c/cybersecurity-tips

The 2FA app on my old phone saved me from a $400 crypto drain attempt

Last month my main phone got stolen in Chicago, but the 4-year-old backup phone with my Google Authenticator still had all my codes, which stopped the thief from touching my exchange account because I had a separate device as my second factor, so has anyone else tested whether their backup phone actually works for restoring access or just assume it does?

Paid $180 for a password manager that I could've done myself

Signed up for SecureVault Plus after a phishing scare in March and dropped $180 for the year. Turns out the free version of Bitwarden does everything I needed, plus I could've just written them in a notebook like my dad does. The only thing I got was a nicer looking app and a subscription renewal reminder I keep ignoring. Anyone else shell out for premium tools before checking the free options first?

Two years of using the same password everywhere, caught by a gas station receipt

Has anyone else had that wake-up moment, or am I the only one who trusted a single password for way too long?

Password manager vs. paper notebook, which one actually keeps you safer?

I've been going back and forth on this for weeks after a friend in Denver got locked out of his vault and lost two days of work. I know the cloud sync is convenient, but I can't shake the feeling that a physical book can't be hacked remotely. Has anyone else made the switch and regretted it, or found a middle ground?

My bank's fraud alert scared me so bad I called my mom before checking my account

Got a text on Tuesday saying someone tried to use my card for $847 at a store in Miami. I was in Ohio eating a sandwich. My first thought was panic, then I called my mom to tell her I was being robbed. She said, 'Did you check your app yet?' I had not. Turns out it was my own auto-pay subscription I forgot about, and the bank flagged it because the store name changed after a merger. Now I double check everything before telling anyone. Has anyone else triggered their own fraud alerts with something dumb like this?

One bad phishing email in Seattle changed my whole approach to MFA

Last Tuesday I almost fell for a fake Microsoft login page. It came as a calendar invite from someone I actually work with. I clicked it during a rushed lunch break and typed my password. Then the real security alert popped up 10 minutes later. I caught it before they got in, but it shook me. I used to think MFA was just extra friction, now I see it as my only real safety net. Has anyone else had that wake up call moment where you finally stop ignoring those setup prompts?

Switched from random passwords to a passphrase system after a scare in March

I used to let my browser save everything and reuse the same garbage password for like 5 different accounts. Then in March someone got into my email through a data breach and started resetting my other logins. Took me a full day to lock everything down. Now I use three random words plus a number pattern that makes sense only to me, and I keep a paper list in my safe as backup. Has anyone else gone back to paper after an incident, or am I the only one who doesn't trust password managers fully?

The 'reset your router' advice that cost me a whole workday

My IT buddy Dave swore that rebooting the router would fix our office wi-fi dropouts, so I did it Tuesday morning and lost VPN access for 6 hours because the firmware update it pulled killed our firewall rules. Turns out the real issue was a dying switch on the other side of the building that Dave never checked. Has anyone else had a quick fix turn into a bigger mess than the original problem?

Found a USB stick in the post office parking lot, nope nope nope

I was about to plug it in to see whose it was, but then I remembered that DefCon talk about dropped USB drives and instead I just turned it into the lost and found, so has anyone actually ever found a clean USB that wasn't part of some test?

Realized my password manager was a lie after 4 years

I thought I was the security guru because I used a password manager. Then last month I saw my master password sitting in a draft email on my phone. I don't even remember typing it there, probably from 2022. If my phone got nabbed at a coffee shop near downtown Portland, someone would've had every single account of mine. Has anyone else caught themselves storing secrets in the dumbest places?

Shoutout to the free VirusTotal upload that caught a fake invoice scam

I was about to open a PDF from a 'client' last Friday, but ran it through VirusTotal on a hunch and found 3 known malware signatures, has anyone else caught something sketchy that way?

My 2FA habit looked paranoid until the hotel Wi-Fi incident

I used to skip two-factor codes on my phone for quick logins, but after watching a guy on hotel Wi-Fi in Denver pull up someone's bank app in 30 seconds with a spoofed page, every account of mine gets the code now, and has anyone else had a scare like that over public networks?

