The City of Austin aims to protect and secure cyberspace by participating in national public awareness programs such as the STOP. THINK. CONNECT.™ campaign.
We encourage you to help yourself and others in the Austin community to be safer and more secure online. Practice good online safety habits with the following cybersecurity tips and advice:
- Keep security software current with the latest security software, web browser, and operating system to defend against viruses, malware, and other online threats.
- Turn on automatic software updates (if an available option) to defend against known risks.
- Protect all web-enabled devices (e.g., computers, smart phones, tablets, gaming systems) that connect to the Internet from viruses and malware with the latest security software.
- Secure your accounts and protect your personal information by asking account providers for protection beyond passwords. Many now offer additional ways for you to verify who you are before you conduct business on that site.
- Make passwords long and strong by combining capital and lowercase letters with numbers and symbols to create a more secure password.
- Create unique passwords for every account to help thwart cybercriminals.
- Keep a list of your passwords and store it in a safe, secure place away from your computer.
- Set the privacy and security settings on websites to your comfort level for information sharing.
- Delete or if appropriate, mark as junk email, suspicious email, tweets and posts containing links that could compromise your computer.
- Limit the type of business you conduct at Wi-Fi hotspots and adjust the security settings on your device to limit who can access your machine.
- Check to be sure that sites are security enabled when banking and shopping online. Look for web addresses with “https://” or “shttp://”, which means the site takes extra measures to help secure your information.
- Check trusted websites for the latest information on how to stay safe online, and share with friends, family, and colleagues.
- Protect your valuable work, music, photos, and other digital information by backing it up and storing it safely.
- Report stolen finances or identities and other cybercrime to the Austin Police Department’s Financial Crimes Unit, and to the Attorney General of Texas or the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).
To learn more about what you can do to protect yourself and others from cyber threats, visit http://www.dhs.gov/stopthinkconnect.
STOP. THINK. CONNECT.™ is a trademark of the STOP. THINK. CONNECT. Messaging Convention, Inc. The logos and artwork connected with the STOP. THINK. CONNECT. trademark are copyrighted, 2010-2011. All Rights Reserved. The trademark and logo may only be used in accordance with the license provided at www.stopthinkconnect.org/license.