Unlocking the Secrets of Cybersecurity with Patricia
Sep 16, 2023Season 2Episode 5
Shireen Botha
Strap in for an enlightening journey into the complex world of cybersecurity with our expert guest, Patricia. Ever wondered how to shield your digital life from the prying eyes of cybercriminals?
Patricia walks us through pragmatic steps to keep cyber threats at bay - from dodging suspicious links to the potency of unique passwords, and even the multi-faceted power of Buzz Sprout for podcasting enthusiasts.
But this isn't just a one-way street. Our conversation veers into the personal experiences of Patricia, as she shares her intriguing journey of interpreting Abraham Hicks's teachings in Spanish. Thinking about starting a YouTube channel or curious about fostering mutual respect in host-guest interactions? Patricia's got you covered with valuable insights on these and much more. Prepare to be inspired and informed as we navigate this digital labyrinth with Patricia!
Strap in for an enlightening journey into the complex world of cybersecurity with our expert guest, Patricia. Ever wondered how to shield your digital life from the prying eyes of cybercriminals?
Patricia walks us through pragmatic steps to keep cyber threats at bay - from dodging suspicious links to the potency of unique passwords, and even the multi-faceted power of Buzz Sprout for podcasting enthusiasts.
But this isn't just a one-way street. Our conversation veers into the personal experiences of Patricia, as she shares her intriguing journey of interpreting Abraham Hicks's teachings in Spanish. Thinking about starting a YouTube channel or curious about fostering mutual respect in host-guest interactions? Patricia's got you covered with valuable insights on these and much more. Prepare to be inspired and informed as we navigate this digital labyrinth with Patricia!
Tales from the Wild, stories from the Heart A journey into the mind and soul of fired-up business professionals, where they share their vision for the future and hear from a different non-profit organization every month as they create awareness of their goals and their needs. Dive into a world of untamed passion. As we join our host, shereen Guerta, for this month's episode of Friends from Wild Places.
Speaker 2:
So, ladies, let's take a pause before we continue. I just wanted to pop in with a little bit of a buzz sprout advertisement. As you may or may not know, Friends from Wild Places uses buzz sprout. Podcasting isn't hard when you have the right partners, and the team at Buzz Sprout is passionate about helping you succeed. Join over 100,000 podcasters already using Buzz Sprout to get your message out to the world. When I started this podcast, I didn't know where to begin and was quite overwhelmed, but using Buzz Sprout made it much easier and straightforward To start your own podcast and get a $20 Amazon gift card. Follow the link in the show notes. This lets Buzz Sprout know we send you and help support our show. Buzz Sprout. Let's create something great together. So back to you, Patricia. So how did you get into cyber security and why?
Speaker 3:
They are, like I had mentioned before, our business had been doing IT since for many years 37 plus years for my partner and so he got into more and more into cyber security. Because of the nature of our business, we wanted to stay at the Vanguard, and now they cyber security is such an important component of just being in this technological world, so that's how we got more and more into it. He eventually got into the University of Miami program, like I have mentioned. Now, Right this moment, we're both enrolled into the MIT online program and while I was homeschooling I had taken a step back from the networking, from the marketing and all of that stuff. I still continue to do my work.
Speaker 3:
I started like a behind the scenes everything that I had to do for clients, and I was very involved.
Speaker 3:
I became very, very heavily involved aside from homeschooling, in my channel in YouTube which actually speaks about Abraham Hicks, like we had mentioned before, and I translate from English into Spanish and I dubbed the clips that Abraham gives the permission as to Hicks gives the permission to do so, and at that time I was reluctant to get into cyber security because I thought such a disconnect from this that I'm sharing about living with gratitude and appreciation in your heart and being, you know, feeling love and appreciation for one another and respect and all of that.
Speaker 3:
And then here's this world about cyber crime and extortion and hacking, and I just felt like it wasn't something I wanted to get into. But as time went by and more and more there are more breaches, there are more extorsions and tales of people just like you and me and all of us here getting scammed or getting robbed, and then I realized, you know, I wanted to be part of the solution and we have this tool here with our company, the service and this knowledge and expertise. So I want to use it to service the community and help them be protected and be empowered with in the cyber life, rather than be afraid or fearful, and that's why I got into it now. I'm really, really committed and I'm really excited to be able to make a difference.
