Should you worry about online privacy?

Online security and privacy is something I am big on. I lie to help people stay safe on the internet. Nowadays there are so many ways to get your identity stolen or even have your computer infected. It’s very easy to run into these types of things. There are many ways to avoid getting your identity stolen. The first thing to avoid that is that if you go to a banking site, like usbank.com make sure you see https://www.usbank.com and not http://www.usbank.com. Also check around on the website for any unfamiliar watermarks or links. If you think it’s a fake site don’t click. Once you click and put in your information a predator already has enough information to make you go bankrupt. It’s not just banking sites. It can also be myspace. I’ve seen many mypsace profiles get overtaken by spammers and phishers because they clicked on links that hijacked there account. If they’re able to hijack your account they can send mail bombs or even attack other accounts and try to trick you.

The next thing you should do is if you get an email from your bank asking to update your account, odds are it is fake and it’s a predator waiting to steal your information. Always call the bank and ask if they sent it. If they didn’t then avoid the link and delete it as soon as possible. Odds are it was scam and it was someone trying to hijack your bank account.

That type of scam is called a phishing scam and it is very dnagerous. If you give phishers important information like your credit card or you social security number they can really do some damage to your credit and even identity. They will stop at nothing to get this information. So please be be careful when you’re doing online banking. Be sure it’s the right site and not a lookalike site. If possible go directly to the site and don’t use Google to get the site. Using google will make it easy for any phisher to get in since you didn’t go to the real site.

Luckily there are many ways to avoid these. You can use software. There are many companies now that allow you to download free anti-phishing software. So you have the extra guarded protection. This is something I like to see. This helps keep you safe and you don’t need to worry about it. It runs silently for you and alerts you of a phishing site. Even Mozilla Firefox has this nowadays. I don’t see phishers going away anytime soon. They want money and they want to be rich, so they steal other people’s account information and then you make you bankrupt and you have to call around canceling credit cards and getting a social security number. It’s not an easy process by any means.