One of the leading cyber security companies in the US, Gary Salman is CEO of Black Talon Security. Are you concerned about your online security? Are you tired of every search you do online shopping and those ads of those same products showing up for weeks on end? Gary will give you sone serious tips on how to keep your home and home office secure and what you might be doing today that is making it easy for people to break into your network.

Gary is A dynamic and successful entrepreneur who built and sold his first technology business at age 30 to a publicly traded company. Gary's first company built and successfully deployed one of the very first cloud based healthcare systems in the industry serving thousands of users in all 50 states. Gary's unique background includes being a database developer as well as having 15 years in law enforcement. His vision and drive enables Black Talon Security to provide cutting-edge and customer focused cybersecurity solutions to businesses of all sizes. Gary has lectured to over 7,000 people at numerous national events. He is a sought after speaker and writer on the latest cybersecurity trends and mitigation strategies. Gary personally oversees all breaches and has been part of the team that has mitigated some of the largest distributed ransomware attacks in our Nations's history.

For more information about Black Talon head to https://www.blacktalonsecurity.com/

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Gary Salman: Hard-wired is always going to be more secure because a majority of wifi can be hacked. That's that's the reality of it. Um, once again, what's the person's intent, you know, how much time are they willing to do it, but some of the older wifi devices, there are tools you can download off the internet right now that will crack your wifi in minutes.

[00:00:53] Gary Salman: Like it's not even an allergy. When it comes to remodeling and renovating your home. There is a lot [00:01:00] tonight. We got you covered. This is around the house.

[00:01:17] Eric Goranson: We've got Gary Salman from CEO of BlackTalon security. Welcome

[00:01:26] Eric Goranson: Hi Gary. And then we've got a mutual friend who is also on our team here. Darren Broderson. Welcome to around the house. Finally, we get you on the show instead of in the background.

[00:01:44] Eric Goranson: yeah. Well, I wanted to talk security for a couple reasons here, because I tell you what Caroline's really great at opening emails that have attachments and getting hacked and sending them out to everybody else.

[00:02:16] Gary Salman: Absolutely.

[00:02:23] Caroline Blazovsky: This is the secret, but we all went to college together. So this is our reunion slash educational episode on, around the house. But yes, these two were both graduates at Muhlenberg college with me in 1994, not the ages, you know, we don't look our age, so it doesn't matter. But anyway, and these two guys, I liked the

[00:02:46] Gary Salman: You use those on

[00:02:51] Gary Salman: Oh yeah. Picking up, picking her off before or something like that, you know,[00:03:00]

[00:03:05] Caroline Blazovsky: there, Gary.

[00:03:13] Eric Goranson: I've been found a few times, so

[00:03:19] Eric Goranson: There we go. I think we have a non-proliferation treaty here. If nobody's firing then everybody.

[00:03:26] Gary Salman: Carolyn. How's that?

[00:03:31] Caroline Blazovsky: thanks guys. Thank you so

[00:03:33] Eric Goranson: So, Gary, let's talk about you a little bit. What is your expertise here? Because, uh, you've got quite the, uh, quite the backup. Yeah,

[00:03:49] Gary Salman: He remembers this, you know, I was writing programming code and I even had a little business. We had a little business, like a little side gig side hustle as like sophomores in college. Right. [00:04:00] So, um, yeah, so I really wait, what did you guys do? I didn't know that wait mailing or that day we'd like manage mailing lists for companies all throughout like Allentown and like sold them, the paint, all these different companies.

[00:04:27] Eric Goranson: were called matrix printers. Kids

[00:04:50] Gary Salman: Remember the typewriters that like you had like one little light screen LCD and you could like, see one second. And if you made a mistake, you can change that. Then you hit enter and you gotta commit. And [00:05:00] you're like, oh my God, I still had a typo start your whole damn paper over again. What the hell? I feel old.

[00:05:09] Eric Goranson: yeah, I took typing class in high school, not computer entry, so yeah, I, I can I, can I go the

[00:05:17] Eric Goranson: my teacher, he came in, he used to come in and we, we were first period. It was the, you started out in that and uh, he always had his coffee in his coffee mug, but four rows back, you could smell the whiskey in it.