Speaker 2:
Well, that's awesome Because I mean, as a business owner myself, I'm a virtual bookkeeper, so 99% of my business is online. It's on cloud based accounting systems, it's on Zoom, it's email. You know, I'm constantly virtual, and so one of the biggest things as a business owner of a virtual bookkeeping company is I needed cybersecurity. So when you talk about cyber security, I know I can relate to how important it is for a virtual business owner. Can you give me some ways I can avoid cyber attacks? Because I mean, it's so easy. There was a scam email going about QuickBooks and they were asking people to sign in, but it wasn't the QuickBooks' link, it was something else and if you didn't pick up on it, you could have given away your password and, as QuickBooks pro-advisors, you don't think that it's anything else but QuickBooks just trying to, you know anyway, long story short, please. I just want some good pieces of advice on how to avoid being cyber attacked, as one would say.
Speaker 3:
Yes, that's a really good question, because we all need to take at least the most fundamental precautions to be able to spot those threats. And indeed, like you're saying, the email that was going around with the QuickBooks brand. Those were obviously spoofed emails because QuickBooks didn't send them, but they made them look like they came from QuickBooks, right, exactly. So that's the threat and, in fact, the weakest link in cybersecurity right now is humans. We click whenever we're not supposed to click. I mean, we don't know. See, we can easily be fooled by emails like that, and it's not like you're not a smart, intelligent person. It's just that they make it so easy for us to fall and be scammed. So the thing to do first is, as far as email is concerned, you could just be very careful not to click on links. If you find this suspicious, do not click on the link, but rather go to your QuickBooks account. Either type yourself directly the URL, the address, in the browser, or, better yet, bookmark the saved address into your browser so you don't inadvertently mistype it or click somewhere else, because, just the same that they spoofed the emails to make it look perfectly legit, they could spoof the websites as well and make them look just like the vendor that you're trying to get into. So that's one thing. Avoid clicking on links, especially when you're in the phone you cannot hover over to. If you're in your desktop, you could hover over the link and in the bottom corner in the left you can actually see the real address that it would take you, so then you could perhaps spot that the address is a fake one. It looks as if it's real, but it is a fake one, because it gets displayed in the bottom, but if you're in your phone, you cannot do that. So then, avoid clicking anywhere in the phone, not only in emails, but in text messages as well, no matter where it comes from. It's a WhatsApp or a text or any other chat program you might have. If it looks suspicious, do not click it. If it looks urgent, oh, you need to verify right now, because otherwise they're going to rob you or whatever.
Speaker 3:
Don't just go directly to your account yourself. Another thing that you really have to do is to create unique unique is very important long and complex passwords, because if, in the case that for some reason, somebody hacks, let's say, your bank account, or they hack the bank and in the bank they steal millions of username and passwords, then they'll have that password and if it wasn't unique, then they'll use that password to go into God knows how many other accounts that you might have had with that password. And that has happened. I mean, they have been the target, got hacked and they've stole like 15 million username and passwords. The Marriott got hacked and they stole about 300 million records. I don't know so many others have gotten hacked and Assume your info is already in the dark web because breaches continue to happen. Got it so for that reason, passwords are important to don't ever put your birth date as a password, for example, because they already would have that.
Speaker 2:
Right.
Speaker 3:
And even if they don't, there are scripts right now that can crack a password in a matter of seconds, because they already have tables collected of the most popular passwords and they can crack it either way. If it's in a dictionary, they have dictionary algorithms that they can use to crack it and they can crack it in seconds. So long complex, with symbols, with numbers, uppercase, lowercase, random. Since that's hard for us humans to memorize in our brains, use a password manager. That's really a great idea to do. Okay, use also multi-factor authentication. I don't know if you heard about those. Some people find it a little inconvenient. It may be, but it's better to be safe. And if you have that enabled, make sure it's actually two factor or multiple factor, meaning you're entering through the browser in your desktop and the second factor would be in your cell phone. That's where the code comes in. So it's two different devices. It's not in the same device. Otherwise it's not a factor. It would be a two step because it would be in the same device. It's still better than none, but better if you have it in a separate device, also because if you lose, say, your cell phone or your laptop, you at least have something separate.
