With the popularity of online retailers skyrocketing, protecting personal information while shopping online has become very important.  The number of consumers who have personal information stolen online grows each year and the amount of money lost to the thieves total in the millions of dollars annually.  Consumers need take steps to protect their personal information while on the internet and following these tips will reduce their risk of having their identity stolen.

Identity thieves continue to find new ways to obtain personally identifying information and credit card numbers.  Many of the tactics used are hard to identify as a scam and closely match legitimate services.  Because the payoff for the effort can be very large, these thieves put a lot of time, effort, and money into creating methods to get people to divulge personal information.  Individuals that are not paying attention can easily fall for these tricks without ever realizing what happened.

Email Scams

When using credit card numbers and personal information online, there are a few things to keep in mind to keep this information safe.  One important thing to keep in mind is that no company asks for personal information or credit card information in an email.  Most legitimate companies will only ask for credit card information when a purchase is made and no company requires a social security number to create an account.  If any of this information is requested by email, it is almost certain that the email is an attempt by a scammer to obtain your personal information.

The most common email scams duplicate emails sent from popular companies, such as Paypal, eBay, or Chase Bank.  The fake emails look like notifications and receipts that these websites email to individuals that have used their services.  There is typically a link in the email for the person to enter their account password and provide additional personal information.  This information is transmitted directly to the scammer’s computer for use in any way that they desire.

To avoid becoming a victim of this scam, never provide account or credit card information to any company by clicking a link in an email.  It is much more secure to go directly to the website using the URL associated with the company to see if there are any alerts attached to the account.  Most companies provide account holders with a copy of emails sent to them stored in a particular area of the account.  If the email does not show up in the inbox of the account on the website, that is a good indication that the email was fraudulent.


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