Overheard a guy say his password manager was 'too hard', big red flag

At a coffee shop in Austin last week, this dude told his friend he kept his bank login in a notes app because LastPass felt like a hassle. Told him that's how you get drained in a phishing scam, anyone else know someone who refuses to switch?

Is 2FA actually safer if you sync tokens to the cloud?

I spent 4 hours last Tuesday locked out of my bank account because the cloud backup of my authenticator app got wiped when I switched phones, and support wouldn't help without a code I didn't have. Doesn't storing recovery tokens offline defeat the whole convenience point, or am I just being paranoid about the syncing risk? What do you all do when the phone dies?

My uncle the plumber taught me about phishing and it stuck

Last month my uncle came over for dinner and somehow we got on the topic of scam emails. He's a plumber in Cleveland and has zero tech background, but he told me he spots fake bank emails by checking if the sender address has a number in it. He said over 40 of his buddies got hit with that Zelle scam in 2023 and he started checking every sender line. Hearing it from a guy who fixes pipes made it click way more than any tech article I read. Now I check sender domains on my phone too, even for texts. Has anyone else had a non-tech person explain something that finally made it stick?

Just realized most people reuse passwords way more than I thought

I was reading that Google survey from 2023 and it said 65% of people use the same password across multiple accounts. That honestly scared me because if one site gets hacked, they have the keys to everything. Have you guys started using a password manager yet or are you still on the old system?

TIL password complexity rules are mostly theater

I spent years forcing people to use symbols and 90-day rotations until I saw a coworker tape his new complex password to his monitor. That's when I realized we were just making security theater, not actual security. Has anyone else had their assumptions challenged by seeing how real users actually behave?

Hit 500 unique passwords in my manager and it freaked me out

My password manager showed I've got 501 saved logins right now. That's just accounts I actually use, not counting old ones. Half of them are probably from random sites I signed up for once. Has anyone else hit a weird number like this and realized how much of your life is just logins?

Bitwarden vs LastPass - made the switch after 2 years

I used Lastpass for about 2 years until that breach last December. Switched to Bitwarden and honestly the free tier just works better - no limits on device types. Anyone else ditch a password manager after a security issue?

Heard a sysadmin say 'password managers are just a single point of failure'

I was at a coffee shop near my office in Portland and overheard this IT guy arguing that password managers put all your eggs in one basket, and that memorizing 15 different passwords is safer. But I've been using one for years and never had a breach, plus I can actually remember my logins now. So which is riskier: trusting one vault app or relying on your brain's memory for every account?

Switched my password manager after getting locked out of my own email last month

I used to just write down all my passwords in a notebook stored in my desk drawer. Thought that was good enough until I needed an old login for my bank while traveling and couldn't get home to find it. So last month I moved everything to Bitwarden, the free version, and set up two factor authentication on my phone. Now I can access all my accounts from anywhere, but I'm still paranoid about losing my master password. Has anyone ever gotten locked out of their password manager and how did you get back in?

Pro tip: stop using the same password for everything, even your grandma's streaming account

I used to think password managers were too much hassle until my cousin's Netflix got hacked last month and they used the same password for their bank. That one login opened up like 4 different accounts before they caught it. Now I use Bitwarden and honestly it takes maybe 10 extra seconds a day. Has anyone else had a close call like that where you realized how fast one password spreads?

Spent 6 hours tracking down a malware redirect that ended up being a rogue Chrome extension

I finally realized password managers aren't just for tech people

My neighbor Carol called me last week after her email got hacked for the third time this year because she kept using "Fluffy123" for everything. I showed her how to set up Bitwarden on her phone and now she actually remembers her passwords without writing them on sticky notes. Has anyone else had luck convincing older relatives to switch or do you just let them keep using the same password for 15 years?

Tried using a password manager after my accounts got hit 3 times in one month

Honestly I kept putting it off thinking it'd be too complicated. After my email and Steam got compromised back to back I bit the bullet and set up Bitwarden. Took maybe 20 minutes to get everything moved over. Now I just generate random 20 character passwords for every site and don't have to remember any of them. Has anyone else had luck with the autofill on mobile or does it still glitch out for you sometimes?