Speaker 3:
Backups are really, really important in case, for some reason, you get attacked or spyware. You clicked whenever you weren't supposed to and then there's ransomware coming up. They block you out of your computer. You at least have backups and, if possible, encrypted in a cloud or in a hard drive external hard drive from your computer. Those would be the most basic fundamentals. There's also firewall, antivirus, anti malware software and update your software as often as possible. If you can enable automatic updates, then do so. That would be the basic. I mean, I have a list of other items and, if you want to, I can give you a link for anyone who's interested in downloading that list. The top things you could do as a solopreneur not to get hacked, it's very important for you to just be aware and be aware, to be aware where to click and whenever you're surfing in Google or, for example, don't just click on all the free things, free whatever. If it looks too good to be true, then probably you want to pass it up.
Speaker 4:
Benjish, I have a question. When you mentioned the password manager, this is my thought process, because most everyone out there that knows me personally. I am not the IT. I got the AOL account. I miss my Razor phone. That's my hub. But how do you know that the password manager companies are not scammers?
Speaker 3:
Well, you have to go to a reputable one. That's a really good question.
Speaker 4:
I was saying I can only envision me trying to find a password manager company and it's actually like a scam company. Could you maybe mention a few that are reputable?
Speaker 3:
I like to use one password. That's the one we recommend for our clients and that we use ourselves, and we've used it already for, I want to say, at least a good AERS, maybe longer, and it's one the number one. Passwordcom. That's been really good. It's very user-friendly and it can synchronize across your devices.
Speaker 3:
The reason it's called one password is because you only have to memorize the one password, the other one, to the password manager and there you keep all the passwords. And it's a great tool because let's say something got hacked, let's say target got hacked, so then it'll tell you you know you need to change target passwords. They have a watch tower feature inside so you go into there and it tells you you know alerts of what's vulnerable, what isn't, what's good, what's you know not good. And it's safe so far, although we can't ever be 100% sure that anything is 100% safe and secure, just because of the nature of how technology works. But this one is very, very it would at least be very, very, very difficult to crack, to hack, because of the way of the algorithm, the encryption algorithm, works.
Speaker 3:
So, yeah, that's definitely one that I would recommend. Thank, you.
Speaker 4:
That's fascinating. Thank you so much, patricia, just for sharing with us and again, I always learn so much from our interactions and collaborations. But I wanted to, I wanted to inquire with you. You had mentioned about your YouTube and I think you said a big, big number. How many, how many followers did you or do you have?
Speaker 3:
A little over 97,000 followers. So, yes, it's a very active community there and I'm hoping we get to 100,000 this year because we're celebrating 10 years. So 10 years, 100,000. So that would be that would be really cool.
Speaker 4:
Can you give our listeners? Maybe we can get you over to that number. From my understanding is that you actually interpret Abraham Hicks's teachings is that correct into Spanish and you have, I guess, subtitles underneath in addition, is that correct?
Speaker 3:
Yes, Some of my videos are subtitled very few, just subtitles. Usually it's my voice, my audio, because people prefer to listen while they do their activities, you know, throughout the day, and so they have the audio and the subtitle comes up. Often I also try to just do subtitles. One time and people were like, please come back with a video, we need the audio. So, yeah, that's what I do.
Speaker 3:
Abraham Hicks, whose author real author is Esther Hicks. She gave the permission a long time ago for folks to translate either subtitle or dub her works up to 15 minutes of her clips into any languages in the world. So that's how I discovered them. Back then I kept myself glued to YouTube listening to Abraham about 13 years ago when I discovered Abraham, and I kept on doing that for two straight years until one day it didn't occur to me that it was in different languages. I always heard them in English and one day there was a little video with subtitles in Spanish and I was, oh wow, people are subtitling into Spanish and I thought it would be much better to do it with an audio, because that's what I do and I get to do my work while I listen. And so I said let me try to dub it, to dub the audio, and that's how it got started.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 4:
Where can we support you? Where can we support you for your YouTube?
