For the past five years, Cyber Monday has been the marketing term for the Monday immediately following Black Friday. It is now one of the biggest online shopping days of the year, with 77% of online retailers reporting substantially increased sales. Scammers seek to take advantage of seasonal opportunities like Cyber Monday, so beware of…
Most major websites now install cookies on your computer, which track what you do online. Over time, these cookies develop a profile, which becomes your digital fingerprint, to a certain extent. You may have noticed after searching for a specific product, advertisements for that particular product or brand appearing on various other websites you visit.…
Security is all about layers of protection. The more layers that are put in place the more secure you and your family will be. For example, if you lock your doors that is one layer, but not enough. A home security system which includes an alarm, security cameras and even signage are all additional layers…
For some social networking sites, security is not a top priority. Some do not protect your data with the same vigilance you could expect from your bank, for example. Nor do social media require strong passwords. And if you use the same passwords for more critical sites, like webmail or online banking, having your social…
There have been thousands of privacy related news reports over the past year depicting social networks, Google, marketers and advertisers as evil privacy violators who are slowly sucking dry whatever privacy we have left. Facebook has been raked over the coals by advocates and watchdogs who say their tactics violate their own policies. In response,…
“Wikileak” is turning into a verb. This is when sensitive information in office document files such as Microsoft Word, Excel, Textpad, or PDF files can be easily copied, transferred, sold and leaked, all without the owning organization’s knowledge. It is easier than ever for sensitive information stored in electronic documents to be copied and publicly…
There’s dumb criminals and then there is this kid. A family was away from their home and had someone take care of some items around the house. Apparently the caretaker was doing some work on the exterior of the home and opened some shutters around a window and saw someone inside who wasn’t supposed to…
First thing I tell my seminar attendees is “The chances of anything bad ever happening to you is very slim. So don’t worry about. However you should still put these systems in place.” Are you a helicopter parent? An “alarmist”? Or Chicken Little: The sky is falling, the sky is falling! I heard somewhere along…
I rent cars all the time. I travel and need to get around so I can teach people about how scams work and how to protect themselves. Yesterday I encountered what seems like a scam but is probably just very unethical behavior on the part of Enterprise Rent a Car. Here is how it played out. I…
According to the figures released by the FBI, the estimated number of violent crimes in the Nation declined in 2009 for the third consecutive year. Property crimes also declined in 2009, marking the seventh straight year that the collective estimates for these offenses dropped below the previous year’s total. What has always bugged me about…
