#FactCheck-Mosque fire in India? False, it's from Indonesia

Introduction

Social media has become integral to our lives and livelihood in today’s digital world. Influencers are now strong people who shape trends, views, and consumer behaviour. Influencers have become targets for bad actors aiming to abuse their fame due to their significant internet presence. Unfortunately, account hacking has grown frequently, with significant ramifications for influencers and their followers. Furthermore, the emergence of social media platforms in recent years has opened the way for influencer culture. Influencers exert power over their followers’ ideas, lifestyle choices, and purchase decisions. Influencers and brands frequently collaborate to exploit their reach, resulting in a mutually beneficial environment. As a result, the value of influencer accounts has risen dramatically, attracting the attention of hackers trying to abuse their potential for financial gain or personal advantage.

Instances of recent attacks

Places of worship

The hackers have targeted renowned temples for fulfilling their malicious activities the recent attack happened on The Khautji Shyam Temple, a famous religious institution with enormous cultural and spiritual value for its adherents. It serves as a place of worship, community events, and numerous religious activities. However, since technology has invaded all sectors of life, the temple’s online presence has developed, giving worshippers access to information, virtual darshans (holy viewings), and interactive forums. Unfortunately, this digital growth has also rendered the shrine vulnerable to cyber threats. The hackers hacked the Facebook page twice in the month, demanded donations and hacked the cheques the devotes gave to the trust. The second event happened by posting objectional images on the page and hurting the sentiments of the devotees. The Committee of the temple has filed an FIR under various charges and is also seeking help from the cyber cell.

Social media Influencers

Influencers enjoy a vast online following worldwide, but their presence is limited to the digital space. Hence every video, photo is of importance to them. An incident took place with leading news anchor and reporter Barkha Dutt, where in her youtube channel was hacked into, and all the posts made from the channel were deleted. The hackers also replaced the channel’s logo with Tesla and were streaming a live video on the channel featuring Elon Musk. A similar incident was reported by influencer Tanmay Bhatt, who also lost all the content e had posted on his channel. The hackers use the following methods to con social media influencers:

• Social engineering
• Phishing
• Brute Force Attacks

Such attacks on influencers can cause harm to their reputation, can also cause financial loss, and even lose the trust of the viewers or the followers who follow them, thus further impacting the collaborations.

Safeguards

Social media influencers need to be very careful about their cyber security as their prominent presence is in the online world. The influencers from different platforms should practice the following safeguards to protect themselves and their content better online

Secure your accounts

Protecting your accounts with passphrases or strong passwords is the first step. The best strategy for doing this is to create a passphrase, a phrase only you know. We advise choosing a passphrase with at least four words and 15 characters.

To further secure your accounts, you must enable multi-factor authentication in the second step.

To access your account, a hacker must guess your password and provide a second authentication factor (such as a face scan or fingerprint) that matches yours.

Be careful about who has access

Many social media influencers collaborate with a team to help generate and post content while building their personal brands.

This entails using team members who can write and produce material that influencers can share themselves, according to some of them. In these situations, the influencer is the only person who still has access to the account.

There are more potential weak spots when more people have access. Additionally, it increases the number of ways a password or account access could fall into the hands of a cybercriminal. Only some staff members will be as cautious about password security as you may be.

Stay up-to-date on the threats

What’s the most significant way to combat threats to computer security? Information.

Cybercriminals constantly adapt their methods. It’s crucial to stay informed about these threats and how they can be utilised against you.

But it’s not just threats. Social media platforms and other service providers are likewise changing their offerings to avoid these challenges.

Educate yourself to protect yourself. You can keep one step ahead of the hazards that cybercriminals offer by continuously educating yourself.

Preach cybersecurity

As influencers, cyber security should be preached, no matter your agenda.

This will also enable users to inculcate best practices for digital hygiene.

This will also boost the reporting numbers and increase population awareness, thus eradicating such bad actors from our cyberspace.

Acknowledge the risks

Keeping a blind eye will always hurt the safety aspects, as ignorance always causes issues.

Risks should be kept in mind while creating the digital routine and netiquette

Always inform your users of risk existing and potential risks

Monitor threats

After the acknowledgement, it is essential to monitor threats.

Active lookout for threats will allow you to understand the modus Operandi and the vulnerabilities to avoid criminals

Threats monitoring is also a basic netizens’ responsibility to ensure that the threats are reported as they emerge.

