Most consumers are aware of the basic steps they need to take to protect themselves from identity theft.  We are a legion of shredders, we are all aware that before we donate our magazines to our doctor’s office or recycle them, we should be very careful to remove and destroy the address labels.  Pre approval credit card offer letters are no long the innocuous annoyances that flood our mailboxes, but are potential breeding grounds for theft.  The news tells us, our neighbors tell us, our instincts tell us.  But it seems as soon as we get our wits about us, the criminals will think of a way to get to us and our private information is some way we haven’t thought of and likely won’t think of until it’s too late.  One of those new ways to garner personal information is on social networking sites such as Facebook.  So of course, now there are some very easy dos and don’ts to follow in order to keep our personal information safe on these sites.  Firstly, make sure you aren’t giving away too much information in your very user name.  First and last name and year of birth, for example is often enough information to get started stealing the rest of it.  Don’t forget that although one piece of information in and of itself might be harmless, the combination of that information with other pieces can make it much easier for a criminal to use that information to steal your identity.  Secondly, make sure to take the steps necessary to take control of the privacy of your information on your social networking site.  Make sure you don’t just accept the bare minimum of Privacy or just the privacy that the site recommends.  The site wants to do its very best to get the traffic up, to send you to their advertiser’s sites, to make sure that your information goes as far as possible, so they will never recommend a level of privacy that is in your best interest.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 17th, 2010 at 7:56 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.