There are some threats that also come with shopping online. Identity theft is one of the common frauds. So staying safe while you are shopping is a paramount.
Here are some tips for shopping safely:
- Use credit card instead of debit card and pay the bill off monthly. Credit cards offer protection from identity theft that debit cards don’t.
- Using a disposable credit card is even better than using a credit card. It works just like most gift cards. You add a specified dollar amount and use it, once it’s gone you can add more or purchase new one.
- Some online websites don’t offer secure shopping. That means savvy criminals can capture everything that you enter on these sites including your personal or credit info. While shopping online limit yourself to secure websites.
- Shop at home. If you are using a public computer you have no control over who might be using it as well.
- Many sites offer you the ability to save your credit card information on their sites to speed up the shopping process but there are some risks involved in it. If that company you are shopping with has a data breach your personal information could be at put at risk.
Online Banking – A Good Choice for the Customers
Online banking has now become the demand of almost every customer. Almost all the banks of the world are offering the different online banking services to their customers. According to a research report, the Bank of America alone has about 30 million customers who are using online banking services at their homes. This has created ease for the customers and now they can easily manage their accounts by sitting in their homes.
When someone chooses online banking services, he or she must pay proper attention while selecting their passwords. The passwords must contain both numeric and alphabetic characters. The users must also be careful while filling the online registration forms and they must select the security questions or mother’s name properly as they are not known to every one.
Different banks offer different online services to the customers. Normally these include the access to the bank account. Through this service the customers can have the complete access on their bank account. They can check the balance of their account, request the new cheque book and more importantly they can transfer the amount to other bank accounts (charges and conditions apply). In addition to this many banks offer the online utility bill payment option. The online banking is also popular as this service also sends the Mobile alerts to the customers who have provide their cell numbers and who want to avail this service.
The customers must be careful while using online services and if they are using the public compute on networking shared computer, they should be more reluctant. When the customers are using an unsecured Internet or public connection, they should notice that the firewalls on the computer are on so no one can access the account of the customers.
