To help you maintain a certain level of privacy on social media sites, here are some tips:
- Please read Terms and Conditions carefully. It is a bit difficult and time-consuming task, but at least have a look.
- Go through privacy settings in your account. Don’t rely on default settings.
- Stop clicking on useless posts like “Check your death day”, “Find which celebrity do you look like” and so on.
- Install a good antivirus software in your laptop and phone.
- Turn off your location. Some sites even keep track of your activities in the offline world, but turning off location will at least do the least possible loss.
- Do not forget to set up Security Answers.
- Never leave your account logged in. You are in a way inviting cyber criminals to hack your account or act as an impostor.
- Always check and analyze your post before posting. Try not to put too much revealing photos online.
- Always try to create strong password for a site and try to change it in regular interval of time. Never ever set same passwords for multiple sites.
Below is the list of few security threats that you might face in social media accounts:
Most social networking sites have information like Birthday or Email address. Hackers can hack your email account by using social information and can have access to all the information he/she wants. You don’t need to hide all information. You just need to take the following precautions:
-Always set strong passwords. Don’t go for the easy passwords built using your Birthday or child’s name etc. i.e., from the information that is easily accessible from the social media account.
-Do not reveal too much information in a post. Be careful with what you post online. For example, if I write “Happy Mother’s Day “Lisa Money Cardholder.” Now you see someone can guess an answer to a security question “What is your Mother’s Maiden Name?”. This how it works for the thieves to get information by just analyzing your posts. They get so much information that they can even compromise your account.
-Do not reveal your location. Try to keep the location section either blank or set it to a false location.
-Do not use social media accounts from untrusted devices and networks in hotels, cafés, hospitals etc.
-Do not elect to remember passwords for social media accounts when offered by web browsers.
With the advent of Social Media like Twitter, there comes URL Shorteners in picture. Twitter allows a post to be maximum of 280 characters. Thus limiting the size and amount of information that can be shared. Shortened URL’s can trick users into visiting harmful sites since full URL’s are not visible. It is best to keep the following points in mind before clicking on shortened URL to avoid being hacked.
-Before clicking a link, place the cursor on the shortened URL. This will show the complete URL and will give you an idea about where the full URL actually points.
Avoid posting too many details online. Will you ever stand in the middle of a crowd and shout where you are going on a vacation? So why post all the details of your trip on social media? You are clearly giving your house keys to burglars. Try to take following precautions while posting any information online:
-Avoid posting specific travel plans and itinerary. Never mention exact date and time.
-Never post photos during the trip. Try to post photos after your return home from the vacation.
-Try to stay offline during vacation.
-Use the highest privacy controls to let only selective groups like family, selected friends to view your status updates and photos.
Every time we visit a website, it puts invisible markers which we call Cookies in technical terms in our computer. The job of these cookies is to track the user activity as you navigate from one site to another. This is the reason we are able to see the advertisements of our interest on the new page that we open. Cookies are the major loophole in the entire secure scenario. Some sites provide an option to opt out of the tracking feature, but if you don’t get that option, please be careful to clear the cache and the cookies on your browser regularly.
Wheatland Federal Credit Union cares about your security and non-public personal information.
When/If corresponding with your credit union through social media please do not divulge any personal information. Call your credit union instead. Never use your account number, any type of dispute, services being used or other private account information. Also, never ask for a service to be completed during a conversation on social media.
Try to achieve Private and Secure Social Media Accounts.