[00:05:37] Gary Salman: It was in shop class and he cut off his fingers or something. Yeah. Fair point. But anyway, um, yeah, so look, I'm by trade. I'm a computer programmer. I've written millions of lines of code over.

[00:06:16] Gary Salman: Um, and that was kinda my first introduction to security, where we had just installed some relatively new state-of-the-art security measures because even back then systems were getting hacked. And I still remember to this day where we had installed the solution, my head engineer walks into my office. He is like, Hey, we got a major problem.

[00:06:53] Gary Salman: They didn't get into the system, but, uh, an attacker tried to breach it from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, FBI [00:07:00] invested the whole case and, uh, ended up arresting him. And the guy spent many years in jail because of that attack. So that was my first like, wake up call. Wow, this, this stuff's real. Right. You know, the, the risk that we could have had, we probably would have lost our business if he got in.

[00:07:31] Gary Salman: We're dealing with criminals all day long, right. We're dealing with the prevention of these criminals from gaining access to these systems and then we're dealing with. The unfortunate event of them breaking into it and holding these businesses and individuals hostage, because not only do they encrypt all the machines with ransomware and demand, hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars to decrypt the data, but they now also steal almost everyone's data.

[00:08:11] Gary Salman: Everything we do is connected to the internet and, and, you know, these systems are at risk, everything from, you know, financials to healthcare, to small businesses, to power grids and supply chains, everything and military, right. Everything's being touched by, by these types of events. Um, so yeah, it's, it's definitely an extremely interesting and dynamic field to be in.

[00:08:33] Eric Goranson: though our industry here in, in the, in the media side, like with Caroline and I we've had some huge problems with Salem media and a bunch of other different stations out there that have had full on ransomware attacks that has taken some systems down for weeks. I mean, I was watching my TV channel here and they were doing the weather on white boards because they couldn't [00:09:00] log into the weather computer.

[00:09:15] Gary Salman: you know, the

[00:09:20] Darrin Broderson: And I just actually just left the meeting, uh, about that is, uh, So Gary's point the cloud, the cloud is now a solution for a lot of media companies because the behind the scenes is that there are commercial logs. There are music logs, they're programming logs that are all generated by computer, which when the listener or the viewer for TV, uh, or even digital content is, uh, consuming that content you don't realize, but everything is locked.

[00:10:17] Darrin Broderson: And, um, you know, I would then throw it back to Gary. I know that with the healthcare field, uh, the HIPAA rules and privacy, you know, it was a whole nother layer in terms of what you're giving up by, uh, that, that data being breached. And it's, you know, it's, it's a real life problem these days,

[00:10:56] Eric Goranson: That does not sound like Caroline. And sure enough, I'm like, Hey, you [00:11:00] got to hit that thing. And she's like,

[00:11:09] Eric Goranson: And then, but we can't pick on Darren cause Caroline's want to Caroline's friends got hacked and send it back to her and she opened it again.

[00:11:18] Eric Goranson: have

[00:11:22] Caroline Blazovsky: So all of a sudden she sent the same thing back to me and like an idiot. I opened it. So I got, I got dirty. Yeah. I guess

[00:11:39] Gary Salman: You let him in. You know, it's, it's, it's the same concept. So, what do we do Gary? Like

[00:11:49] Gary Salman: then because we're remote employees, right. And remote workforce, it's a huge issue. And it's one of the reasons why there are a lot more attacks right now is because people are working off their home machines, they're logging [00:12:00] into their offices, right.

[00:12:22] Gary Salman: Let's take a family of four right there. They're all on the internet. All the kids have their laptops out. They're downloading games. They're doing all this stuff, moms on the same network and connected to her or her work network, right. Her office 13 year old son. Google's the name of a game downloads.

[00:13:00] Gary Salman: And, and pre COVID. That happened a little bit, but not to the extent that we're dealing with it now where most companies are mostly remote. Um, you have smart devices, everyone's got wifi. Everyone wants wifi that like spreads their internet through the entire neighborhood. Right. I got to have it in my basement, the third floor of my house.

