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Internet Privacy Cleanups - Tips and Tricks
You should also take care to protect your internet privacy by NEVER clicking a link in your email because it states anything about "Balance Overdue",
"Order Placed", "Account Charged", "Password Required", "Account Shutdown", etc! I can't believe people continue to fall for scams like this. No business will EVER
email you a link to enter your credit card information, enter your password for verification, etc. This rule applies ALWAYS! If anything was ever
going to be shut down, like your bank account, etc., they would certainly notify you by telephone and postal mail, and you should always call their
support to verify if you have any concern. Never, ever, follow email leads that tell you that you MUST do something like enter your password and
credit card to prevent your account from being shut down or have action taken against it. This is one of the major privacy scams on the internet, and you should not fall for it. As I said, pick
up the phone and call your bank or credit card company, etc., if you have any issues, or send an email to their customer support to verify (just make
sure you aren't using a phony customer support email address listed in the fake email). I have probably received at least 1000 privacy scam emails, some
look very real and have very real looking websites, but I'm amazed that anyone would actually fall for these types of privacy scams.
If you ever get an email containing website links (where you are required to enter personal or private information), simply open a browser separately
and type in your web address or use your bookmark as you would normally do to sign on. This way you won't be fooled into hitting fake website links
in your email, and you will be sure that you went to the correct website! Also look at the URL at the top of your browser and make sure it really shows
the website you wanted to sign on too.
When browsing the internet, another thing you can do to help protect your privacy is to cleanup the files that are left behind. You may find
webpage pictures, videos, sound files, all webpage text, cookies, and various other pieces of data stored on your hard disk, basically everything you
browse or view is stored somewhere on your computer. These are easily found
by anyone else sharing your pc with you, and privacy items like this should be cleaned up. These are "cached" on your pc to make things faster when
reloading pages again, so there is a benefit why they are there, but if you have privacy concerns then it is wise to clean up at least occasionally.
Cookies can be even a bigger problem, as they can potentially
lead to targeted advertising to you, and can be used as tracking or advertising to see how often you have returned to webpage or to see what you have
been viewing. One of the more proven and well tested programs for
safely cleaning up everything is a disk cleaner program called Complete Cleanup. It will also show you how much garbage data is on your pc, and you
may be surprised what is actually left behind on your hard drive. You can get more info or a free trial on
their disk cleanup software homepage.
Other internet privacy files left on your computer include data like search engine history. Anyone can type a character in a search engine and
will often see your search terms appear in the list. Even passwords are stored on many webpages, depending upon your browser settings. Now some of these
privacy settings are great features and nice to have, especially for those who like having these terms show for easily selecting again later, so there
is a reason why these features are there. However, it can be a major privacy and security issue for those who do not want it, or share the computer
with anyone else who can easily stumble across these pictures, website links, passwords, videos, and more. (Complete Cleanup will also remove these).
Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox, Mozilla, and AOL all have options to cleanup the browser files left behind, so you also have options located there,
but this can be tedious and time consuming, not to mention many things are missed and the software removes much more.
On your start programs menu under accessories and system tools, you will find a disk scan and clean up option. You should also use this regularly to
help cleanup garbage data on your computer. It will help remove excess files and reclaim lost disk space. I would recommend using that once a month, or
at least every 3 months etc. Also run your disk defrag, it's a smart thing to do to help keep your computer and hard drive cleaned up, and it will
help keep your computer running efficiently. Computer performance improvements are always good.
Browsers all have options today for storing your passwords so they are automatically entered for you when you visit the websites. Firefox and Internet
Explorer both do this. I would recommend NOT doing this for financial or critical sites like banks, brokerages, or even your email. It's fine to use
that for all non critical sites like blogs or forums. If your computer is ever stolen or shared with someone else in your house, they may have access
by using your browser. It's always best to be safe rather then sorry.
Never, EVER fall for emails that state anything related to "you will receive money" if you cash a money order for them, or send a small sum of money (or bank account number, credit card, etc.). Ignoring
these emails that state anything similiar to this is right thing to do, and this rule applies ALWAYS. Note that many of these mails do not ask for money initially!...
they try to lead you along before attempting to get money from you later. Some even attempt to get to know you first, like through dating services where they then
say they will send you a money order or need a favor, once they have tried to gain your trust. Do NOT fall for these, simply delete any mail like this. You are asking to lose
your money if you follow up on these scams in any way, these are a security risk and be smart and take simple steps to protect your privacy.
View other security tips and tricks by visiting the main security and privacy homepage.
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