Cash in the house

A few notes for window cleaner, or odd things my neighbour gets for me, and I have a dish of pound coins for my grocery deliverers, who have all been extremely helpful.

I refuse to live my life looking over my shoulder or weighing up every move before I do anything.

Our neighbours refused to open their gorgeous, quirky garden when we had our village open gardens because people could come and have a look round with a view to breaking in.

It must be so horrid to view life and other people with such suspicion.

Silverbrooks

People are chosing to be sarcastic about what I wrote of the dangers of repeatedly divulging personal information about themselves on an open forum on the world wide web.

I spent decades working in forensic investigation including building profiles from people’s social media posts. I would hazard a guess that my profession knowledge and experience in these matters exceeds yours.

Of course, what I said is predicated on the notion that the Gransnet servers could be hacked revealing both members’ email and IP addresses both of which can then be linked to other data held about a person on the dark web including their personal address.

For investigators, that information is obtained with a court order. For criminal networks it is obtained through cyber crime. One of the most common reasons for a cyber attack is to obtain personal data and sell it on using the dark web.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking all criminal networks are multi-billion businesses dealing in drugs and trafficking. There are also networks of disaffected young hackers sitting in their bedrooms talking to others about what mischief they can cause.

Gransnet is a small, leaky forum trawled constantly by bots searching for keywords in posts usually to post spam. How do you think that is possible? Mumsnet was recently subject to a cyber attack where photos of child abuse were circulated. Did you think that was done by an organisation with benign intent? Does it give you confidence that this outdated forum is secure?

Larger companies and organisations which put a lot more more resources into IT security are subject to cyber attacks. Someone posted here yesterday that they had received a personal message from someone who knew their surname. How did that happen?

You can chose to make fun of someone who is warning other elderly people to be careful about what they reveal about themselves and their daily habits to the world wide web. Others might chose to take my advice and be more careful about what they write.

For the record, my own personal data was stolen and used to commit multiple cases of insurance fraud. I wasn’t the victim in the sense that I didn’t lose money, other people did, but it was stressful while it was going on including having enforcement agents trying to force their way into my home to search for people involved in the fraud. I’m pretty resilient but how would you have coped with that?

How had my personal data been obtained? Because I was once a member of another discussion forum where the membership database had been hacked and details posted on the dark web. Why had I been chosen? The police said the fraud was being perpetuated on people with a particular nationality and my name was assumed to be from the same country.

So if you think it can’t happen, you are wrong.

Also for the record, I did not say that people would be targeted only for having cash in the house. I said they could be targeted because they reveal on a daily basis when they are away from home, plus other data about where they bank and where they shop and what their vulnerabilities are. All of this is valuable information for a would-be burglar or financial scam. The chances may be slim but surely one elderly victim is one too many. I am just urging people to be careful but for some reason that’s an excuse to poke fun or bury heads in the sand.

I don’t think anybody is being sarcastic Silverbrooks, but nor do I think that the type of information people divulge on Gransnet generally gives a picture of them that would provide bait that would be of sufficient interest to other people. There are odd exceptions - but they are not common. Your past experience, which I don’t doubt, makes you hyper aware of risk, but we need proportionality or there would be no social interaction at all.

I'm sorry too, Silverbrooks. I wasn't mocking you personally - more 'joking' about people who give out too much information. I am very careful what I post, and keep SM locked down so only friends can see my posts and profile information.

I’ll try not to labour this too much further. I doubt it will make much difference, if any at all. Some people will go on documenting every aspect of their life on this forum, treating it as a safe space.

Only this morning someone has announced that they have just received a large inheritance which they have put in the bank. Why do this? Why use a public forum to announce that you are an elderly, single women who has just come into a lot of money?

Yes, I am hyper aware because of my job, my knowledge of how the internet is used for criminal purposes and how I have been affected personally by online data theft.

Many cyber attacks go undisclosed and unreported unless it’s a well known organisation or business e.g. the recent attack on M&S. An organisation may not even be aware of a cyber attack unless they have incident detection systems, early warning services, and security audits.

People might recall that in March, Gransnet had a spate of outtages to do with Cloudflare.

www.gransnet.com/forums/chat/1346367-What-is-happening-to-Gransnet?pg=2

Nobody at HQ seemed to be aware until it was reported - or if they were they didn’t bother to inform users so who knows what what going on and whether any data breaches occurred?

Cloudflare is a network service used by MN/GN. It is constantly fighting cyber attacks which often come in the form of something called DDoS - Distributed Denial of Service. In 2024, Cloudflare said they were blocking 4,870 DDoS attacks every hour.

DDoS is a cyber attack where multiple systems flood a target with traffic, making it unavailable to legitimate users. These attacks aim to overwhelm the target's network capacity, causing it to crash or become slow and unresponsive. In itself it may seem no more than an inconvenience to a customer, one of those occasions that might have you reaching for cash in a cafe, supermarket or petrol station.

However, while DDoS attacks primarily focus on disrupting service availability, they are sometimes be used in conjunction with other attacks, including data theft. DDoS attacks can be used as a diversion, allowing hackers to steal data or infiltrate a network while security teams are distracted by the denial-of-service.

Some history of a past DDoS attack on Mumsnet, where CEO Justine Roberts felt it necessary to explain:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/site_stuff/2452113-More-about-the-Technical-side-of-the-attacks-on-Mumsnet

Note what she says in the opening post:

The hacking attack on our website was separate from the [Denial of Service], though we believe perpetrated by the same person or people.

We try to balance security against usability and the sensitivity of the information we hold. After all, as pointed out by one of you in an earlier thread, the majority of information we have about a user is what that user publishes in Talk, which is there for all to see.

And that’s my point really. On their own, someone’s name, address and email address may only of limited use to criminals but coupled with other data that a person choses to publish, it could produce a profile to be exploit in specific ways through financial fraud or burglary.

Thank you Silverbrooks I thought you were posting sensible reminders.
I expect most people thought that.

Even relatively harmless breaches (or even errors) can be upsetting and worrying.
I spent weeks on-and-off last year with post (from the government) coming for two different companies to my address.

One turned out to be a keyboard error (wrong number) but the other was only resolved when someone sent them a new iPhone to my address and the police were involved.

I am always wary having spent years working with ex offenders and on the local MAPPA board.

Ex burglars used to say things like don't put your new TV box out for the bin men or wrapped gifts in easy sight in the run up to Christmas. They demonstrated why you needed deadbolt on patio doors by lifting my (old) workplace patio door out with two screwdrivers!

Don't buy a house backing onto a canal, have plenty of lights round the back of your property.... I had credit card advice from an ex-fraudster.

These days I think a lot of advice would be about cyber crimes. .. and our online footprint.

I am always grateful for any kind of online security advice that is given.

Silverbrooks
Crikey you really do know a lot about security.

Silverbrooks Yes, I do agree although I probably worry more about children's photos being put on social media as they have not chosen that nor given their consent.

Watching the BBC programme programme Scam Interceptors gives an insight into how people, often elderly, are targeted.
Some scams are very sophisticated now.

Thank you Silverbrooks.

We've been scammed several times, no need to robbed as well!