Protect Yourself Against the 7 Scams of Christmas Holiday Season 2017

As the most wonderful time of the year 2017 arrived, Christmas brought with the time of online shopping. According to the National Retail Federation, there are more than 151 million people were shopping in the store, but more than 100 million people shopped online during Cyber Monday and Black Friday sale even why it would not be that great convenience to shop online. Although, it is quite common these days that more and more people turn to shopping online instead of shopping malls to buy gifts for Christmas. However, one of the main question arises in this Christmas holiday season 2017 is that is it safe to purchase gifts online, especially when so many peoples were sharing their credit card details online. Here are few important tips that you should keep in mind before purchasing Christmas gifts online by providing your credit card information online.

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Cyber Security Tips For Online Shopping in Christmas Holiday

Do Not Try To Click on Any Suspicious Links

Usually, cyber criminals deliver malicious links which looks more legitimate than the real ones. As these links are especially of the well-known online shopping websites like Amazon, Flipkart and eBay. Thus, many online shoppers fall victim. One of the safest way to avoid getting tricked by these obfuscated links is to refrain clicking on the links provided through social networking websites and emails arrived from unknown sources.

Keep Your Eye on New Online Shopping Portals

In most of the cases, people love to purchase gifts and other goods from new online shopping websites because they generally provide attractive deals, coupons, discounts and offers. However, you should always be safe from such new vendors as sometimes shoppers are trapped and exploited by the hackers easily. Never rely totally on the reviews of seller or company because in most of the cases, they provides fake customer reviews.

Use Strong Passwords Instead Weaker Ones

This is considered as one of the most important suggestion for online security, but the peoples do not intend to use it. You should always avoid using easy to crack passwords for your online shopping or banking websites. You can use the combination of both upper and lower case letters, special characters, number in your password. Avoid using the most common passwords like 123456, your name or password. Most importantly, do not use the same passwords for multiple websites.

Always Use HTTPS Secured Websites For Online Shopping

Before providing your confidential banking or other information online, you need to make sure that the domain you arrived is a secure portal or not. Meanwhile, the secured web pages have a closed padlock in the status bar and their URL address starts with HTTPS, which means the website have SSL verified authenticity and entire communication of that portal is encrypted. So, no you can gather your personal or sensitive data and misuse it for gaining illegal profits.

Do Not Provide Your Personal Details To Every Site You Visit

There are several online stores which provides an option for the customers to check out just as a one time customer. In case, if you are not shopping regularly from any commercial websites, then you should avoid filling unnecessary information in order to remain safe and secure from any type of online scams. Moreover, it is highly suggested to log off from the retailer’s portal right after making any purchase.

Avoid Using Debit Cards Instead Use Credit Cards

Just for online shopping purposes, it is always considered to use credit card which is comparatively better option rather than using your debit card. In case, if anyone manages to intercept your important financial data online, then they can do less damage, because credit cards have spending limits but the debit cards don’t. Even you can make use of a virtual credit card that are especially designed for online shopping only.

Check Your Bank Statements Frequently

Nowadays, most of the banks allow for setting up email notifications for any transaction using credit card. If you notice any changes that are unusual, then they have to get reported and suitable actions must be taken which is needed to get a prompt refund. So, there are always considered to be the smarter options in order to adapt than to become a victim.