Speaker 3:
Oh, thank you, it's in Spanish, like I said, so it's youtubecom slash tu vida ahora, which means your life now. If you want, I can put the link there. Or, or, sherin, I'll give you the link so you can put it in the show notes.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 3:
I'll have that. Yeah, you could. If anyone is interested in learning Spanish, you could use it to learn Spanish, train your ear at least.
Speaker 2:
I like that. I need to learn some Spanish myself. So, Patricia, if there are some listeners out there that would like to start their own YouTube channel, what could you say are some of the first few steps that they need to? They need to do to get where you are?
Speaker 3:
Okay, I think first I would advise anyone to choose a topic that they're very interested or passionate about, because YouTube is not for the faint of heart. It takes consistency and you know it can be very time consuming, at least at the beginning, until you get your groove and find your own pace. But I think consistency is another one. Just stick to the schedule. At the beginning you can test Some people say test up to six or seven or eight topics. So, for example, you can decide to post a video, let's say every Friday noon or whatever it is that you want, and do every Friday at noon, eight times different topics that go for within your realm of interest or passions and see what has better, you know, better following or better reaction from the YouTube community. And then go from there. Use YouTube's discovery keywords. You can just type in and YouTube will provide you some options or some alternatives or whatever keyword that you use. Use that and later you will have some history to see from your own videos what which ones are performing better. So use that as guidance as to how to continue to produce the content that the audience is wanting to see. And after you, select your winner out of all those eight tests or different topics, then pick the one that that makes the most sense and then stick to the schedule.
Speaker 3:
I think the YouTube algorithm favors the consistency, favor someone who's always doing fresh new content. Obviously, I think all the social media channels do that, but it's especially true with YouTube and interact with your audience. People love that. And if, from time to time, you can go in and do a live interaction, interact with the audience. I used to do a lot of live streams in YouTube and I would interact and later they would write to me and say thank you, you call my name, you talk to me. I mean it was like they love that. I mean, who doesn't right, right? So I think that's that's my advice and obviously do the SEO tags, the meta tags and all of that stuff Take advantage of that.
Speaker 4:
What was the one thing, prisha, that maybe jump your number of followers? You know what? Was there? One thing that happened with the catalyst.
Speaker 3:
Yes, yes, at the beginning the first jump that I experienced was with someone had a Abraham Hicks group in YouTube that I hadn't even known about, and they discovered my, my YouTube videos and so they shared them in their community in their YouTube group, and so all of a sudden, in a matter of hours, they went up, I think, from maybe had 10 people at that time up to 400 or 500 or something, and then it started to climb steadily, a little bit, a little bit at a time, and then later I was invited to a summit for Abraham Hicks type of topics, spirituality topics and those. Each time I got invited to a summit it would climb 1000, 2000, you know, overnight. So those definitely. I mean, if you can find influencers like that, that really helps because they already have their audience that you know comes, you know it's noticed that it's interested in that topic.
Speaker 4:
So that I'm I want to make it my mission to get you over to the number that you want. So I'm going to take an initiative. Yes, I mentioned that to you, so that's what I my goal is yes, definitely. Thank you so much.
Speaker 3:
That would be awesome. I wanted to say also, because you mentioned Tanya, that you get a lot of my interactions with me and I want to say it's mutual. I am getting so much out of you, both ladies, sherri and Tanya, that it's it's never. You know a one way thing. I'm so happy and so honored that you find something valuable coming from me, but it's the same as well for me. I am just really thrilled and grateful and I appreciate you, ladies, so much.
Speaker 2:
Well, thank you Likewise. Yes, it was lovely Tune in next week for part three of Friends from Wild Places, in the final episode with Patricia Espinosa.
