: How to Detect, Prevent, and Eliminate Them | Antivirus

When programming experts use their coveted knowledge for crime, malicious code is born. We tell you everything you need to know to be forewarned!

Technology has changed the world dramatically and no one can deny it. Few remember what life was like without a cell phone, without means of instant communication, without online files for data storage, without home banking, without Wi-Fi. But, all these comforts of today's life also have certain risks, such as malicious code, that we have to know so as not to be easy victims.

It is not that technology is bad, the problem is that criminals evolve along with the rest of economic activities and, therefore, companies have a greater demand to be at the forefront and beat cybercriminals.

As the name implies, malicious codes are pieces of web script developed to create vulnerabilities in systems. In a crude analogy, we could say that it is as if someone made a hole in the perimeter fence of your software to take the information, files and even boycott the operation of your equipment.

Unlike other computer attacks that a system can suffer, the malicious code includes website scripts that take advantage of vulnerabilities to load malware through new entry doors, many times an updated antivirus is not enough to stop its action, it is essential to perform specialized scans and leave systems development in the hands of trained professionals.

How Does Malicious Code Work on My Computer?

The malicious code is a self - executable application that produces gateways to information from a computer with different costumes that can be Java applets, solutions HTML, accessories, scripting languages, and other languages predesigned web pages or emails.

Downloading the code gives the cybercriminal access to the victim's computer and allows sensitive data to be exposed. In this way, cybercriminals can even delete valuable and irrecoverable information, as well as install spyware.

Visiting infected websites or clicking a malicious email link or attachment are the primary avenues for malicious code to penetrate systems.

How Can Malicious Code Be Detected?

The renowned international domain and web hosting provider, Godaddy, offers the following recommendations so that users can know if they are being threatened by malicious code :

• Review the malicious code inventoried on the Stop Badware and antiphishing.org log pages, to know the most well-known cases and to be alert.
• Take into account safe browsing certifications when browsing different websites
• Enable the view of file extensions, and scan all files with extensions such as .exe, .bat, .cmd, .scr, or .pif through an antivirus software.
• Use link analysis software to scan all links in your own code, especially in advertisements.
• Search for possible virtually invisible frames, in general, harmful scripts are placed in the code with iframe tags with height = "0" width = "0".
• Search your own code with the search for unknown lines. It is very common for malicious code to be encoded with hexadecimal or Unicode / wide character. Look for strips of percent signs (%) followed by two characters (eg% ww% xx% yy) and/or lines followed by 4 characters (like \ u9900 \ u1212 \ u8879).
• Download the files from the website into a virtual machine where you can scan them and avoid infecting the computer itself.

How Can I Prevent Malicious Code in My Business System?

As always, in terms of computer security, prevention is vital to avoid serious problems resulting from the criminal attack. The main tool to avoid being a victim of malicious codes is website protection scanners.

Through periodic scans of your website, you will be able to detect vulnerabilities to correct them and not be easy prey for hackers.

In addition, it is important to:

• Review all software before including it in your systems
• Evaluate the use of web security certificates for your site
• Include ad providers that do not contain malicious code and scan them regularly.
• Give greater vigilance to areas of your company's software that are available for user-dependent data generation.
• Implement high-security passwords.
• Install the latest versions of the patches available for third-party software on the site.

How Do I Remove Malicious Code?

In case of detecting the attack of a malicious code in your business software, it is necessary to follow the following action guidelines:

• Put the site down to avoid the spread of cybercrime and that your customers and visitors are not at risk.
• Remove all malicious code that you have detected through scans and script reading.
• Repair the vulnerabilities for which you believe the malicious code has entered, to prevent future attacks.
• Conduct an investigation of the case and possible spread of the cyber attack to determine the scope and alert other potential victims.

People who invest time and energy to get hold of other people's resources have always existed in the history of humanity, and the best option that remains for us to respond to the development of new forms of crime is information and prevention.