Welcome back! We hope everyone had a wonderful Winter Break. Now is a good time to review some best practices for keeping your Marist College accounts safe and secure during the course of the new semester. These tips can also be used to secure your personal accounts, including social media, shopping, and financial accounts:

• Practice good password hygiene - Change your key account passwords once a year, even if the site you use does not ask you to. Rotating passwords is still a key tool in keeping your accounts secure. Create longer passwords (they are harder to guess or crack!) using passphrases. Never share your passwords with anyone - even your family members.
• Double (and triple!) check the “from” address - Verify that the “from” address in an email is what/who you expect.  The Marist EXTERNAL EMAIL banner helps identify off-campus communications.
• Check the link before you click – Hover over a link before you click it.  You can see where it is sending you at the bottom of your browser.  If an email claims it is from Marist personnel but the link doesn’t go to a Marist service, report the email as suspicious.
• Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) - Marist accounts are protected by MFA while off-campus.  You should also enroll all your personal accounts whenever it is offered, especially on online financial services.
• Don't be afraid to verify - If you get a phone call, ask questions, including offering to hang up and call back on a verified, known phone number.  If an email looks like it is from someone you know, try picking up the phone to verify it came from them.

Thanking for your all your continued help and support. The timely reporting and communication to both Gone Phishing and the Help Desk has contributed significantly to our ongoing efforst to keep Marist College safe from computing threats.