We can never be too careful when it comes to protecting ourselves from identity theft and the slime that carry through with committing it. We often review how to protect ourselves when we know our information has been compromised, but what have we done if we don’t know that it has or if we have not been a victim?

Being proactive is key. We must have protection to help stop (or at least significantly slow down) this crime.

1) We had a previous item on installing a firewall on your computer to be less likely of being hacked by internet “crime” surfers;

2) We also reviewed being sure that we have virus protection software which can prevent your computer from sending out your data, completely unknowingly to you;
3) Be sure to password protect any files that contain personal data. The harder the password is to guess, the harder it is to hack. Use a combination of letters and numbers, caps and lowercase;
4) Buying online can be safe, however, you want to do business with companies who have security protected websites. Look into what type of security the website provides;
5) Do not dispose of a computer hard drive without completely removing the data from the hard drive. Use a program that will completely erase data, not just the delete function.
6) Do not provide your personal information in response to any email that appears to come from your bank or a website you have shopped with. Legitimate companies will never email you to ask you for this information. Also, do not visit their website via a questionable email link. Always manually enter their website name into your browser and then proceed to log in on their verified web page;
7) If you use programs that share, swap or download files or programs, be very careful that they are not illegal or sharing your personal data. These can also expose your computer to other users. Only advanced internet users should use this type of program.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 26th, 2008 at 7:29 am and is filed under Articles Concerning Identity Theft. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.