Introduction
The internet is rampant with cybercriminals and hackers just waiting for the perfect opportunity to pounce on your sensitive and confidential data and use it for fraud and other malicious purposes. The bad news is that these online threats and malicious actors are here to stay for the long haul. The good news is that you can prevent them from compromising your sensitive data by applying effective security measures. And that's where Encryption comes into the fold.
Since prying eyes are everywhere, these cybercriminals are becoming competent in their fraudulent schemes to steal your data. Encryption becomes necessary to ensure these crooks cannot decipher or intercept your data. In this in-depth guide, we'll walk you through exactly what you need to do to have encrypted connections and why it's necessary. So, with that out of the way, let's get started.
Why Is It Important To Encrypt Your Internet Traffic?
Encrypting your internet connection is vital for several different reasons:
1) Data Privacy
Encryption helps prevent your personal and confidential data from being intercepted by third parties and malicious actors. Without Encryption, anyone can gain unauthorized access to your sensitive data and track your online activities. It includes anything from the websites you visit, messages you send, and the data you're sending and receiving.
2) Preventing Unauthorized Access
Encryption prevents unauthorized access to your data and online communications. If you've encrypted your internet connection, even if someone manages to intercept your data, they cannot decipher it without an encryption key.
3) Protecting Personal Data
Many people conduct confidential and sensitive transactions, including online banking, shopping, and sharing Personally Identifiable Information (PII) such as your name, phone number, house address, or Social Security Number. Encryption ensures that information like this remains safe, secure, and away from prying eyes.
4) Protection Against Cyberattacks
Encrypting your internet connection can protect you against various cyberattacks, including man-in-the-middle attacks, where the attacker intercepts and alters the communication between two parties. With Encryption, it becomes a challenge for attackers to tamper with your sensitive data.
5) Protection When Using Public Networks
When using public networks, at a coffee shop, cafe, shopping mall, or the airport, your data would be at risk of getting intercepted by third parties since you're using an unsecured public network. Encrypting your internet traffic makes your data safe and secure even when using public WiFi. Encrypting your connection protects your data in such vulnerable environments.
What Are The Different Types Of Encryption?
Here are three main types of Encryption:
1) DES Encryption
DES (Data Encryption Standard) was accepted as a standard of Encryption in the 1970s, but the same doesn't hold today. It only encrypted 56-bit data at a time and was found to get easily hacked not long after its introduction. However, it serves as a standard for future and more secure Encryption tools.
2) AES Encryption
AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) is the best Encryption mechanism. Governments and organizations use it for classified communications. AES uses "symmetric" key Encryption, meaning someone on the receiving end of the data needs a key to decode it.
3) RSA Encryption
RSA (Rivest-Shamir-Adleman) is another popular Encryption standard commonly used for data that gets sent online and uses a public key to encrypt data. It has proven to be an effective way to securely transmit information between people who do not know one another and want to communicate without compromising their sensitive data. Its vast key length, up to 2048 bits, makes it hard to decipher data encrypted by RSA.
What Are The Significant Ways You Can Have Encrypted Connections?
You can achieve encrypted connections through the following ways:
1) Using A VPN
A VPN (Virtual Private Network) encrypts your internet traffic and masks your IP address, preventing third parties from intercepting your data. A Secure VPN for Data Protection ensures that no third party or malicious actor can track your online activities since your IP address is concealed. When you're connected to a VPN, any transmitted data is encrypted, which means no third party can decipher or intercept your data, making VPNs an excellent choice for achieving encrypted connections.
2) Using Encrypted Messaging Apps
Standard SMS texts are not encrypted, meaning any third party can monitor and spy on the text messages you're sending. To ensure that your text messages don't get deciphered and tracked, it's a good idea to use end-to-end encrypted messaging apps. End-to-end Encryption means that you and the person you're communicating with are the only two people who can read or modify the data that's getting transferred.
WhatsApp, Signal, and Viber are examples of messaging apps that are end-to-end encrypted. WhatsApp, for instance, guarantees that only the people who are communicating with one another can read the sent messages and that not even WhatsApp itself can read those messages.
3) Use HTTPS
When you're browsing websites, make sure that the URL starts with "https://". HTTPS (HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure) ensures that the connection between the browser and the website is encrypted using SSL/TSL (Secure Sockets Layer/Transport Layer Security) protocols. HTTPS is an added layer of encryption that ensures that all your usernames, passwords, sensitive data, and sensitive financial data, such as your credit card information, are protected and secure.
4) Use The Tor Browser
The Tor Browser has been specifically created, keeping the user's privacy in mind. Using the Tor browser enables you to stay anonymous online. By remaining anonymous, you can protect yourself against cyberattacks and government surveillance. All browsing history and cookies are automatically cleared using the Tor Browser instead of manually removing them from a standard browser like Edge or Chrome.
The Tor Browser lets you browse the web anonymously by routing your Internet traffic through volunteer-run servers. Your internet traffic gets routed through encrypted servers known as Tor nodes or relays, which makes it a challenge for ISPs and government agencies to race your online activities.
5) Using Encrypted Email Services
You can use email services and plugins that support email encryption. Some examples include PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) or S/MIME (Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) to enable encryption of your email messages. Various email services offer additional layers of privacy and security, such as temporary email addresses or "burner" messages that delete automatically after a certain period.
6) Secure Your WiFi Connection
It would be best to secure your WiFi connection by checking your WiFi and router settings and checking that the WPA2 and WPA3 encryption protocol is on. While there may be other protocols, like WEP or WPA, they may be outdated and ineffective in encrypting the connection. Always use a strong password for your home WiFi connection (which means using uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters and also using the latest encryption standards available.
Wrapping Up
The digital era will continue to see a rise in cybercrimes and hackers becoming competent and sneakily finding ways to intercept and steal confidential user data. As users, it's our responsibility to find the most effective ways to keep our data safe and secure and away from prying eyes. Although Encryption is just one of the ways to protect our sensitive and confidential data, it's an excellent place to start since Encryption ensures that even if your data gets intercepted, no third party or malicious actor can decipher it.
