Let’s say your computer was hacked. Perhaps your passwords were weak, or perhaps someone guessed them and managed to break into your accounts. The first thing to do is simple; Don’t panic. While that may be hard advice to follow in the early minutes after a severe hack, it’s important not to overreact since that could just make things worse. Here are the five most important steps you need to take after your computer was hacked.
1. Secure Your Accounts
If someone has managed to break into your accounts, it’s important to immediately change all of your passwords across all of your online services. If you think credit card information may have been compromised, which happens fairly often when hackers get access to email accounts, this contact the support line for that credit company.
2. Disconnect From The Internet
Okay, now that you’re done panicking and securing your accounts, it’s time to disconnect from the internet and go offline. Just trust us on this one, so long as the computer has been hacked, there’s really no reason to continue being tethered to it. Remove all USB and external hard drives out of the computer. That way, you won’t accidentally run any scripts that might launch a counterattack while you’re offline.
3. Get The Computer To A Professional
It’s important not to try and fix things yourself if they’ve been hacked. More than likely, that just means you’ll run into a lot of computer jargon and confusion without many answers. Instead, it’s probably going to be better if you contact a professional PC service center to help you with the data recovery process.
The nice thing is that there are plenty of great people out there who can be trusted to handle computer hacks, and they can get your system back up and running in even the direst of circumstances.
4. Don’t Panic About Cyber Attacks
Part of not panicking about cyber attacks is knowing why these kinds of attacks happen in the first place. Therefore, you should take time to educate yourself on the various cyber security measures to foster to avoid being hacked again. You should also alert some of your friends to ensure they don’t make the same mistake you did. The majority of cyberattacks are due to human error, thus it’s important that you be vigilant about the cybersecurity of your computer.
Bottomline
With the rise of cyberattacks occurring every second, computer users should now more than ever foster good cyber security practices. If you’re in Fort Lauderdale or Coral Springs and your business computers have been hacked, contact Priority 1 Computers to help you with data recovery at affordable rates.