ways to protect personal data from online fraud and identity theft.

[darrensmits]

Here are some measures you can take either when making online transactions or simply in your day-to-day computing life to make sure your data is not stolen.

1. Keep your personal and sensitive data off your computer – What can a virus or spyware program possible to with your personal data if you don’t store it on your computer? It’s simple and very effective. Try your best to keep bank account numbers, passwords, etc off your computer. If you want to keep it in electronic format for easy access, that’s fine, simply buy a $20 flash drive and store all the sensitive files there. Keep it in a safe place and if you need to refer to the documents, then just plug in your drive. Lots of people tend to leave their computers on for long periods of time and it can be compromised at any time, so if there is no data to steal, then you’ve already done a lot to prevent data theft! If you REALLY want it on your computer, then at least make sure you encrypt it.

2. Avoid saving credit card info, etc on shopping sites – Many web sites today, such as Orbitz, Amazon, eBay, give you the option to save your credit card info so that you don’t have to type in all the information each time you want to buy something. That’s great for them, easy money and more sales, but what about you? What if someone eventually does hack into their database (and don’t worry many people are trying everyday) and downloads thousands of credit card numbers, bank account numbers, etc? It might take an extra minute, but it’s better to not save your info on any shopping site.

3. Do not use the same password for every last thing on the Internet – Yes we all hate passwords, but hackers love people who don’t use passwords or who use passwords like “john” or “joe”. You don’t have to keep a different password for EVERY site, that would be crazy, but definitely not just one. These days just about everyone has an eBay, Amazon, Orbitz, etc account and so if a hacker figures out one password, they’ll go ahead and try to see if it works on any other site. Make sure passwords are different a more complicated. Just throwing in a number or symbol at the end will make it hundreds of times hard for a person to crack your password!

4. Always think before providing information when solicited – If you ever get an email that has a link in it that requires ANY personal information, make sure you go to the web site yourself manually by typing in the address. Half the time links in emails point to fake addresses with very close names. Also, if you post items on sites like eBay or Craigslist, you will always be bombarded by scams from Nigeria, etc that sound way too good to be true (like someone would actually pay more for your item than what you listed it at)!!! And just because a web site exists does not mean it it legitimate! If you’ve never heard of the site before, just type it into Google once and see if anything like “XXX IS A SCAM” pops up!

5. Only connect to secure wireless networks if you can – If you have a home wireless network, secure it quickly! Connecting to non-secure wireless networks is asking for trouble. At the place I work, the sales people’s computers constantly have spyware on their computers because they connect to lots of insecure hotel wireless networks constantly. Avoid them at all costs!

6. Clear your browser’s cache after an online transaction – Sometimes your browser will save certain information you typed into forms, etc when you are online, so it’s always good to clear that after you’re done. Here’s an article I wrote previously on how to clear your browser history. Also, if you get that message sometimes from your browser asking you whether you want it to automatically save your passwords, etc, click NO. It’s another small pain, but it might help you one day!

7. Make sure anti-virus and anti-spyware are installed and up-to-date – This, of course, should be obvious. You can either buy excellent anti-virus programs like Kaspersky Anti-Virus or free programs like AVG, which is pretty good too. Either way, make sure you have something installed. However, most people usually stop there and don’t install any anti-spware programs. That’s a big mistake! Nowadays, spyware programs send your data to their creators so they can make money. Some good anti-spyware apps are Windows Defender, SpySweeper, SpywareBlaster, AdWare, and Spybot Search and Destroy. I have three installed on my computer!

[donaldjustine13]

Those seven ways to protect a credit card information are really important for those who don't really know how to use their credit cards. They must be kept in mind always. These will help them be alert and aware that might happen ungood to them.