[00:13:37] Gary Salman: And then when bad things happen, there's a possibility that it can spread from their machine to your machine. And the other part is if they're using your wifi, they're using your internet. If they're visiting sites that they shouldn't visit, for instance, that comes back to your IP address at your house under your account, you know?

[00:14:11] Gary Salman: Who cares? But they're not thinking about the security issue related to that. And then they have all this home automation. Right. I, you know, I'm sure you guys have done home automation stuff. Right? So you have your, your

[00:14:28] Gary Salman: in my house.

[00:15:01] Gary Salman: And I also have cameras. And she said, here's what happens every time. And she happens to deal with children. All right. So I'll leave it at that. Every time she walked from room to room, um, when she went into the next room, the music station would change to highly inappropriate radio stations. And she's got 13 year old kids in it.

[00:15:41] Gary Salman: Right? And this, this was a hundred percent proven, right? This wasn't an ecological thing.

[00:15:47] Gary Salman: reason that so we weren't able to figure out

[00:15:57] Caroline Blazovsky: Is it just power that they can like, I mean, what do you [00:16:00] find to be like the reasoning,

[00:16:16] Gary Salman: There's ways of hiding on the internet nowadays that takes a lot of government resources to track you down. But it's just not what we're going to do. We fixed our problem and prevented them from getting in again. But yeah, look, I think in this case it was just malicious, you know, to mess with our power trips, you know, things like that.

[00:16:52] Gary Salman: They were messing where they're emotionally. But, but the flip side to this scenario is when she found out they were watching her, she felt [00:17:00] personally violated. Right. So not only were they messing with the radio stations, so like, oh, so they could watch me throughout my entire day at my office. And the answer was, yes.

[00:17:24] Gary Salman: This is a huge invasion of privacy. And, and I think that's, I wouldn't want that, you know, you won't want someone watching what you're doing in your house, outside your house listening. Right. Which may even be worse. Um, that's, that's, that's a tough pill to swallow and people have to think about when they put these types of technologies in their homes that there's risk.

[00:18:02] Gary Salman: If it's connected to the internet, it's, it's susceptible to. Right. Every company has it's free. It's free. Yeah. It's game on you. You hook it up, you connect it. It's it's game on for the hackers. And, and sometimes there's systemic issues, right. There, there are companies that have wifi devices or modems that you, you know, you plug your fiber connection in, or your cable connection into those devices are systemically vulnerable, and there's hundreds of thousands or millions of them out there.

[00:18:54] Gary Salman: Right. They'll be able to potentially access those types of devices. So a lot of people don't put Eric you're [00:19:00] done

[00:19:19] Eric Goranson: And I'm going to throw some just big, broad names, like ring doorbell, or, you know, Alexa or any of these other devices that are. And I mean, I've got stuff that, you know, that, um, I can, you know, I can unlock my doors. I can open my garage door, you know, I can monitor my electrical system and all these other things as a whole house secure is the industry, or is it just company by company?

[00:19:57] Gary Salman: get into ours. So let's, [00:20:00] let's kind of break those out. So one of the things that you're starting to see more and I'll pick unreal.

[00:20:23] Gary Salman: So then you look at other camera companies that provide similar services as ring. They don't offer that. So technically if someone gains access to the server, intercepts that information, they can, they can see those feeds, those videos feed. So you want to start looking at things like that, strong passwords, like you alluded to a really.

[00:21:00] Gary Salman: There is no single piece of software or single piece of hardware, hardware, regardless of how much money you want to spend on it, that solves this problem. Right? So you can't just say, like, I'm just going to use a 20 character password in my system's not gonna be. It doesn't work that way, but maybe I implement the multi-factor authentication.

[00:21:45] Gary Salman: So some of these devices allow you to auto update, right? So the second it gets a notification that there's a new piece of software. Great. Maybe it's some new features, but kind of the secret sauce is most of the time it's security. I think we all know that [00:22:00] right? All the major vendors are constantly pounding out new updates.

[00:22:22] Gary Salman: So if they're not pushing out updates, they don't have security front and center, then ultimately that risk transfers to you. Right? Cause in the end, you're the end user. I mean, you also brought up a really interesting concept of this third party risk where one of these IOT manufacturers have their systems compromised and the hackers gain access to every single one of their customers, infrastructures it's happened.

