There's been an increase across the sex work subreddits of people losing their accounts and complaining that Tryst or whoever is slow to get back to them. The best course of action is to prevent this from happening in the first place with some basic internet security knowledge!

1. Password safety. Stop using the same password across multiple platforms. Can't remember your passwords? Get a password manager. Don't want to do that? These days, it's not terrible practice to write down your passwords and store them somewhere safe (not in your handbag or laptop bag, folks). Stop using short, useless passwords; someone can break an eight character password in two minutes with the right conditions. Don't make your passwords easy to guess -- no, your dog's name is not a secure password option when you post about her on social media!!

2. Multi-factor authentication (MFA). This uses more than just a password to allow you into accounts, so even if you have bad password security practices, no one is getting in without access to your phone. I'm sure you've done this with banking apps before; they make you type in a code you've received via SMS in order to log in to your account after inputting the correct password. Tryst has this as a built in option, but you can use apps like Google Authenticator to make this a necessity for other accounts as well.

3. Basic knowledge of phishing scams. Stop bloody clicking links in emails and texts, folks. We've been told not to do this since the beginning of the internet. Unless the email you've received is solicited (ie you asked for a password reset and PD sent you an email with a link to click immediately), click nothing. Scrutinise the address any emails come from closely, check that emails match the correct domain for the directory -- if it comes from tryst@gmail, it's not really Tryst; they use @tryst.link. Familiarise yourself with how your directory contacts you; Tryst will never SMS you, so any SMSs you receive from someone claiming to be them are phishing attempts. Check for spelling errors in the body text.

4. Prevent scammers from even having your email. Use a different email address in your ad to the one you use to log in to the directory. Scammers take all the addresses they can see on a site and use those to send you these phishing emails. If the email you use to log in is different to the email clients see, then anything going to [client facing email] claiming to be from the directory is a scam, since you know the directory will only ever email the account you used to sign up.

5. Keep your apps updated. Hackers get smarter, but so do software devs. Updating your apps will keep them current for security patches.

6. Remove access. Old devices or borrowed devices don't need access to your accounts. Periodically go through and delete accounts that are no longer in use and remove access from old devices. Don't keep accounts logged in on public or borrowed devices.

Lola, one of the founders of Tryst, is around on this sub and very friendly, but I'm sure she's a little tired of having to put out entirely preventable fires. You are responsible for your own internet safety; you need to take the same care with it as you do your sexual health. For better or worse, sex work is an online game now, so it's yet another thing we need to have downpat.

You're all smart enough to construct your own brand and finesse clients, so I know you can manage this stuff when you're given information on what needs to be done. You've got this. 💚