Internet security
According to the results of an international study conducted in the European Region, in the Middle East and Africa, it turned out that the index of the Russian Federation’s citizens on security in the Internet reached the European average. In this case, more than 11,000 people (including children and pensioners) from 27 countries were interviewed. They showed their knowledge of their use of proven web resources and programs. Unfortunately, in Russia the knowledge of users about security methods in the virtual space is not enough to ensure protection against the malicious content of web resources to the fullest extent, therefore information security on the Internet is still an acute problem of our time, which affects every user.
Interestingly, the average knowledge rate on information protection is only 44 points out of 100, and this is in all countries of the world, which means a very low level of knowledge about Internet threats, which is what many Internet fraudsters use. Many respondents still use antivirus software and long unique passwords, but this is not enough; additional training is needed in software and technologies for secure data transfer. Also, 56% of respondents said they do not understand the importance and effectiveness of such knowledge, and 78% do not know how to fence their computer system from network attacks, such as phishing, and theft of personal data. Meanwhile, 87% use antivirus software, and only 18% install antivirus software on their smartphones. Apparently, many simply do not understand the fact that it is much easier to prevent viruses from infecting a computer than to search for and deactivate them later. It is curious that only half of the users, knowing that online fraud with virtual money and the theft of personal data is common, change personal information on social networks to limit the information they place on the Internet.
February 7, 2012, the International Day of Safe Internet was held, and in honor of this volunteer actions were organized in Europe, in which more than six hundred Microsoft employees took part in 20 different European countries. The main objective of these actions is to teach children the development and proper use of modern technologies and software, which contain proven and reliable methods of information protection. I hope that in our country, measures will be taken and actions are being taken to increase the level of knowledge of Russian citizens about information security on the Internet.