www.richardjespers.com
  • Home
  • Books
  • Journals
  • Blog

Levin is Paul Revere of Cyberspace

4/1/2016

0 Comments

 
Picture
A WRITER'S WIT
For any writer, the ability to look at a sentence and see what's superfluous, what can be altered, revised, expanded, and, especially, cut, is essential. It's satisfying to see that sentence shrink, snap into place, and ultimately emerge in a more polished form: clear, economical, sharp.
Francine Prose
Born April 1, 1947

My Book World

Picture
Levin, Adam, and Beau Friedlander. Swiped: How to Protect Yourself in a World Full of Scammers, Phishers, and Identify Thieves. New York: Public Affairs, 2015.
 
When you aren’t an expert in a particular field, you can be cowed by someone who  is (supposedly) an expert. That’s how I feel as I read Levin’s book Swiped. It’s a clever title. You think at first: Oh, he’s talking about how you swipe your card in a reader when purchasing an item, and then you get caught up in the pun. He’s really talking about when someone else swipes your card and swipes it in a reader or uses it to swipe your data. As a student of rhetoric, I’m always suspicious of what seems like hyperbolic speech, oversell, overkill. At the same time, Levin could be Paul Revere, and most of us just haven't heard his cry. Although Levin’s book provides a great deal of usable information, I do believe he could have honed it down to one well-edited magazine article, and it would have been just as effective. You be the judge.
 
Let me share a few of the nuggets I found interesting:

“More than 500 million photographs are uploaded to major websites every day. More than 2 billion pictures are taken on mobile devices every day” (Kindle Location 85). Elsewhere Levin cautions against using geotagged photos at websites like Facebook because it can give thieves clues to your PII (personally identifiable information). It probably begins with the settings in your camera or iPhoto. I think it makes sense NOT to geotag.
 
“Debit cards increase your exposure to fraud. Use a credit card” (Kindle Location 578). Levin asserts that “carefully placed cameras” (by thieves?) can record PIN numbers as you enter them in an ATM or device at your favorite store. Not sure what his authority or source is on this assertion, and he’s assuming that thieves could EASILY install their own cameras at ATM stations. Seriously?
 
He warns against the free release of your social security number: “With your Social Security number in the wind, whoever finds it—or, more likely, whoever buys it on one of the many black-market information exchanges on the deep web—holds the keys to every part of your life. What that means—plain and simple—is that you’re going to need an efficient way to keep one eye over your shoulder, all the time” (Kindle Location 591). The paranoiac tone notwithstanding, Levin’s advice is probably good. Elsewhere in the book, he directs the reader to keep only a COPY of your Medicare card in your wallet with all but the last four numbers blacked out, the “M” or “F,” as well. This way, you can still inform someone who needs the number (medical personnel) but protect yourself from unwarranted use if someone should steal your wallet. He also warns against carrying your Social Security card (or copy) for the very same reasons.
 
At one point Levin makes a list: “We expose our most sensitive personal information any time we
 
Pick up a phone, respond to a text, click on a link, or carelessly provide personal information to someone we don’t know;
 
Fail to properly secure computers or devices;
 
Create easy-to-crack passwords;
 
Discard, rather than shred, documents that contain PII;
 
Respond to an email that directs us to call a number we can’t independently confirm, or complete an attachment that asks for our PII in an insecure environment;
 
Save our user ID or password on a website or in an app as a shortcut for future logins;
 
Use the same user ID or password throughout our financial, social networking, and email universes;
 
Take [online] quizzes that subtly ask for information we’ve provided as the answers to security questions on various websites.
 
Snap pictures with our smartphone or digital camera without disabling the geotagging function;
 
Use our email address as a user name/ID, if we have the option to change it;
 
Use PINS like 1234 or a birthday;
 
Go twenty-four hours without reviewing our bank and credit card accounts to make absolutely sure that every transaction we see is familiar;
 
Fail to enroll in free transactional monitoring programs offered by banks, credit unions, and credit card providers that notify us every time there is any activity in our accounts;
 
Use a free Wi-Fi network [i.e. cafés or even airports] without confirming it is correctly identified and secure, to check email or access financial services websites that contain our sensitive data” (Kindle Location 668-678). These tips are all good advice. I only question whether we need to check our accounts EVERY DAY. Perhaps every second or third day, even once a week?

“The deep web is a hidden part of the Internet. It consists of a vast number of sites, most of them thoroughly boring, that can’t be found by a traditional search engine like Google. To access these sites, you need a password, a specific URL, a sophisticated understanding of how computers communicate, or sometimes all of the above. The deep web is four hundred to six hundred times larger than the ‘surface web,’ that is, the familiar sites you can access via search engines and see every day” (Kindle Location 781).
Hm, yes, okay. On the one hand, I want to run screaming into the street. On the other, I want to laugh. So . . . the deep, dark web is LARGER than our mere regular Internet? But it is also harder to break into? Perhaps the underworld of crime has always been that way, but something about Levin’s tone makes me wary. Moreover, he repeats many, many times that everyone, EVERYONE, will be hacked or in some way attacked by parties wanting access to our personal digital information. Mathematically, that doesn’t seem possible. It’s like saying EVERYONE will have a car accident in his or her lifetime, or EVERYONE will contract TB or AIDS. Some people just won't.
 
