The fever of ESports has taken the whole world by storm. Online gamers can participate in famous ESports tournaments like Counter Strike Global Offensive, League of Legends, etc., from anywhere.
This is one of the significant reasons why the online gaming and ESports industry has expanded during the last few years or so significantly. Currently, the industry is valued above $100 billion worldwide.
As expected, the online gaming and ESports industry have caught the eyes of hackers and other cyber goons. Thus, securing this fastest growing industry from the prying eyes of hackers, scammers, and other cyber-terrorists has become a daunting task for all stakeholders related to the ESports industry in 2021.
Why is the ESports industry insecure?
As we all know, video games are mostly delivered via online platforms such as EA origin, Battle.net, Steam, Twitch, etc. Besides, millions of gamers provide their personal details including name, email address, contact number, date of birth, residential address, and credit card data to create their profiles on these platforms.
As a result, cybercriminals are constantly targeting these platforms to accomplish their malicious objectives. Apart from this, hackers are targeting ESports conventions, tournaments, and events to make things even worse for online gamers security-wise in particular.
The story does not end here as cybercriminals have options galore when it comes to jeopardizing the online security of gamers. This is because the frequent use of public Wi-Fi networks makes such tournaments and events even more attractive to cyber attackers.
Why is Cybersecurity important for ESports?
Similar to other industries like entertainment, e-commerce, healthcare, and supply chain, the ESports industry is also prone to various cyber threats. As we all know, ESports events are extremely popular these days. It means there is a strong likelihood that people will participate in these events from all around the world in huge numbers.
As a result, it becomes an uphill task for the management at times to secure such famous events from hackers and other cyber criminals where millions of gamers join the live broadcast at a time.
Similarly, people of different age groups stream such events including kids and teenagers on their desired devices like desktops, laptops, and mobile devices. Therefore, hackers can easily target them because they are not concerned about their online privacy compared to people of other age groups.
All these above-described scenarios indicate why cybersecurity is crucial for securing different ESports tournaments, conventions, community meetups, and events globally.
How to secure the ESports conventions, tournaments, and events from hackers and other cyber goons?
Digital platforms developers must up their game in terms of cybersecurity. It means they should make security related to different platforms such as Twitch, Steam, Battle.net, and others their topmost priority.
They should hire a team consisting of the best cybersecurity professionals that should rigorously perform pen-testing tasks on their behalf. As far as online gamers are concerned, they should not hesitate in using a free cybersecurity tool for ESports that can improve their online privacy significantly while participating in different ESports conventions, tournaments, and events.
Apart from this, online gamers should take other precautionary measures to keep themselves secure and anonymous when participating in any ESports event or tournament from anywhere.
For instance, they must refrain from using the public Wi-Fi internet connection at any cost. By doing so, hackers or other cyber terrorists will not target them.
In addition to this, they can opt for GNU Privacy Guard before becoming a part of any ESports tournament or event. The said protection tool allows them to encrypt their data and other communications comprehensively. Luckily, they can use this amazing security tool on different devices like Windows, Mac, and Linux without any cost and enjoy streaming their favorite ESports events from anywhere.
The Takeaway
The importance and need of cybersecurity in the online gaming and ESports industry is growing rapidly with each passing day. As gamers and ESports players have to spend a lot of time online, they become prime targets of cyber goons.
Moreover, they provide banking information including credit card details and other crucial data, which is stored in databases of different gaming companies eventually.
Therefore, gaming companies should not take cybersecurity issues that relate to the ESports industry lightly at all. Likewise, they should take all the possible cybersecurity measures that allow them to protect their customers’ databases accordingly.
Otherwise, they can face serious consequences in the form of hacking, malware, and other security risks in the future. From an online gamers’ perspective, they should also use different security tools like antivirus software, firewalls, etc. that help them protect their digital footprints while participating in various ESports tournaments and events worldwide.