[00:23:06] Gary Salman: Very, very difficult to recover from. So you have an IOT device hanging on your wall, a thermostat camera systems, um, smart devices, like TVs as a possible that through a piece of software, that's managed by a third party, they could feed access to that software and gain access to your vice flip the microphone on turn the cameras on capture your feeds.

[00:23:46] Gary Salman: You know, and, and, and that's what forces the issue for a while, or they gets too right. They have some massive lawsuit and now all of a sudden security is important, you know? So it, it's, it's important for, for individuals to start asking those questions on these, on these forums, on [00:24:00] these message boards, all these, you know, all these other places, Hey, how do I know my, my device is going to be, you know, safe and secure.

[00:24:18] Eric Goranson: Gary, I've got a question for you too. Uh, I'll use Darren as an example, let's say Darren's hanging out in Midtown Manhattan, he's mosey and down the block heading to a meeting, doing his thing.

[00:24:46] Gary Salman: Like for instance, I'm on, um,

[00:24:56] Eric Goranson: And I actually turned that feature off on my phone because it was [00:25:00] irritating. And I did thought it was a security risk is something like that. A security risk that you should be aware of with,

[00:25:15] Gary Salman: Often those networks are shared networks. So now your device appears on a network with everyone else that's connected. Um, so what I usually say is if you don't need the wifi, turn it off, especially. Bluetooth, right. If you're going to an airport, a hotel, a big city, you're traveling around what the hell, you know, what that do you need Bluetooth for?

[00:25:56] Gary Salman: So it's just like, you know, I'm sure you guys talk about home [00:26:00] security. You can put the little, you know, $12, you know, lock on the front of the door and a criminal comes by and laughs and takes their heel of their foot and applies a little pressure with a kick and the door flies open, or you can put, you know, a $500 top aligned, dead deadbolt in our alarm system and a big barking dog.

[00:26:31] Gary Salman: Look in, in the Darren scenario, I would say, turn that stuff off, right. I mean, it's also tracking where you are in many things, Gary,

[00:26:41] Caroline Blazovsky: So Gary, like for example, um, I really like the smart locks for houses, right? Cause I like the idea of not having a key, what's the danger there? Like, is it really not the best thing to do?

[00:26:59] Gary Salman: or three? [00:27:00] I think it's a couple of things. Those types of devices have a place, right? Especially with kids and family members and folks coming into your homes potentially to, to service them, not having to give a physical key out to them there's value.

[00:27:31] Gary Salman: And, and try and break into the Bluetooth signal and, and open your front door. Well, I guess if they want in bad enough, that's a possibility, I think your bigger risk is your actual account, right? That account you use to manage those devices, right? And you go to the website, slage.com for argument's sake, you create your account, right.

[00:28:05] Gary Salman: Like that's probably more of a. Then some dude rolling up with some high-tech Bluetooth cracking tools. Right? Look, it's possible. Like I said, if, if you're a big enough target, you know, um, they, they want to take off with Carolyn's plane that she lands in her backyard. I mean, you know, you got, you got, you got my JAG, JAG, Jaguar, but look, it's, I think this type of work, this is where we are as a society.

[00:28:59] Gary Salman: So [00:29:00] I think Carolyn's idea is perfect right related to tax service. She's, she's got this Bluetooth lock that opens the front door of her house and she's thinking, and I don't mean to be talking for you, but I think conceptually she's thinking, well, how can someone walk up to my door and hack this thing and get the door to pop open for me as a security expert, I'd say that's less likely the more likely avenue is I'm going to hack her account online and then leverage that account to possibly, you know, do things to her door.

[00:29:37] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Uh, Garrett, Darren wanted to throw out a question

[00:29:49] Darrin Broderson: Tech savvy. I, I think even, uh, chatting about it now, it's fine. Feel like I'm a beginner, but the Gary, what would be the best way? Um, [00:30:00] you're talking about having unique passwords for unique sites. Uh, what's the best way these days aside from, uh, scribbling it on a notebook that you stick under your bed, what's a great way to manage passwords.

