Expert tips for keeping your information safe while you shop online

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As we approach major holidays, with Black Friday and Cyber Monday right around the corner and a massive increase in shopping for the Christmas season, we can count the breaches and total personally identifiable information records lost in the billions.

According to Cyber Defense Magazine, someone loses their identity to a breach every two seconds. Every American has had an identity theft event happen in their life more than once by the time they reach the age of 30. There are over 25 billion records stolen on the internet as of today. Most of them include personally identifiable information such as names, addresses, credit cards, emails, phone numbers, and passwords, and many have medical records information in them.

With major holidays and an increase in online shopping, cybercrime isn’t going away—it’s huge. In fact, it’s now the biggest form of crime worldwide, surpassing drug crime. Cybercrime is estimated to account for over $7 trillion in theft and damages by 2021.

So, with identity theft on the rise and privacy disappearing, cyber hackers and criminals love the holidays: There’s a surge in debit and credit card usage; there are more packages for “porch pirates” to steal; and online shopping is easily turned into a cybercrime honeypot.

Now is the most important time to understand the latest threats and to be vigilant. This is your chance to help halt hackers on the holidays. With that said, here are my top 10 expert tips to help you enjoy the Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping experiences without losing your privacy and identity or putting your children’s safety at risk.

1. Understand Email Security Basics

In an email phishing attack, you’ll receive a hyperlink that, if you click it, installs malware. Or there’ll be an attachment with a name you think you can trust, but if you try to open the attachment, you’ll also get infected.

Don’t trust any hyperlinks or attachments in emails unless you’re 100 percent certain you can trust the source.

2. Learn to Guard Against Even More Sophisticated Spear Phishing Attacks

Every day, there’s a cybercriminal somewhere in the world looking to…

Read the entire story with all of my top ten tips exclusively at The Epoch Times by clicking here…

Source:  Gary S. Miliefsky, Publisher of Cyber Defense Magazine and exclusively on assignment to The Epoch Times