2013 was a truly remarkable year that initiated the need for data security across enterprises, both big and small, and government institutions. Cyber-attacks conducted on popular and large Internet services such as Twitter, Facebook and Evernote as well as brazen attacks on government sites were making headlines almost every other day. If 2013 only exhibited prominent data infringements, it would definitely have been a year to recall. But mid-2013 saw data and document security enter into a new limelight; data leaks that rocked the world to its very core and shook individuals and organisations across the globe.
Here, we look at some of the biggest data breaches in 2013 that have paved the way to implement greater PDF security and more advanced solutions to secure your PDF documents. To begin with we will start at the most serious and far-reaching data leaks ever to take place in American history.
1. The Release Of 58,000 Documents By Edward Snowden From The National Security Agency To A British Daily – The Guardian In June 2013.
In what was already an historic year for data breaches, the data leaks initiated by Edward Snowden managed to eclipse every other data security issue ever to take place in the history of data security. As an NSA contractor, Snowden revealed highly sensitive documents to a range of media publications across the world, creating the ‘NSA leaks’, which disclosed functional inside-information of various important Internet surveillance plans being carried on by the National Security Agency. This momentous data breach pushed data security into the national cognizance. The Snowden leaks activated a raging dispute (that still continues to this day) regarding the boundaries of rational search, personal confidentiality, and our competence of safeguarding our own data not just from lawbreakers, but from all kinds of intruding eyes.
2. Over 320,000 Passwords Stolen From Facebook
Over 320,000 individuals who had Facebook accounts became prey to a malicious program known as the Key Logging Software – Pony. This malicious program made use of the keystrokes entered in by the user and recorded the password and login information of the users accessing Facebook.
Although this nasty cyber-attack was discovered in October 2013 by Trustwave, reports indicate that the malware might still be active on other sites. Unfortunately, the culprits still remain at large.
3. 50 Million Accounts Hacked In Livingsocial
Cyber criminals attacked a highly popular daily deals website known as LivingSocial in April last year and over 50 million users were impacted by the assault. The incident affected the company to such an extent that it began to lose ground steadily within an already contentious daily deals space.
Also Read : Top 3 Open Source Java libraries for creating and manipulating PDF documents
4. Over 50 Million User Accounts Compromised In Evernote
Hackers gained access to user information of over 50 million accounts, including encrypted passwords, login information and e-mail addresses stored on the site. Evernote reacted sharply by implementing a two pronged authentication for enterprise users. This incident, however, was a stark reminder that individuals ultimately are responsible for their own data. Documents stored on Evernote were compromised because of lax security on the part of the users.
The best way of protecting documentation is to leverage a robust solution for document security such as LockLizard. Not only does LockLizard protect documents with its PDF DRM software securely on your preferred device(s), but also after it has been uploaded to cloud or web services such as Evernote.
