I am contacting you to let you know that on Saturday 13th April 2024, we identified a technical anomaly within the Neighbourhood Watch scheme management module of the Alert system. This anomaly represented a potential risk to some of your data (as detailed below).

 What was the issue?

Read more: Ourwatch / Neighbourhood watch data leak

Data from Action Fraud, the national fraud and cybercrime reporting service, shows that 22,530 people reported that their online accounts had been hacked in 2023, with victims losing a total of £1.3 million.

How are accounts hacked?

Read more: Over 22,000 email and social media account hacked

ue to high demand, we’re expanding our monthly webinars about Cyber Security and Online Fraud and you can see and register for upcoming webinars here https://bit.ly/49laP7q

Delivered by our Protect Officer for Surrey and Sussex Police Cyber Crime Unit to empower you with knowledge to navigate the digital world safely.

Previously advertised on our social media pages, our March sessions are almost fully booked and therefore, we have extended the sessions and best of all, they are completely free! 

Read more: Surrey and Sussex Police Cyber Security Webinars - Book Now

YouTube and Meta announce new safety updates
Meta, the company that own Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp and Threads, announced:

  • it’s working with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children to expand its ‘Take it Down’ initiative, which provides a simple, privacy-friendly way to address the spread of intimate images online. 
  • they’ve partnered with Thorn on a new guide for teenagers on how they can avoid ‘sextortion’.
  • they’ve also added new safety notices and alerts to help users report accounts that threaten to share their private images.

YouTube also announced that they had expanded measures to help keep young users safe, including updates to its in-stream “Take a Break” prompts, a broader roll out of content restrictions for potentially harmful topics, and a new report on digital wellbeing, created in collaboration with adolescent health experts.

Just like Meta, one of our focuses is to protect our children and young people from sextortion, which is currently affecting boys and young men aged between 14 and 17. If you have a son, we have a parents guide available on the West Sussex County Council website for you to take a look at.

WSCC's parents' guide on sextortion.

Read more: YouTube and Meta announce new safety updates

Most of us look forward to an annual holiday or short break which, more often than not, we find and book online.

But fraudsters also love the internet. They use fake websites, listings, emails, advertisements, social media posts and texts – and also phone calls – to trick you into paying for a holiday or other travel to Never Never Land. In other words, it simply doesn’t exist.

To help save you from losing your holiday and your money, we’ve put together some expert tips on safely searching and booking holidays and travel with confidence. Either take a look at our attached leaflet or read the tips on our advice page: https://www.getsafeonline.org/holiday/

And if you or any of your family are interested in a career in cyber you might be interested in our International Women's Day webinar, next Friday. 'Celebrating and Championing Women in Cyber' hosted by Baroness Nicky Morgan. To register simply visit the below link: https://www.getsafeonline.org/international-womens-day-2024/  

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