Startpage and Cybersecurity: Keeping your personal data private
To protect ourselves from such cyber criminals, we’ll need to dive deeper into cybersecurity and privacy.
Smartphones, smart homes, smart cities – digital networking is finding its way into all areas of our daily lives. In addition to the many advantages and convenience, the digital world also brings with it great risks: more attack surface for cyber criminals. To protect ourselves from such cyber criminals, we’ll need to dive deeper into cybersecurity and privacy.
In this article we’ll answer: Who cyberattacks are targeting, how does cybersecurity work, and most importantly – how can protecting privacy help minimize the risk of attacks?
What is cybersecurity?
Just as there are security mechanisms in real life, measures can be taken to guarantee safe freedom of movement on the Internet.
Cybersecurity is about protecting systems, networks, servers, end devices, and data against attacks. In cyber attacks, unauthorized persons gain criminal access to the systems or data of companies, authorities or individuals with the aim of causing damage or demanding a ransom. According to Cybersecurity Ventures, damage related to cybercrime is projected to hit $10.5 trillion annually by 2025.
The increasing digitization of the everyday and business world in the digital space has the consequence that the number of cyber attacks continues to rise and the forms of attack can take on very different forms. The attacks often hit larger and medium-sized companies, as cyber criminals are often looking for financial gain through blackmail. For this reason, it is important to maintain of IT security on an ongoing basis in order to leave as few security gaps as possible open for such attacks. Those responsible use protective mechanisms to ensure that the company’s networks, operations, and software remain protected.
How can you protect yourself against cyber attacks?
Cyber attacks don’t just affect companies, authorities or public institutions. Individuals are also becoming victims of attacks more and more frequently. An essential measure therefore includes the clarification and provision of information on how to best protect your data.
Data and identity theft is one of the most common forms of attack to which individuals can also fall victim. Everywhere that data is in circulation, there is a potential target. It is therefore obvious to make the protection of privacy the top priority – in professional as well as personal life.
More privacy, more cybersecurity
The less personal data there is shared, the lower the risk that it will be stolen, sold, or made public. The good news: You don’t have to become an IT expert to protect your data on the Internet. Everyone can do something for their own security online.
Whether it is your own data or that of customers or business partners: Responsible handling of personal information is the top priority. Collecting and storing data should be avoided wherever possible. The same applies to disclosing your own data. Fortunately, there are numerous tools out there to help protect privacy:
- Switch to email services that respect your privacy. With , for example, you can create different alias addresses. If one of these email addresses is leaked, you can simply delete the address without damaging your entire email account.
- Use a browser that allows you to set more stringent data protection settings. You can find a list of recommended browsers here.
- Use a password manager to help you keep track of your passwords. Remember, never use the same password for multiple accounts.
- Navigate the web with a private search engine that protects your data, such as Startpage. In contrast to non-private search engines, which come pre-installed on browsers, your data is neither collected nor stored here.
- Protect your webcam from attack. Cyber criminals can gain access to the camera in your laptop or PC by manipulating webcams. With our webcam cover, you can easily protect yourself from such attacks. If you need a webcam cover, email us at [email protected] to get a free Startpage webcam cover.
This is how Startpage protects your privacy
So that your privacy comes first, our founders made sure when developing Startpage that personal information such as IP address, location, or search history is not saved in the first place.
Startpage’s Principal Software Engineer Brandon Stansbury explained, “A particularly severe security violation that can occur to a user’s privacy is when a company storing your information suffers from a data breach. The greatest defense against a user data breach is not logging user data at all. The Startpage Privacy Policy ensures we don’t have any of your data, leaving nothing for cyber criminals to steal.”
Every search on Startpage goes through an anonymization process in which your personal data is removed from our own “on-premise” servers. The search query is then forwarded and executed by our “application” servers, which have no personal information about you. Finally, the search results for the query are returned unpersonalized and unfiltered via the “on-premise” server. This is how we ensure that each of your searches takes place in complete privacy. You can find more details on how Startpage works here.
Our Anonymous View feature lets anyone access and explore websites without leaving a trace. Here are a few ways Anonymous View helps keep you secure:
- Startpage’s Anonymous View keeps you secure by using an HTTPS connection and blocking all non-HTTPS connections. This means you can even stay private and secure on unsafe networks, like at airports, train stations, or coffee shops.
- Startpage helps protect you from phishing attacks. Anonymous View does not permit form submissions containing user-entered text fields.
- Startpage hides your network infrastructure: Your IT infrastructure includes certain headers that can expose your IP address or even your work station.
Essentially, Anonymous View enables you to visit the websites from your search results anonymously and gives you a completely private and secure experience. To use Anonymous View, simply click on the mask symbol to the left of the search result you want to visit and you can access external pages anonymously.
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