Find out more about what you can do to keep your computer and online accounts safe.
If you found out someone was going around town passing themselves off as you and buying things in your name, using your money, you would be absolutely furious. You would have every right to feel this way too. There is something about identity theft that is so personal and invasive that makes it very upsetting. So, in order to combat this we keep our money and identification documents somewhere safe where only we can get to them.
In other words, we make it very hard for would be impersonators to pull this trick off.
It’s no different online
Yet when we are online, many of us take risks that we would never ordinarily take in the real world. There is a distance about being online that we think offers us some protection but this really isn’t the case. In fact, it is exactly this layer of impersonality and anonymity that makes it such a breeding ground for identity theft and other fraud. There are some very unpleasant people in the virtual world. Some of them are very clever and can do things we find it hard to stop. However, there are also others who are merely waiting for us to slip up and do something silly. This is sometimes all they need to get the information they need to exploit you.
Keep your identity safe
So, there are certain things you should do and other things that you shouldn’t in order to stay safe online. Be very vigilant and learn how to suspect a con. If a site is asking for too much information or details you don’t feel comfortable
giving, the simply don’t. If you are providing information and it’s not essential
that you give them your personal details (if it is not a business contact,
for example) then be a little bit creative with the truth. The less a potential
fraudster knows about you, the better it is for you.
The online identity theft statistics make for pretty shocking reading. There are some scams that most of us can spot a mile away. It is, of course, very unlikely that a member of a deposed royal family is going to email you and promise you riches in exchange for monetary help in the short term. Yet these scams must work sometimes or people simply wouldn’t bother.
In short, you need to protect your online data as much as you possibly can.
It is only by protecting your data that you will be able to rest easy, safe in the knowledge that you have taken the necessary precautions.
There are various other online date theft prevention tools that you can use to help you make this possible. Use your common sense, use the tools at your disposal and be vigilant. Follow these simple rules and you will be able to avoid falling into the many traps and pitfalls of online data theft and identity theft.
Karol is a nurde who likes playing video games and MMO. He like doing social networking too but he hates hackers.