[00:30:18] Gary Salman: So there are some amazing tools out there. I think Darren, Darren nailed it, right? How do we, how do we deal with all these passwords? Because in the end, what do we do? We're like, well, I'll use this password for this bank, this bank in this bank.

[00:30:43] Gary Salman: So Carolyn uses the password. I like, you know, home improvements, uh, is, or is her password, right? I like home improvements is her password. And she logs into a bank using that password. That bank is compromised. They [00:31:00] steal her username and our password. Then they take her username and password and load it into a hacking tool called a credential stuffer.

[00:31:30] Gary Salman: So, so, so to Darren's point, how do we create?

[00:31:40] Caroline Blazovsky: that's what's happening. Exactly. Gary

[00:31:56] Gary Salman: Cause I can scribble this stuff on a piece of paper. Like, that's the worst thing you can do. [00:32:00] So there are tools called password managers. You can look them up. Some of them are free. Some of you pay literally a couple dollars. They are multi-platform capable. So you can use them on an apple, on a windows machine, on an iPhone, on an Android.

[00:32:32] Gary Salman: You go to American express, you log in, you have this tool installed on your desktop and you immediately say, I want to change my password. Okay. So you enter your current password that you've used on 10 different websites. And then. Um, the American express webpage will, redisplay an option to create a new password.

[00:33:10] Gary Salman: And then the password management tool memorizes that password. So now the second time that Carolyn goes to American express, the password manager opens and says, would you like me to insert your username and password? And Carolyn says, yes. And it didn't search the username and password and logs are in.

[00:33:42] Gary Salman: That's a very effective way. If you look at many reasons, if you look at the reasons why many people have their personal stuff hacked, or even their businesses, it's because they reuse passwords or they fall for the phishing and spear phishing emails, or they have these vulnerabilities, which we haven't even talked about.

[00:34:07] Caroline Blazovsky: flat

[00:34:23] Gary Salman: Look, the reality is as far as I know, there's only ever been one compromise of those accounts. But what I would say to everyone is it's way more likely that your current passwords get stolen and reused on different websites than it is for the password tool to get. It makes it harder.

[00:34:42] Caroline Blazovsky: It's common sense. Like make them jump over this hoop, run through this fence, do this. If they're going to hack you, at least give them a run for their money. Like just don't hand it over. That's the thing

[00:34:53] Gary Salman: See what w

[00:35:14] Eric Goranson: It's just a, Hey, you know, I got this, got that. It's still secure. I've got capitals. I've got. Different symbols from a gash to a pound, to a money to whatever, you know,

[00:35:26] Darrin Broderson: giving us the code. He's giving us here,

[00:35:34] Eric Goranson: Yeah. But had different levels for different staff.

[00:35:39] Gary Salman: more

[00:35:49] Gary Salman: Can, you can use that same tool to manage your wifi, your router, your modem. Maybe even if you have a firewall right at your home or your small business like that, that's another way you can, you [00:36:00] can protect those devices.

[00:36:02] Darrin Broderson: think, I think it's a great thing for, you know, for parents and kids, you know, to maybe, uh, you know, I think in terms of education, my dad is the first, I'm the first person he calls. And then I call a buddy of mine. Who's smarter than me. And, uh, you know, maybe this, maybe this kind of helps that, you know, so that the person, uh, child, adults, whoever can kind of feel independent enough, uh, technology technologically, so that they can kind of keep their

[00:36:32] Gary Salman: So, so, so Darren has an interesting concept here. So one of the things that these password managers can do is, um, allow you to share your password with family members and friends without showing them the password. So maybe there's something you want. Yeah. Maybe for instance, for some reason, you're going to be going away for a while out of the country and you want your neighbor to have access to.

[00:37:12] Gary Salman: Um, maybe you can allow them to use a certain type of application a certain time of the day by restricting their passwords. And there are actual parental applications that allow or restrict access to the internet to certain types of websites, to certain types of applications. Like there's a lot of cool technology out there.

[00:37:38] Eric Goranson: contractor working at your house, you could share your door code with them without ever giving him so much of the access to that. If it's that type of door code, where they could have

[00:37:55] Eric Goranson: wouldn't work on mine.

