Alongside the gift of technological convenience come cyber threats. Ask any member of the information technology community and you will hear countless stories of spikes in data breaches in recent years. These global, digital attacks have forced homes and companies to increase vigilance when it comes to cybersecurity and their activities online.

There are several variations of the modern tech support scam. Whereas the common denominator always boils down to manipulation, the specific mechanisms of achieving this objective may vary and allow security analysts to single out three main tactics of these scammers.

We take a look at some of the most common ways that cyber criminals can utilize physical attacks against your company, as well as some of the tactics and techniques that you can use to defend organization against them.

CyberSecure My Business™ is a comprehensive national program led by the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) to help businesses of all sizes learn to be safer and more secure online. Each month we share the latest cybersecurity resources, news and events taking place to help small businesses.

Even nonprofits are at risk online. If you’re the owner or manager of such an organization, you can’t rely on goodwill or flying under the radar — here are five suggestions for making your organization, and the people who represent it, more secure against cybercrime.

To commemorate Data Privacy Day – an international effort held annually on Jan. 28 to generate awareness about the importance of respecting privacy, safeguarding data and enabling trust – the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) hosted an afternoon event, which was streamed live from LinkedIn’s offices in San Francisco, CA.

Consumers’ intensified focus on protecting their privacy underscores the need for businesses to incorporate data privacy into the building blocks of their organization through physical, technical, organizational and administrative safeguards.

Virtual private networks, or VPNs, have become a popular privacy tool. We are hearing about VPNs more and more often. Television commercials about VPNs are becoming more common, and one company ran a full-page ad in the New York Times. Major internet service providers have launched their own VPNs, as have adult websites.

This all begs the question: What even is a VPN and should we all be using one?

While the benefits consumers receive from sharing their data are undeniable, we need to ensure that private information is used appropriately. Otherwise, consumers like me will be reluctant to try new technologies, and we are likely to see an erosion of the benefits of these new technologies. That’s why it is critically important to develop comprehensive federal privacy legislation in the United States.