The research also found that vendor self-disclosures increased by 69%

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Users’ feeds were spammed with posts from strangers on the pages of celebrities

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Today is Ukraine Independence day. It’s also the six-month anniversary of the official launch of Russia’s invasion into Ukraine, with no clear end to the aggression in sight. Despite the widespread fears of cyber war at the outset of the invasion, no highly damaging incidents such as crippling attacks on Ukraine’s power grid have yet occurred.

As our updated timeline shows, however, the invasion did begin on February 24 with a disturbing assault on Ukraine’s communications capabilities via an attack on satellite provider Viasat, attributed to Russia’s GRU intelligence arm. Since then, a spate of digital disruptions by Russia, and digital defenses by Ukraine and its allies, point to a steady drumbeat of mostly low-level but steady and robust cyber assaults.

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Business email compromise (BEC) attacks, where hackers hijack finance-related email threads and trick employees into wiring money to the wrong accounts, has led to losses of tens of billions of dollars over the past several years. These scams are growing more sophisticated, and hackers have developed ways to bypass multi-factor authentication (MFA) on cloud productivity services like Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365).

A BEC attack recently analyzed by cloud incident response company Mitiga used an adversary-in-the-middle (AitM) phishing attack to bypass Microsoft Office 365 MFA and gain access to a business executive’s account and then managed to add a second authenticator device to the account for persistent access. According to the researchers, the campaign they analyzed is widespread and targets large transactions of up to several million dollars each.

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Equipping and guiding your digitally connected child is one of the toughest challenges you will face as a parent. As your child grows and changes, so too will their online activities. Friend groups, favorite apps, and online interests can shift from one month to the next, which is why parental controls can be a parent’s best friend.  

According to a report from Common Sense Media, teens spend an average of seven hours and 22 minutes on their phones a day. Tweens (ages 8 to 12) spend four hours and 44 minutes daily. This is time outside of schoolwork. 

That is a lot of time to stroll the streets of cyberspace for entertainment purposes, and it’s only increased since the pandemic.  

Striking a balance between screen time and healthy device use is an always-evolving challenge. On the one hand, your child’s device is an essential channel connecting them to their self-identity, peer acceptance, and emotional well-being. On the other hand, that same device is also the door that can bring issues such as cyberbullying, predators, risky behavior, and self-image struggles into your child’s life.  

Raising the Safety Bar 

Parental controls are tools that allow parents to set controls on their children’s internet use. Controls include content filters (inappropriate content), usage limits (time controls), and monitoring (tracking activity). 

Many of the technology your family already owns or sites your kids visit have basic parental controls (i.e., built-in controls for android and iPhone and social networks such as YouTube). However, another level of parental control comes in software specifically engineered to filter, limit, and track digital activity. These consumer-designed parental controls offer families a higher, more powerful form of protection.  

 If you are like many parents who land on this blog, you’ve hit a rough patch. You have concerns about your child’s online activity but aren’t sure how to begin restoring balance. Rightly, you want to find the best parental control software and put digital safeguards in place.  

8 Signs Your Family Needs Parental Controls 

Every family dynamic is different, as is every family’s approach to online monitoring. However, most parents can agree that when a negative influence begins to impact the family’s emotional and physical health, exploring new solutions can help get you back on track.  

Depending on your child’s age, you may need to consider parental controls if:  

 1. They don’t respond when you talk to them  

If your child is increasingly engrossed in their phone and it’s causing communication issues in your family, you may want to consider software that includes time limits. Connecting with your child during device-free time can improve communication.  

2. They’ve started ignoring homework and family responsibilities  

There are a lot of reasons grades can plummet, or interests can fade. However, if your child is spending more and more time online, limiting or monitoring what goes on in that time can help restore emotional balance and self-discipline to meet responsibilities.  

3. Their browser history shows access to risky content  

Innocent online searches can lead to not so innocent results or children may go looking for content simply because they’re curious. Parental controls automatically block age-inappropriate sites and filter websites, apps, and web searches.  

4. They won’t give you their device without a fight  

If the phone has become the center of your child’s world at the cost of parental respect and family rules, they may be engaged in inappropriate behavior online, connecting with the wrong friends, or struggling with tech balance. With the proper parental controls, a parent can block risky content, view daily activity, and set healthy time limits.  

5. They’re losing interest in family outings and other non-digital activities  

Poor habits form quietly over time. If your child has dramatically changed their focus in the past three to six months, consider zooming in on why. It may not be technology use, but you may consider an additional layer of protection if it is.   

6. They go into another room to respond to a text  

While everyone deserves privacy, if constantly sneaking away to communicate with a friend is your child’s new norm, you may consider making some screen time adjustments.  

7. They are exhausted  

Unbeknownst to parents, kids might be exchanging sleep for screen time. Parental controls can help you nip this unhealthy habit. Setting time limits can help kids experience deeper sleep, better moods, more focus, and more energy. 

8. They overshare online  

If you browse through your child’s social media and notice their profiles are public instead of private, or if your child tends to overshare personal information, parental controls can help you monitor future activity. 

Ideally, we’d all prefer to live in a world where we didn’t need parental controls at all. Unfortunately, that is neither a present nor future reality. So, we recalibrate, keep learning, and keep adding to our parenting skills. As always, we believe the first go-to digital safety tool is investing in consistent open and honest conversation with your child. And the second tool? Yup, reach for the parental controls. While you may hear some hemming and hawing from your kids at first, the peace of mind you gain from having parental controls in place will be worth it.  

The post 8 Signs It May Be Time for Parental Controls appeared first on McAfee Blog.

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