[00:38:06] Gary Salman: it. So I don't know if that was, yeah, it depends. Some of these, some of these, uh, entry devices, um, allow different levels of access into them.

[00:38:34] Gary Salman: Um, and then, you know, obviously obviously take it away. But I do know some of these, these electronic door locks, you can assign say up to 10 or 15 different codes for different, you know, different, uh, vendors, employees, for sure. Things like that. And that way we punching it in.

[00:39:12] Gary Salman: access all the documents.

[00:39:33] Gary Salman: So there are, there are, there are families that actually do that husbands and wives who will have their own, for instance, last pass or Dashlane accounts. And they actually put them in a sealed envelope. They go to their attorney's office and they say, Hey, in the event of something catastrophic. You know, the attorney is authorized to open it and turn the password, a decryption code over to the spouse or the significant other right.

[00:40:06] Eric Goranson: stuff. Now I have a question for you, Gary, is it smart for a homeowner in a residential application to start using a VPN or virtual

[00:40:18] Gary Salman: Yeah, so let's, there are typically two types of VPN, so let's make sure we're talking kind of the same thing arc, there's the type of VPN that allows you to say connect from your home computer to the corporate environment, right. And you're basically taking your home network and connecting it to your office network.

[00:40:45] Eric Goranson: just even if you're not trying to get in there, you know, if you, there's a lot of security software that you can buy that, that will throw the quote unquote VPN package with it, or you can purchase that.

[00:41:05] Gary Salman: yeah. So VPNs do play a critical role, um, that the type that you and I are talking about now, they're good for certain things like maybe you are in a live in a country or you're traveling to a country where the government monitors everything restricts access to say US-based news, right.

[00:41:42] Gary Salman: There's a couple advantages to that for, for various reasons. Hopefully you're using it for good purposes. Um, but you can limit what your, or basically restrict what your internet service provider tracks about you. Right. So they're not going to typically be able to see what websites you're visiting, things like that.

[00:42:16] Gary Salman: Yeah. Right. It's interesting.

[00:42:19] Gary Salman: alive. Yeah. Carolyn

[00:42:35] Gary Salman: Yeah.

[00:42:58] Gary Salman: Uh, Eric help, [00:43:00] once I count, uh, the VPNs do help limit some of that, it does kind of mask your, your, your, your location. Um, so there are, there are some, there are some benefits to it. Um, yeah, I

[00:43:15] Gary Salman: So the way these VPNs work, it depends on what technology are you using.

[00:43:38] Gary Salman: To the CNN or Fox news servers. And then the data sent back to you pretty quick, right? Fractions of a second. When you use a VPN, what it does is it connects you to an anonymous server somewhere in the world. So you connect to the server. Then the server makes this connection to CNN or Fox news. And then CNN or Fox news sends the data back to this anonymous server.

[00:44:17] Gary Salman: Some people say 15 to 30%, slow down sometimes more, sometimes less. All right. So once again, you're balancing, you know, security with, um, you know, efficiency. So, uh, but yeah, look, there's, there's definitely reasons why you want to do that. And the other interesting thing is if you let's just say for argument's sake, you're, you're going to Germany.

[00:44:56] Gary Salman: So there are, there are some advantages to using them as well. So, [00:45:00] and you're

[00:45:14] Gary Salman: store mode.

[00:45:29] Gary Salman: questing inside the store for, yeah, I haven't seen that yet. It's very cool though. Right?

[00:45:47] Caroline Blazovsky: So Gary, how do we keep our anonymity? How do we search sites?

[00:46:12] Caroline Blazovsky: And, you know,

[00:46:30] Gary Salman: Uh, take a look at a alternative to Chrome called brave. I think it's brave.com. It's an, it's a type of browser that, um, purports to be more, uh, not only secure, but, uh, it blocks a lot of the tracking capabilities that these websites have. It informs you, Hey, this website is trying to drop all this stuff on your computer.

