If you’re constantly on the go, the information you store in your laptop (or PDA) is as valuable (sometimes more so) than the computer itself.
An American Survey in 2006 showed that 15 million people lost sensitive data (including employee and client data) in incidences of lost laptops.
While we do not recommend handcuffing your laptop to your wrist, you can minimise such risk (and your firm’s potential liability) with the following steps.
DO NOT :
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Leave your laptop unattended, whether in the office, a restaurant or a client’s office.
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Leave your laptop in your car, it’s not safe, even in the boot – thieves have the tools to detect it.
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Put your laptop on the floor when checking in or in other crowded locations eg LRT stations.
DO :
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Back up your laptop data regularly.
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Consider packing your laptop in an ordinary-looking briefcase, not a laptop bag.
Open Sesame : Passwords
We all have more passwords than we can easily remember, which means we have all been guilty of using (or thought about using) “password” or “1234” as our password at some point.
More often than not, because we resort to using obvious passwords, they can easily be guessed. We compound this problem by writing them down and/or sharing them with others.
HERE’S HOW TO UP YOUR PASSWORD ANTE :
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Never use your name, “password” or “1234” as your password!
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Change your password(s) every two-three months.
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Use at least eight characters.
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Your password should contain at least one character from each of the following groups: upper and lower case letters (A,B,C… a, b, c…), numerals (1, 2, 3…) and symbols (~, @, #, $...).
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Do not reuse old passwords.
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Do not use the same password for everything.
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Do not let your browser remember your website passwords.
‘Should You Handcuff Your Laptop to Your Wrist?’, Steven M Berwick, CPA, February 2008, http://www.abanet.org/lpm/lpt/articles/tch02082.shtml