Love a Little Online Shopping? How’s Your Privacy Awareness?

I am a sucker for online shopping and my current obsession is with books. When you have Fishpond, Book Depository and Borders offering free delivery in addition to highly reduced prices, well – it’s a marriage made in heaven!

Now, every time I find a new shopping site, I have to register my details. And as I was entering my name into another site last night, it made me think about how many sites have my personal details.

This week is Privacy Awareness Week and what a great opportunity to ‘take-stock’ of how you are managing your privacy, particularly online.

When it comes to privacy, I think most of us feel we have it sorted. We ignore friend requests from strangers on Facebook and we have an array of clever passwords. So, why bother worrying much more about privacy. It’s all good, right?

Unfortunately – it isn’t quite that simple. Managing your privacy, particularly online, requires a little more work to make sure you are safe and protected from possible identity theft.

Here are a few quick tips that will help get your privacy sorted.

1. Make sure your passwords have at least 10 characters and use a combination of letters, numbers and symbols. Change them regularly and try not to use the same one across all your devices.
2. PLEASE refrain from visiting banking or credit card sites when using an unsecured wireless connection.
3. Beware of professional looking pop ups that may appear on your screen telling you to download software. These downloads may contain malware (aka nasty software) which could give you a virus or worst case, send your private information back to a cybercriminal!
4. I know everyone loves to ‘Check In’ on various social media applications but remember it can be risky. Not only may you be alerting the world to the fact your house is vacant but you are providing your location to any unwanted followers. Go retrospective! Consider doing the location based post after you’ve left that location.
5. Invest in a comprehensive security package that provides safe searching technology to steer you away from fake websites that try and collect your information.

If you have a spare moment, why not check out the Identity Theft tool (ID Theft) on the Privacy Awareness website and test yourself about how aware you are regarding the risk of ID theft. But make sure you study the tips above first – it might help you improve your score!

Till next time,

Alex

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