[00:47:15] Gary Salman: Um, so you know, maybe a combination of duck, duck go and a VPN may help. Limit what someone can know or track about. You keep in mind that nothing's a hundred percent. If someone wants information and they have enough resources, they're probably going to get it. Um, so, you know, duck, duck go is a, is another good way of doing it.

[00:47:51] Gary Salman: So if you're a person who constantly looks up clothing and shoes or tools, right, there are, there are [00:48:00] marketing companies that will buy that data and be like, oh, this is a tool guy. Hey, you know, The company that starts with M and the company that starts with D right. They're gonna be like, oh yeah, send that data over.

[00:48:33] Gary Salman: And you're actually taking an ad out on people who are extremely liberal letter, 60 to 90 for argument's sake, you're missing the wrong target market. So anyway, we're off topic a little bit, but conceptually, the selling of this information is really where the value is.

[00:48:53] Eric Goranson: Don't try blocking them. Actually. You

[00:49:23] Darrin Broderson: It knows your browsing and your user, the user experience companies can now follow you and know that you went into the store. Uh geo-farming geo-fencing so, you know, these, this device that we all take with us, it's, it's kind of like that diary that I think companies tap into what what's a good practice in terms of, you know, hiding, guarding, shutting off on, you talked about the Bluetooth in life.

[00:50:14] Gary Salman: So, you know, you can actually go into these platforms now and start turning off a lot of these tracking this. We could do a whole nother show on this. So, but I'll give you a high level answer. Darren, Google searching, you know, what does Alexa know about me? And believe it or not, you can go into Google's website now and actually hear the recordings that they have about you.

[00:50:49] Gary Salman: Look the geo, the geo location, Diane, look, that's a powerful marketing tool and, and you go to the Javits center for a trade show, the auto show for it. Right. [00:51:00] Maybe the major auto manufacturer and be like, Hey, I want to geo locate around the Javits center in New York city. And I want to deliver ads on my 20, 23 vehicle.

[00:51:26] Gary Salman: We flip through the 30 pages and hit accept, and you just agreed to give them whatever they wanted and you can't be like, oh, I didn't know. Right. I didn't agree to that. Yeah. You agreed to your text messages or phone book, your GPS coordinates your, your camera, your microphone, all these things. And then they're like, but it's, it's an apple device.

[00:52:06] Gary Salman: And can I go in there and change the settings and what I'm kind of telling you as you can, right? Most of the time you can turn off all these tracking capabilities, the recording capabilities, uh, geolocation, you just, you just have to go into these applications and do it. And like I said before, just search it right.

[00:52:37] Gary Salman: So just.

[00:52:54] Caroline Blazovsky: Right.

[00:53:14] Gary Salman: so hardwired is always going to be more secure because a majority of wifi can be hacked.

[00:53:45] Gary Salman: You can't take, I don't know of any commercially available, right. To, uh, uh, thermostats, for instance, that have, you know, a network Jack in the back of the, the thermostat, they're like, Hey, set up your wife. I like, there's not even an option. So if we've liked these [00:54:00] types of devices and we can accept the risk, then we're going to have to have wireless.

[00:54:21] Gary Salman: You can't function as a person or you can't function as a business. So it's kind of like this, Hey, where's the middle ground here where I can function as an, a person or I can function as a business. And that's where a lot of organizations land. What's at risk, right? What's what's behind or inside my network that if I do get hit, that could potentially put me out of business.

[00:54:56] Gary Salman: Um, it's just anything in life. It's about risk mitigation. You want to [00:55:00] drive 75, 80 and a 40 mile an hour zone. Okay. There's some risk associated with that, you know, it may work out. Okay. It may not for you. Uh, you know, maybe I'll take my reciprocate and just go right through the wall and hope not to hit a, uh, you know, 120 volts or, um, like I did, uh, an AC conduit.

[00:55:47] Gary Salman: Yep. Yeah. That's what I got.

[00:56:07] Gary Salman: turns into a brick.

[00:56:14] Eric Goranson: well actually it's in the cause it's got a computer in it. So then what happens is, is that usually most likely that fif will go into the Milwaukee service center and go, Hey, I want a new one. Cause this one quit working and then they plug into the computer and go, oh, that's Eric G saw that was stolen here on

[00:56:31] Gary Salman: And we're going to return it to him. Meet the sheriff.

