How Likely is it That My email Will Be Hacked ?

 Editor's Note: I published this blog in March of last year in response to an upsurge in phishing emails and other hacking incidents. The recent UK government demand that Apple provide them with a bypass to their end-to-end encryption serves as reminder that our comfidential data is at risk. Whatever the outcome of this particular 'spat', (in which I suspect Messrs. Trump and Musk will soon become involved, given their roles as 'champions of free speech') there is only one way to ensure that your 'at risk' data remains hidden - encrypt it yourself.....read on to find out how.......

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Could my email be hacked....?

Unfortunately, it's more likely than you might think that your email either has already been hacked...or will be at some point….here’s why.

There are a host of opportunities for a would-be hacker to find a way into your email account, and some of the 'professionals' are really expert at it. 

We’re all familiar with many of these methods, ranging from phishing emails designed to elicit personal info from you by purporting to be someone else, to the use of ‘easy to guess’ account passwords which never get changed. I won’t list them all here, but the results of our collective vulnerabilities are worrying, particularly when it comes to the more vulnerable in our society, or those who are not sufficiently ‘computer savvy’ to realise the dangers.

Once into your account, hackers can easily glean enough information to steal your identity. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), there were 1,291 publicly reported data breaches and ca 166 million victims in 2022 - if taken at face value, this means there's a good chance that hackers may well already have access to your email account information and could access your account at any time.

There are measures you can take to make your email account(s) less likely to be hacked, such as using ‘strong’ passwords. Setting up 2-factor authentication, where this is available (i.e. exchanging a one-time password or code via text to confirm your ID), certainly should also help. 

There is admittedly also some ‘strength in numbers’ – i.e. the more email accounts there are, the less likely it is that yours will be chosen by a hacker. This doesn't of course apply if you are specifically targeted for some reason e.g. you have celebrity status or are a social media influencer, or you're unfortunate enough to come under scrutiny by one of the government agencies with powers to bypass security...and (at present!) you're not an Apple user. 

Ultimately, the safest approach is to assume your account is potentially compromised at all times, and never to exchange any confidential or private information such as personal ID or bank account details ‘in clear’ in your messages.

Easier said than done, I hear you say….and of course, you’d be right.

We all need to exchange such data with others now and again, so how can we protect our data when we really need to expose it in this way ? A good option is to add an extra layer of encryption of your own to those parts of the email text that you don’t want others to see. A layer of simple additional encryption will slow a hacker down and make him / her wonder whether your account is really worth the extra effort involved.

You can add this type of extra encryption quite easily for yourself – there are of course a plethora of online encoder available, and plenty of downloadable apps, but I would recommend avoiding these. There is, after all, no guarantee that they won’t steal your data after you’ve uploaded it, or risked it with a smartphone app. Use a stand-alone package that runs on your pc and you know can’t pass any data to the cloud. You will, of course, need to involve your correspondent(s) in advance, by making them privy to whatever software you employ and providing them with the keyword/password you've used to encrypt your message.

As a simple example, I recently updated an encoder/decoder app which I generated some years ago and which runs under MS Excel (verified as working with Office 2010 onwards) – you can download this free of charge. The workbook is entirely stand-alone and does not require an internet connection. It has a built-in user guide to get you started. Once you and your correspondent(s) each have a copy of the workbook, you can exchange encoded message text securely at any time using an agreed and unique keyword (NOT sent in the same email!). Since this can be between 7 and 15 letters long (uppercase and lower case) the number of possible combinations is around 5.6x1025 i.e. it is virtually unbreakable by 'brute force' decryption methods with standard computer equipment.

Why not give it a try ? It's easy to use, and might just prevent someone stealing your ID or emptying your bank account.

Final Thoughts

The overall message is.....be vigilant. Be aware of the pitfalls described above and take steps to avoid them. This should not prove to be an undue burden, and it could save you a lot of inconvenience and hassle, if, for example, your ID is stolen. If you can help someone you know who is less computer-savvy than yourself ward off the hackers, please do so.

Happy emailing....

First published: 5.3.24

Revised: 9.2.25

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