Interpret the data

All cyber nodal agencies release data and trends of cybercrimes, understand the trends and protect your vulnerabilities.

Data interpretation can lead to an early flagging of threats and issues, thus protecting the cyber ecosystem by and large.

Create risk profiles

All influencers should create risk profiles and backup profiles.

This will also help protect one’s data as it can be stored on different profiles.

Risk profiles and having a private profile are essential to safeguard the basic cyber interests of an influencer.

Conclusion

As we go deeper into the digital age, we see more technologies emerging, but along with them, we see a new generation of cyber threats and challenges. The physical, as well as the cyberspace, is now inter twinned and interdependent. Practising basic cyber security practices, hygiene, netiquette, and monitoring best practices will go a long way in protecting the online interests of the Influencers and will impact their followers to engage in best practices thus safeguarding the cyber ecosystem at large.

Introduction:

The Indian Ministry of Communications has come up with a feature known as "Quick SMS Header Information" to provide citizens with more control over their messaging services. This feature would help users access crucial information about the sender through text message, therefore making the details readily available at their fingertips.

The Quick SMS Header service is the key to providing users with the feature to ensure that they are receiving messages from the correct source. Users can instantly learn all the necessary data about the sender of a certain SMS. This data is invaluable for making the distinction between real messages and suspicious spam or phishing, so the user can have a higher level of defense against online threats and scam activities.

Importance of Checking the Header:

1. Authenticity Verification: SMS header data represents another way to confirm the sender. This feature keeps the end user from wrongly assuming that the SMS is from a trusted source or an unknown sender. Hence, the end user is able to make a choice about the authenticity of the message.

2. Mitigating Spam and Phishing: The rise of SMS and phishing scams has created some significant hurdles for users in the process of differentiating between real and fake messages. Through the Quick SMS Header Information service, people will be able to look up any suspicious messages in order to be able to take appropriate steps to prevent links that lead to malicious websites or requests for personal information.

3. Enhancing User Security: The SMS header information plays an important role in ensuring that the user is secure and has no privacy issues.  The checking of the message headers will help us limit the possibilities of bad activities and reduce the chances of being a victim of cybercriminals.

4. Empowering Consumer Awareness: This feature is designed to encourage the people involved  to take responsibility for the security of their devices and establish a safer and more dependable digital platform.

Benefits:

• Enhanced Transparency: By giving access to the header information to the users, it is transparency that is promoted within the telecommunications ecosystem.
• Empowered Decision-Making: Now that users have information about the SMS header, they can make informed decisions regarding their communications and privacy.
• Efficient Resolution of Concerns: The Quick SMS Header Information serves the purpose of providing the needed resolution by telling us the message’s origin in cases where users come across any suspicious messages.
• User-Friendly Interface: With its easy and clear process, this feature caters to users of all technical proficiency levels, ensuring accessibility for all.

Working:

1. Compose Your SMS: Write a message with the header you wish to find the information about. For example, if you want to know details about a header labeled "SBIINB," your SMS should be in the format "DETAILS OF SBIINB." Note, all letters are in capital only.

2. Send it to 1909: Once your message is ready, send it to: 1909. Please note, this may charge you depending upon your current plan. 

3. Receive Response: The response to your SMS will be sent to you by the concerned telecommunication service provider or directly by 1909, a few seconds after you have sent your message. This response will have the data associated with the header above.

Another method to find SMS header information:

TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) has made a tool on the webpage (https://smsheader.trai.gov.in/) to check for the SMS header associated with the message. 

TRAI has also mandated header registration for messages pertaining to transactional or promotional purposes. This has helped people identify the SMS header by simply looking into the database as made by TRAI.

Steps:

1. Go to https://smsheader.trai.gov.in/. The page looks like as shown below:

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2. Enter your Email, Name and complete the captcha under the Download/View Header Details and click on continue

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3. Enter the OTP received on your email with the captcha and click on continue

4. Now enter your SMS header in the format of AA-AAAA, where “AA” is your prefix and “AAAA” is your header name. For example, we have taken “AX-HDFCBK” as our sample header, so “AX” is our prefix and “HDFCBK” is our header name.

5. As soon as we press enter, the site returns the query with the information of the header, as shown below

Conclusion:

The importance of checking SMS headers is something that simply cannot be overemphasized. This is the principal procedure for identifying incoming messages as authentic, and on that basis, the users are able to make informed choices about the messages they receive. It also contributes to the rise of user safety and privacy.

