https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/ Plain-English cybersecurity for everyone — seniors, youngsters and families first. Scam calls, passwords, updates, and the habits that keep a household safe online. en-us https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/the-teammate-who-isnt-twelve https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/the-teammate-who-isnt-twelve Sun, 01 Nov 2026 00:00:00 +0000 The friendliest voice in your child's game may not belong to a child at all. How game chat became a doorway — and the household rules that close it without closing the game. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/the-call-that-isnt-your-bank https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/the-call-that-isnt-your-bank Fri, 30 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 The name on the screen says your bank. The voice says act now. Almost everything about that call is a lie — here is how the trick works, and the three habits that defeat it every time. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/http2shell-brotli-flaw https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/http2shell-brotli-flaw Fri, 30 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 A tiny program that unpacks compressed web data — built into websites, apps and tools you use every day — had a mistake in it. In October it went from discovery to confirmed attacks in six days. Here is what happened, in plain English. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/ransomware-front-door https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/ransomware-front-door Wed, 28 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 A ransomware gang breached more than 600 organizations in two years — not by breaking in, but by logging in. The same front door exists in every home. Here is how it works, and how to lock yours. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/kev-catalog-trails-attackers https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/kev-catalog-trails-attackers Wed, 21 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 The US government keeps a list of software flaws that criminals are confirmed to be using. In October, attackers moved on one flaw within two hours — and the official list caught up eight days later. That gap is not just a problem for IT departments. It lives in every phone and laptop at home. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/thirty-minutes-to-ninety-seconds https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/thirty-minutes-to-ninety-seconds Wed, 14 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 Every security program has one: the recurring chore everyone dreads and nobody questions. Here's how to spot it — and why retiring it matters more than the minutes it saves. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/poam-is-not-a-spreadsheet-graveyard https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/poam-is-not-a-spreadsheet-graveyard Wed, 07 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 Plans of Action & Milestones die the same way everywhere: a workbook nobody trusts, updated in a panic before the auditor arrives. It doesn't have to work that way. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/script-before-you-buy https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/script-before-you-buy Wed, 30 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000 The security industry will happily sell you a platform for every problem. The engineers who stay in demand learn to solve the problem first — usually with forty lines of code. https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/evidence-is-a-pipeline https://surajpadmakaran.github.io/#post/evidence-is-a-pipeline Wed, 23 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000 If your audit evidence comes from screenshots taken the night before, you don't have an evidence problem — you have an architecture problem. Here's the fix.