[00:56:36] Gary Salman: Exactly. Cool. Yeah. Look, I mean, this was cool technology, you know, if you. Some of these connected devices have tremendous value. You know, your, your contractor, you know, for instance, these tools are expensive. I know what they, I know what they run for.

[00:57:01] Eric Goranson: of that stuff that happens too with those is a great example, is that you're seeing contractors, you know, their, their employees, maybe you're doing, working on the weekends, doing side jobs, using their work tools and they can geo-fence those things on the weekend.

[00:57:27] Gary Salman: on the tools and stuff. T-Mobile right. Rental.

[00:57:38] Eric Goranson: You know, when some of these things here, I mean, emails are always a problem. That's probably the easiest way for people that to get access into the system, right. Is just through a phishing email,

[00:58:03] Gary Salman: Uh, it's all free. Um, you know, that that's, that's a big one. Any type of account that you log into, go into Google and say, how do I enable multi-factor authentication for chase.com, right? And a document will come up and I'll show you how to do it. Enable MFA, MFA will, uh, defeat a majority of attacks. It's pretty hard to get around MFA.

[00:58:46] Gary Salman: So someone steals your username and password what's going to happen is your phone's going to light and be like, who the hell is trying to log into my account. Right. So you're gonna know instantly and you just deny it. Um, so that's, that's definitely a big win, the, uh, password [00:59:00] managers, which we talked about, um, You know, the other thing that I see sometimes is be careful with like free applications versus paid ones, especially if you're using them for business, like tools that you might use to remote into a home computer.

[00:59:36] Gary Salman: Um, so once again, it comes down to, you know, risk mitigation. I,

[00:59:56] Eric Goranson: Cause we know what's we knew who's in the building.

[01:00:20] Gary Salman: Stacey, the mom who works for a bank, her computer sits on it's own separate network, same internet connection, and then all the kids, right. And her significant other, they sit on another network. These networks can't talk to one another. So if the kid, the kids download something malicious or someone opens a malicious net, uh, attachment it, can't spread to the mom's computer.

[01:01:10] Gary Salman: So you can roll into, you know, name the brand of, of, uh, uh, stores like staples or, or, or, um, any of these and go, yeah, best buy, right. Um, you know, and get yourself maybe a cheaper firewall. It's not going to be, you know, a business grade, but look a properly configured firewalls, very effective, right. To add an additional layer of protection.

[01:01:54] Gary Salman: Uh, I think the biggest mistake that I see from the business perspective, cause I'm sure you have business executives on [01:02:00] listening to your show as well. They all rely on their it company for security. And I T companies are really, yeah, like, I mean, Carolyn's raising her hand, like what's that I tell you guys, and, and, and women are great at like fixing computers and keeping you up to date, but they're not security folks.

[01:02:37] Gary Salman: Absolutely. They play very different roles. So what, the reason why businesses fail is they're trusting the person that fixes their computers to implement proper security interest in the real world. It doesn't work. Right. So, you know, look, look for cyber firms that can come in and harden your, um, your, your business.

[01:03:14] Gary Salman: Family offices. They're called. You have people who, uh, do a lot of stock trading either for themselves or, you know, for a select group of, of high net worth customers. They work from home. Look, they have tremendous risk, you know, if they get hit. Potentially cause, uh, some type of issue with accounts in the millions of dollars or more.

[01:03:44] Eric Goranson: so Gary, before we go, how would somebody track you guys down to a well help with their security? Whether it's their home or office or business or whatever they got

[01:03:54] Gary Salman: Yeah. So you can enter a website it's black talent, which is T a L O N security.com [01:04:00] black talent, security.com. Um, there's links there to, to hit us up phone numbers, things like that. That would be, uh, the best way to do it. So find us online. So we're also on Facebook and awesome and all that good stuff.

[01:04:31] Caroline Blazovsky: Yes. He's more than a friend.

[01:04:47] Eric Goranson: around the house. Got it. All right, guys. Thanks for coming on today. I'm Eric G and I'm Caroline B and you've been listening to around the house.[01:05:00]