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Cybersecurity awareness month at Tech

Almost every day on Tech’s campus, a scam email is found on a student’s account and is terminated, according to Deb Zsigalov, Tech’s Chief Information Security Officer.

 

National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, occurring in October, is dedicated to making the public aware of the resources available to navigate safely and securely online.

 

Cybersecurity Education, Research & Outreach Center, known as CEROC, helps implement security for campus wifi and accounts.

 

“For 2019, we had to disable 975 Tech accounts for sending spam,” Zsigalov said.

 

Eric Brown, assistant director of CEROC, said being aware of unsafe wifi networks is important to not having personal information stolen. Some networks are able to hack phones or laptops for financial information.

 

“Free is not free, those free apps that you load on your phone or computer; you are paying for those by giving them your information. Delete things you are not using,” Brown said.

 

Zsigalov said students are getting phished through their Tech emails by prospective job opportunities.

 

Helpdesk specialist Brian Stansberry said Tech provides a cyber threats bulletin on the myTECH website. The list contains active and recent phishing scams among Tech email addresses.

 

“If it seems too good to be true, it is,” Zsigalov and Brown said.

 

To find out more information about cybersecurity awareness, go to www.its.tntech.edu.