NEVER Share These Details Online!
Author: Nichlaus O.
Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit are the most popular social media sites today with a combined user base of billions of people. Your public social media profiles are the easiest ways scammers and hackers collect your personal detail and slowly build a profile of who you are. You may not realize it, but any personal information you share online could be used against you by scammers.
Why Shouldn’t You Share Personal Information Online?
Whether you know it or not, putting your personal information online endangers you, your co-workers, neighbors and family. They can be targeted by scammers, hackers, and home robbers. Be very careful about where and with whom you share the below information.
ID, Passport and Social Security
Any documents that identify you are not for public consumption. This is the kind of information that helps scammers/hackers steal your identity or target you with a tailor-made scam.
Social engineering tactics use your name, date of birth and location to create a profile of who you are even if there is no photo of you. This information is useful to identity thieves and scammers to know who they are dealing with and how to swindle you.
Banking and Payment Details
Your credit card number, bank account information and available balance shouldn’t be shared recklessly. The payments you make can reveal to scammers your financial information. Keep that to yourself.
Passwords & PIN numbers
Your login usernames and passwords are just that, yours. They are not public information and shouldn’t be shared even with friends and family. Additionally, PINs and One Time Passwords (OTPs) are never to be shared with others under any circumstance. Doing so can give strangers access to your accounts and even enable them to withdraw or transfer money from your bank accounts.
Home Address and Phone Numbers
Your address and phone number should be strongly guarded when you are online. Scammers can misuse your information for their many aliases to scam people while their details point to you.
Location Information
Active location data is the one you post or share by yourself, indicating where you are or wish to go. Passive location data is collected by your apps in the background as long as you allow that setting/or turn location ON.
Avoid using the social apps as much as possible. Instead, use your browser to access the socials. Or, change the app settings/permissions to prevent location data from being collected and sent.
Regular Routes to Work and Hangout Places
The streets and means you use to get to work and back home shouldn’t be aired on social media. This way, anyone who may want to track you down doesn’t just get that information easily and for free. The same goes for clubs and places that you hangout often like coffee shops.
Work Complaints and Rants
Let your work issues with fellow employees and your boss be restricted to channels like work emails and calls. Do not go posting them on the socials whether in good or bad light.
Avoid criticizing your current workplace or any other place you worked. It is unprofessional behavior that tarnishes your work colleagues’ reputation and can ruin your employment prospects with other companies.
Privileged or Confidential Information
Whenever you leave a closed-door meeting in which information exchanged is not for the public, it is just a clever move to keep it to yourself. Avoid boasting online about how privileged you are to know what is kept from the public. You make yourself a target for anyone needing that information.
Self-Incriminating Evidence
A chilling story on the news about a couple who pranked their kids, recorded the video, then uploaded it on YouTube is our cautionary tale here. The parent got carried away in their prank and ended up losing custody of 2 children.
A common fad today is making TikTok videos. Some people make videos of themselves drinking and driving, which is a traffic offence in almost every country in the world. It is also funny that some employees who called in sick post photos of themselves partying that same day on social media. As soon as your employer finds this out, you may be out of a job!
Vacation Plans
You may want to keep from bragging online about the exotic holiday destinations you plan to visit. This is because you let everyone who knows where you live that you will not be at home. Burglars have an easy time cleaning out your place when they have this information.
Be Careful With What You Share Online
Be careful on public Wi-Fi in cafes and libraries. Avoid doing your credit card purchases, wire transfers and other financial transactions on public internet spaces. These may have vulnerabilities that expose your data to hackers.
Whenever you sell or give away your computer, phone or tablet, make sure you remove any data that can be used against you like your emails, phone personal contacts, work and banking information and documents.
When transacting money from any of your devices, make sure you are only transacting with people or organizations that you trust.
Report a Scam!
Have you fallen for a hoax, bought a fake product? Report the site and warn others!
Scam Categories
Help & Info
Popular Stories
As the influence of the internet rises, so does the prevalence of online scams. There are fraudsters making all kinds of claims to trap victims online - from fake investment opportunities to online stores - and the internet allows them to operate from any part of the world with anonymity. The ability to spot online scams is an important skill to have as the virtual world is increasingly becoming a part of every facet of our lives. The below tips will help you identify the signs which can indicate that a website could be a scam. Common Sense: Too Good To Be True When looking for goods online, a great deal can be very enticing. A Gucci bag or a new iPhone for half the price? Who wouldn’t want to grab such a deal? Scammers know this too and try to take advantage of the fact. If an online deal looks too good to be true, think twice and double-check things. The easiest way to do this is to simply check out the same product at competing websites (that you trust). If the difference in prices is huge, it might be better to double-check the rest of the website. Check Out the Social Media Links Social media is a core part of ecommerce businesses these days and consumers often expect online shops to have a social media presence. Scammers know this and often insert logos of social media sites on their websites. Scratching beneath the surface often reveals this fu
So the worst has come to pass - you realise you parted with your money too fast, and the site you used was a scam - what now? Well first of all, don’t despair!! If you think you have been scammed, the first port of call when having an issue is to simply ask for a refund. This is the first and easiest step to determine whether you are dealing with a genuine company or scammers. Sadly, getting your money back from a scammer is not as simple as just asking. If you are indeed dealing with scammers, the procedure (and chance) of getting your money back varies depending on the payment method you used. PayPal Debit card/Credit card Bank transfer Wire transfer Google Pay Bitcoin PayPal If you used PayPal, you have a strong chance of getting your money back if you were scammed. On their website, you can file a dispute within 180 calendar days of your purchase. Conditions to file a dispute: The simplest situation is that you ordered from an online store and it has not arrived. In this case this is what PayPal states: "If your order never shows up and the seller can't provide proof of shipment or delivery, you'll get a full refund. It's that simple." The scammer has sent you a completely different item. For example, you ordered a PlayStation 4, but instead received only a Playstation controller. The condition of the item was misrepresented on the product page. This could be the
