While there are many fraudulent activities both online and off line occurring throughout the world, a couple that can be avoided will be mentioned here. First and foremost, always protect your information online! If purchasing anything, products, classified ads, etc, online, ALWAYS make sure the page requesting your credit card information is secure: look for the little closed lock at the bottom of the page. If it isn't there, or you receive a message from your pc telling you the site isn't secure, do not enter your critical data. Instead, contact the webmaster, customer service, or someone associated with the web site and tell them as much as you can about the security breach you discovered. Never, never send your credit card or other critical information through email as your email is NOT a secured transmission.
Another common, unscrupulous method used to try and collect your information is called "phishing". In this case, you will receive an email that appears to be from a legitimate company. It may be a bank, lending institution, store, or even PayPal. Even the URLs for the links appear legitimate. Often the message is some kind of "account alert" where the message requests that you go and change your password, or something similar. Unfortunately, when clicking on the link, you are redirected to a site that appears legitimate, but it's NOT! You are now on a fraudulent site and if you enter your login information, you've just supplied the crooks with the ability to access your account! I just got one of these emails recently from, what appeared to be, PayPal. I may actually have responded and clicked on one of the links, however, what stopped me was the fact that the email address it had been sent to is not one I've ever used with PayPal. Instead, I copied all the information, manually entered the PayPal URL into the address box of my web browser, and emailed the information all to PayPal. Most sites like that have an email you can use to send information on suspected fraudulent activity to. You may have to go to "Contact" information first and look around for it. These "phishers" are very good at what they do. They use the big bank names, and of course, PayPal. Beware, and be aware and protect yourself! Paypal and most other businesses will tell you that they don't send out email notices like this. Be very cautious about all of your account passwords at all times.
Protect yourself from fraudulent activity at all times. First, be aware that your email address is always being "read" by some server somewhere and remember email is not a secure "transaction" ever. If you are contacted by a company and you suspect fraud, DON'T CLICK ON THE LINK, but instead, enter the URL or go to a bookmarked location of the company's site and investigate further. Be extremely cautious about supplying credit card, social security number, or other personal information online. Assume the worst. Actually, I have often done the majority of my Christmas shopping online. But I'm careful. I buy from companies who I've either received catalogs from for years, or have been able to establish their reputation through BizRate, Amazon, Yahoo, or some other shoppers' rating system. The rare instances where I have taken a chance on companies doing business online without any ratings - well, I've been very fortunate as they have all turned out to be wonderful, caring companies, interested in providing good products and great service.
The Internet is an astounding way of doing business. You can find just about anything online these days, which makes it a wonderful tool. Unfortunately, it can also be an astounding way of allowing people to make burglarize your important information too. Just be aware, and beware!