All these admonitions, in a nutshell, are what Levin’s book is about. If I were to liken it to a musical form, I would say it is a rondo: Theme ABACADA or perhaps Variations on a Theme. He keeps repeating the same themes in slightly different ways. A full quarter of the book consists of five appendices, which repeat oft-harped-on information presented earlier.
 
Again, Levin seems to offer the reader/consumer/citizen-of-the-world valuable data, but his Paul Revere appeal could have been reduced to bite-sized pieces. He could have skipped many of the useless or situation-specific anecdotes and provided the reader with a little card to keep in the wallet or purse. Sometimes too much information can also be too little.
NEXT TIME: New Yorker Fiction 2016

Picture
READ MY ‘BEHIND THE BOOK’ BLOG SERIES for My Long-Playing Records & Other Stories. In these posts I speak of the creative process I use to write each story. Buy a copy here!
 
Introduction to My Long-Playing Records
"My Long-Playing Records" — The Story
"A Certain Kind of Mischief"
"Ghost Riders"
"The Best Mud"
"Handy to Some"
"Blight"
"A Gambler's Debt"
"Tales of the Millerettes"
"Men at Sea"
"Basketball Is Not a Drug"
"Engineer"
"Snarked"
"Killing Lorenzo"
"The Age I Am Now"
"Bathed in Pink"
 
Listen to My Long-Playing Records Podcasts:
"A Certain Kind of Mischief"
"The Best Mud"
"Handy to Some"
"Tales of the Millerettes"
"Men at Sea"
"My Long-Playing Records"
"Basketball Is Not a Drug"
"Snarked"
"Killing Lorenzo"
"Bathed in Pink"
Also available on iTunes.

0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    AUTHOR
    Richard Jespers is a writer living in Lubbock, Texas, USA.

    See my profile at Author Central:
    http://amazon.com/author/rjespers


    Richard Jespers's books on Goodreads
    My Long-Playing Records My Long-Playing Records
    ratings: 1 (avg rating 5.00)


    Archives

    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011



    Categories

    All
    Acting
    Actors
    African American History
    Aging
    Alabama
    Alaska
    Aldo Leopold
    Andy Warhol
    Arizona
    Arkansas
    Art
    Atrial Fibrillation
    Authors
    Authors' Words
    Barcelona
    Biography
    Blogging About Books
    Blogs
    Books
    California
    Cancer
    Cars
    Catalonia
    Colorado
    Cooking
    Creative Nonfiction
    Culinary Arts
    Deleting Facebook
    Ecology
    Education
    Environment
    Epigraphs
    Essays
    Feminism
    Fiction
    Fifty States
    Film
    Florida
    Georgia
    Grammar
    Greece
    Gun Violence
    Hawaii
    Heart Health
    Historic Postcards
    History
    Humor
    Idaho
    Iowa
    Journalism
    LGBTQ
    Libraries
    Literary Biography
    Literary Journals
    Literary Topics
    Literature
    Maine
    Massachusetts
    Memoir
    Michigan
    Minnesota
    Mississippi
    M K Rawlings
    Musicians
    Nevada
    New Hampshire
    New Mexico
    New Yorker Stories
    Nonfiction
    North Carolina
    Novelist
    Ohio
    Pam Houston
    Parker Posey
    Photography
    Playwrights
    Poetry
    Politics
    Psychology
    Publishing
    Quotations
    Race
    Reading
    Recipes
    Seattle
    Short Story
    South Carolina
    Spain
    Susan Faludi
    Teaching
    Tennessee
    Texas
    Theater
    The Novel
    Travel
    Travel Photographs
    True Crime
    #TuesdayThoughts
    TV
    U.S.
    Vermont
    Voting
    War
    Washington
    Wisconsin
    World War II
    Writer's Wit
    Writing


    RSS Feed

    Blogroll

    alicefrench.wordpress.com
    kendixonartblog.com
    Valyakomkova.blogspot.com

    Websites

    Caprock Writers' Alliance
    kendixonart.com

    tedkincaid.com
    www.trackingwonder.com
    www.skans.edu
    www.ttu.edu
    www.newpages.com
    www.marianszczepanski.com
    William Campbell Contemporary Art, Inc.
    Barbara Brannon.com
    Artsy.net
WWW.RICHARDJESPERS.COM  ©2011-2025
                    BOOKS  PHOTOS  PODCASTS  JOURNALS  BLOG