Defense is just as important as offense, and when it comes to the digital age, protecting yourself online is a major priority.
The rise of cybercrimes like data breaches, identity theft, and scams is leaving consumers to face the economic fallout. Black and Latino communities specifically are disproportionately affected by cybercrimes, with consumers from those groups being more likely to lose money to digital scams or cyberattacks than white consumers, according to the 2024 Cyber Readiness Report by Consumer Reports, Aspen Digital, and the Global Cyber Alliance.
According to Dr. Fatou Sankare, a certified ethical hacker, professor, and cyber engineer, a common misconception among Black consumers is that they are not valuable targets of cyberscams, leading them to underestimate the risks of cyber threats and fail to take necessary precautions.
“I think a lot of the time, when you talk to people about cybersecurity and data protection, their initial response would be, ‘I’m not that important. Nobody’s worried about me,’” Sankare said. What some consumers might not realize is that “it’s not necessarily the amount of money in your account; it’s the things they can do with the information that pertains to you. [Scammers] are not after your money per se, but they’re after what they could do with the information that you have to make more money.”
Drawing on prior research from the Federal Trade Commission, the 2024 Cyber Readiness report noted several possible explanations for this disproportionate impact. For instance, Black and Latino people are less likely to use payment methods that have built-in legal fraud protections; white consumers tend to use those protections more.
Black and Latino communities are also more likely to use cash, cryptocurrency and money orders to carry out transactions, as well as payment apps like Venmo & CashApp, which have limited fraud safeguards.
“In the Black and brown communities, we’re not on these programs where we look at our credit all the time, right? We’re not using credit monitoring services, so until we go and try to get a loan for a house or try to get a loan for school, we realize that, hey, there’s actually two of you. Somebody has been using your credit all along,” Sankare said.
The minimal protection makes it much more difficult for Black and Latino consumers to get their money back if they fall prey to fraud or any other digital scheme.
Protection from these potential dangers, Sankare said, begins with education. That’s why she founded Dataction LLC, an organization dedicated to revitalizing technology in redlined communities and empowering members of those communities through cyber education.
She routinely holds sessions and classes to teach people how to avoid digital scams and other threats. In one of her most recent cohorts, she taught students to create their own phishing links — a common cyberattack used to deceive individuals into sharing sensitive information, often through emails, texts, or phone calls — to demonstrate how easily a hacker could steal information.
“We created a fishing link where we utilized a login from Hulu or Netflix and we sent the phishing link to each other [in the class],” Sankare said. “One person played as the hacker and the other person played as the victim. We had the server running so the class could see when the link was clicked, and you can see the IP address pop up, so that person now has your geolocation.”
In addition to digital scams, Black people are also vulnerable to digital surveillance, which refers to the monitoring or collecting personal information using digital technologies.
While some of these technologies are deployed to circumvent any online or physical danger, they have been used in ways that increase existing inequalities. For example, studies show that facial recognition systems have misidentified Black individuals, raising concerns of bias when it comes to matters such as policing and public safety.
While these risks don’t mean everyone is actively being monitored, they do highlight the importance of understanding these varying digital systems.
CryptoHarlem, described on its website as “a nonprofit Anti-Surveillance, Cybersecurity Education & Advocacy Organization,” also works to protect marginalized communities from digital harm.
Matt Mitchell, founder of CryptoHarlem, a cyber expert, and self-proclaimed “best hacker in the world,” recommended encrypting data as a defense against any potential surveillance.
“If you don’t use [X] anymore, delete your stuff off of there. You could just make a request or you could use a tool that will help you back up all your DMs and erase it, ” he said.
He also discussed protecting text messages. “Whether you’re only using iMessage or you’re using WhatsApp, having your messages not available to any third party helps avoid that. It mostly has to do with the criminalization of our identities and not making it easier for someone who is either ignorant or has bad intent [to create] a bad day for you.”
Jason Thigpen, a self-employed IT specialist, met Mitchell about 10 years ago, when he first began CryptoHarlem. Thigpen attended several sessions and meetups hosted by the organization, where he said he fell in love with the knowledge they offered.
“They’ve always been very forthcoming with tech resources, whether it’s from a learning perspective or even just protection, privacy, and security, as well as advocacy — helping you learn how people around the world are protecting themselves and how certain government agencies and organizations are infringing on those privacies,” Thigpen said.
If it weren’t for CryptoHarlem, he would not have known or understood the magnitude of digital surveillance. “You don’t find a lot of people who look like us in our communities intentionally sharing that information,” he said. “Even though we have more folks of color in security, we still don’t have enough that are loud about the issues that face our communities.”
Mitchell holds a live stream every week to discuss current events and innovations in tech, offering insight through a Black perspective.
Sankare identified three key steps people can take to protect themselves and their data online.
“The first thing is to look yourself up and see what information is out there. Once you figure out the information that’s out there, try to find ways to take it down,” she said. People can either contact a company to remove their information, or they can remove it themselves.
“The second thing is if it is not necessary to share, don’t share it. You wouldn’t walk up to a stranger and tell them where you work, what’s your favorite color, or what’s your pet’s name,” she said. “I think people get a little carried away on social media.”
Her final tip: Question everything.
“Always question information that is being requested from you, whether it’s on an application that you’re filling out and they’re asking a question and you’re just like, ‘What does it have to do with whatever it is I’m signing up for?’ But also just online,” she said. “If you don’t trust it, don’t go for it.”
This post appeared first on New York Amsterdam News.
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