The hospitality industry had been a focus of internet-related attack in recent times, the hotel sector ranks the highest as the primary target for data breaches. Recent data has shown a series of high ranking breaches from renounced hotel services providers across the globe. Despite the U.S’s recent budget of $14.98 billion on internet security, a recent release by Statista affirms a substantial increase in the total number of records exposed which rose from 197.61million in 2017 to a mouth-watering 446.52million in 2018.
The hotel sector has also witnessed a series of customers’ personal data breaches to hackers activities in recent time. In the month of November 2014, Starwood Hotels and Resort Worldwide now known and referred to as Marriott had a breach of about 3 billion emails affecting about 500million customers. November of the same year, Hilton also experienced a similar attack on its payment system. In April 2016, a suspect hacking activity was also witnessed in the payment system of the Trump Hotels across the United States and Canada leading to the loss of several credit card data details belonging to their customers. Other hotel services providers like Sabre Hospitality Solutions, Hyatt Hotels Corporation, Intercontinental Hotels Group, Marriott, Pyramid Hotel Group among several others have also had their own share of high-ranking hackers activities and data breaches from their systems from 2017 till date.
How to Secure Personal Data Against Loss During Web Activities
Several questions had been raised among experts and users of hotel services with regards to the best way to protect one’s personal data against incessant hackers’ activities, and below are a few tips to consider:
Mask Personal Data Details: – with the use of certain special services like Albine Blur, individuals can now protect such sensitive details like their credit card details. In the course of an online booking activity, Albine Blur allows you to generate a one-time email address and credit card numbers whose usefulness expires upon usage by the original creator. This helps protects against divulging the original card number and email required for access.
Install Extension to Thwart FormJackers: – A 2019 internet security threat report by Symantec classified the activity of form jacking as among the most dangerous forms of cybercrime in recent times. Formjacking is simply a form of hacker activity through which the criminal place a code on a supposed e-commerce website such that it intercepts an individual’s personal data and bank details as they fill them into the compromised website. With the help of a browser-based script blocker such as ScriptSafe, JsBlocker, and NoScript, an individual can successfully escape the threat of form jacking on their devices.
Use VPN:- Usage of free wifi should always go with the use of a VPN so as to ensure proper anonymity and disguise and prevent data theft during usage.
Use Digital Wallets: Internet users should always ensure to possess at least one type of digital wallet like PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay among several others, and make payment with it if possible. This is because a breach of such will not result in substantial data loss as very few data is required in the creation of an electronic wallet.