(Newswire.net — March 22, 2021) —
Every single year, there are countless reports that appear about online scams, identity theft, data breaches and more. Financial scams are more common now than ever, leading to countless victims. Unfortunately, the development of technology just made it easier for the fraudsters to scam people. Billions of dollars are stolen every single year.
The good news is you can do many things to protect yourself. Check out the tips below to help you make smart financial choices and avoid being scammed.
Don’t Wire Money To Strangers
There is a really big possibility you received at least one email from someone claiming to be wealthy and that asks for a bank wire so you can receive a huge return of hundreds of thousands or even millions. This is one of the oldest of all the online financial scams. Even so, people still end up being tricked.
The golden rule is to never wire any money to someone that you do not know. It is almost impossible to reverse most of these transactions and money cannot really be traced.
Never Give Out Your Financial Information
Sensitive financial information should never be given to a business or person if you do not want such information to be known. Also, never offer everything, no matter how legit you think the request it if it comes online. Obviously, you could offer some financial information to credit unions and similar businesses but the general rule of thumb is to not give out the information unless you do so through a highly-secured channel. An email is not a secured channel.
Do Not Click Email Hyperlinks
Speaking about email, never click on a link inside an email. This is especially the case when you are requested to log in to an account from the email or submit some financial documents/information. Hackers are specialists at making it seem as if the email comes from a legit institution.
Remember that financial companies never ask you to submit personal details or banking details. Whenever someone asks for such information, you are most likely looking at a scam attempt.
Use Really Good Passwords
Way too many use passwords like “password” and “1234”. Hackers use complex software that easily cracks the really simple passwords. This includes names, dates and all common words. It is really important that the passwords you create are over 8 characters long. Then, you need to include both upper case and lower case letters, special characters and numbers.
As an extra tip, be sure that you have a different password for every single financial account you have. Then, use software like RoboForm that saves your very complex passwords. This drastically increases the security of your account.
Install Computer Protection Software
The last thing you absolutely need to do is to install both a spyware protection program and an antivirus program. These help you to protect all the important financial information that you have on your computer. Make sure that you choose software that includes a firewall since this helps keep countless malicious attempts away.