The development of more transparent controls and a stronger decision-making process will make it easier for users to handle their digital lives. The Quick SMS Header Information service is easy and convenient to use, as its interface is simple and understandable for users of all technical levels.

In addition to this, TRAI's attempt to make available an online tool for the maintenance of a comprehensive database of SMS headers strengthens its position towards ensuring security for its users in the telecommunications sector.

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Recently, Apple has pushed away the Advanced Data Protection feature for its customers in the UK. This was done due to a request by the UK’s Home Office, which demanded access to encrypted data stored in its cloud service, empowered by the Investigatory Powers Act (IPA). The Act compels firms to provide information to law enforcement. This move and its subsequent result, however, have raised concerns—bringing out different perspectives regarding the balance between privacy and security, along with the involvement of higher authorities and tech firms.

What is Advanced Data Protection?

Advanced Data Protection is an opt-in feature and doesn’t necessarily require activation. It is Apple’s strongest data tool, which provides end-to-end encryption for the data that the user chooses to protect. This is different from the standard (default) encrypted data services that Apple provides for photos, back-ups, and notes, among other things. The flip side of having such a strong security feature from a user perspective is that if the Apple account holder were to lose access to the account, they would lose their data as well since there are no recovery paths.

Doing away with the feature altogether, the sign-ups have been currently halted, and the company is working on removing existing user access at a later date (which is yet to be confirmed). For the UK users who hadn’t availed of this feature, there would be no change. However, for the ones who are currently trying to avail it are met with a notification on the Advanced Data Protection settings page that states that the feature cannot be enabled anymore. Consequently, there is no clarity whether the data stored by the UK users who availed the former facility would now cease to exist as even Apple doesn’t have access to it.  It is important to note that withdrawing the feature does not ensure compliance with the Investigative Powers Act (IPA) as it is applicable to tech firms worldwide that have a UK market. Similar requests to access data have been previously shut down by Apple in the US. 

Apple’s Stand on Encryption and Government Requests

The Tech giant has resisted court orders, rejecting requests to write software that would allow officials to access and enable identification of iPhones operated by gunmen (made in 2016 and 2020). It is said that the supposed reasons for such a demand by the UK Home Office have been made owing to the elusive role of end-to-end encryption in hiding criminal activities such as child sexual abuse and terrorism, hampering the efforts of security officials in catching them. Over the years, Apple has emphasised time and again its reluctance to create a backdoor to its encrypted data, stating the consequences of it being more vulnerable to attackers once a pathway is created. The Salt Typhoon attack on the US Telecommunication system is a recent example that has alerted officials, who now encourage the use of end-to-end encryption. Barring this, such requests could set a dangerous precedent for how tech firms and governments operate together. This comes against the backdrop of the Paris AI Action Summit, where US Vice President J.D. Vance raised concerns regarding regulation. As per reports, Apple has now filed a legal complaint against the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, the UK’s judicial body that handles complaints with respect to surveillance power usage by public authorities. 

The Broader Debate on Privacy vs. Security

This standoff raises critical questions about how tech firms and governments should collaborate without compromising fundamental rights. Striking the right balance between privacy and regulation is imperative, ensuring security concerns are addressed without dismantling individual data protection. The outcome of Apple’s legal challenge against the IPA may set a significant precedent for how encryption policies evolve in the future.

References

• https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20g288yldko 
• https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgj54eq4vejo
• https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn524lx9445o
• https://www.yahoo.com/tech/apple-advanced-data-protection-why-184822119.html
• https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/apple-advanced-data-protection-removal-uk-9851486/
• https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/366619638/Apple-pulls-Advanced-Data-Protection-in-UK-sparking-concerns
• https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619614/Apple-withdraws-encrypted-iCloud-storage-from-UK-after-government-demands-back-door-access?_gl=1*1p1xpm0*_ga*NTE3NDk1NzQxLjE3MzEzMDA2NTc.*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTc0MDc0MTA4Mi4zMS4xLjE3NDA3NDEwODMuMC4wLjA. 
• https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/feb/21/apple-removes-advanced-data-protection-tool-uk-government 
• https://proton.me/blog/protect-data-apple-adp-uk#:~:text=Proton-,Apple%20revoked%20advanced%20data%20protection%20
• https://www.theregister.com/2025/03/05/apple_reportedly_ipt_complaint/ 
• https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616972/Government-agencies-urged-to-use-encrypted-messaging-after-Chinese-Salt-Typhoon-hack

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