Tips to Avoid Impersonation in Social Networks

Social networks are widely used by home users and also by companies and organizations. They serve to keep in touch, post publications, promote products … There is a wide range of possibilities. Now, the fact that it is so widely used also makes hackers set their sights here. We are going to talk about spoofing on social media and what we can do to avoid it.

Impersonation in social networks, a widespread problem

Through social networks such as Facebook, Instagram or Twitter we can suffer a wide variety of attacks. We can receive Phishing messages that seek to access our accounts and put computers at risk. They can also be used to sneak malicious links that lead us to download malware. But without a doubt something that you have to take into account is data theft.

Tips to Avoid Impersonation in Social Networks

Many users have ever experienced that they have impersonated their profile on a social network. This can happen to home users, but it is also very common in businesses and organizations. They may even use the original profile , without the victim knowing it.

This can be achieved through very diverse methods , such as the collection of personal data. An attacker can obtain information from a user and later create an identical profile. For example, impersonate the profile image, put the same name, data such as workplace, mobile number, etc. This would make it possible to go unnoticed and believe that that person has really created a new account.

By creating a profile that impersonates another user, an attacker can have a free hand to send malware to contacts, collect more data, send Phishing messages… After all, they are using a profile that could go unnoticed.

Tips to avoid identity theft

At this point, we want to give some tips to prevent our identity from being spoofed on social networks. A series of simple recommendations that we can put into practice and thus reduce the impact that we can suffer when using Facebook, Instagram or any other similar platform.

Avoid exposing personal data

Something very important is to avoid putting our personal data on the Internet. There is no better way for hackers to spoof your identity than to make it available to anyone on the web. They can use bots to see all this data.

Therefore, if we use social networks and we do not want problems, something interesting is to reduce the amount of information that we make public. It is a good idea to make the profiles private and not available to everyone.

Take care where we log in

Of course we must also be careful when logging in. In this case, it is important to avoid public networks that are insecure or, failing that, to use a VPN . But you also have to avoid using third-party programs that are not trusted and can pose a problem.

Keep equipment safe

Another very important issue is to keep our equipment properly protected. It is essential to have a good antivirus , as well as other tools such as a firewall. In this way we can prevent the entry of malware.

But you also have to take into account the importance of systems being up-to- date . Sometimes vulnerabilities arise that can be used by attackers to achieve their goal and spoof our social media accounts. The available patches must be installed.

Always protect the account

The main barrier we have to avoid intruders on social networks is the password. It has to be a strong and complex key , containing numbers, letters (uppercase and lowercase), as well as other special symbols. All this, in addition, in a random way.

Also, another interesting point is to apply two-step authentication. A way to add an extra layer of security to our records. This way we can increase security and avoid problems.

Do not leave zombie profiles

This is something that many users do not take into account. Let’s say we have created an account on a social network that we stop using. Our data is still there. There may be personal information that they can use to spoof your identity. There could even be a data breach on that platform. Our advice is to delete the profiles that we do not use .

In short, these are some questions that we can take into account to avoid spoofing in social networks. Some basic tips that come in handy.