How to Be Safe When Shopping Online

In recent years, people believed that sending your credit card information through the internet was the kiss of death for your identity. People were unsure of what type of untrustworthy character was on the other end receiving personal information, or who might be hacking through your modem to pluck your credit card info for their own evil purposes.

In truth, however, online shopping is really one of the safest ways to make purchases and pay bills. Merchant online checkouts use safe and secure servers that incorporate coded data transfer that is hack-proof. Most transactions are automated without a person ever reading your information at all. And you are given a printable transaction verification, which you could even save as a file on your computer.

But even though shopping online is safe, there are still some things to watch out for and ways you can assure that your private information remains private.

Avoid “phishing” emails

Be wary of phishing emails that are out to steal your credit or other private information. Phishing emails are usually disguised as an official-looking email from a bank or other reputable institution that requests your private information.

For instance, if you have a PayPal account, it is likely you may have received an email that looked like it originated from PayPal, but was actually a scam. The email usually states that there was a “problem with their server” and you need to resend your credit card information “to verify their data.” In actuality, the email was not from PayPal, but a wolf in sheep’s clothing created to make you feel safe in sending your private information.

In reality, no honest merchant will ever request your private credit card or social security information via email. Always logon to your account, or create a new account, with a merchant before ever sending them your credit card information.

Use only secure servers

When shopping online, a merchant usually uses a type of “shopping cart” software that allows you to ‘place’ items or services in your ‘cart’ and ‘checkout’ when you are ready to make a financial transaction.

These shopping card database applications are designed to be tremendously safe in retrieving and storing your information, but there is a key to know when it is safe. When you shop online and are ready to make a purchase or pay a bill, always look for the “secure server” that looks like: https:// before the web address. The “s” is a signifier that the server they are using to retrieve your financial info is secure and uses only encoded data to send information back and forth. The encoded data makes it impossible for hackers to view or decode the information as it is being sent.

Use prepaid credit cards

Another way to make shopping safe online is to simply purchase a prepaid credit card. A prepaid credit card acts similar to a debit card, as it can only be used up to the amount you prepay into the account.

You could open a prepaid credit card with $50 or $100, use it to make purchases, and then simply destroy the card. Each card has its own unique number, and therefore, if the information is ever stolen, it cannot be traced back to you, nor can the thief use the card when the balance is gone.

Shopping online is a convenient way to make purchases and pay bills. But even with beefed up security from merchants and service providers, it is always a good idea to take the extra step to be careful with your private information.

Write to Grace Carter at grace@creditdonkey.com

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